This article begins with a discussion of power-sharing institutions in terms of their short- and long-term implications, examining the possible lack of fit between power sharing as an incentive to reach agreements during the negotiation phase while proving a source of conflict during the longer-term consolidation phase. In the next section, I analyse Africa's real world experiences with power sharing, looking at the details of experiments in the 1990s after civil wars. I then discuss the question of reassuring weaker parties, linking the search for increased political, economic and strategic security during the negotiation phase with the changed circumstances that prevailed during the consolidation phase. Finally, in the conclusion, I probe the anticipated and unanticipated consequences that may follow from the adoption of power-sharing systems in Africa.