Suchergebnisse

The book describes a new form of communitarian politics on the African continent, that is able to take seriously both individual entitlements and communitarian obligations. This is achieved by proposing a thin version of communitarianism that realizes the organic relationship between individuals and the community.

4. Political parties in consensusIntroduction; Problems with political parties; Consensus as a non-party polity; Is a non-party a one-party?; Conclusion; 5. African aspirations, democracy and African democracy; Introduction; Africa; Socio-politico-cultural reality; Purpose of democracy; African aspirations and democracy; Beyond consensus and majoritarianism; Conclusion; Conclusion; Bibliography; Index; Back cover

Some philosophers on the African continent and beyond are convinced that consensus, as a polity, represents the best chance for Africa to fully democratise. In Consensus as Democracy in Africa, Bernard Matolino challenges the basic assumptions built into consensus as a social and political theory. Central to his challenge to the claimed viability of consensus as a democratic system are three major questions: Is consensus genuinely superior to its majoritarian counterpart? Is consensus itself truly a democratic system? Is consensus sufficiently different from the one-party system? In taking up these issues and others closely associated with them, Matolino shows that consensus as a system of democracy encounters several challenges that make its viability highly doubtful. Matolino then attempts a combination of an understanding of an authentic mode of democracy with African reality to work out what a more desirable polity would be for the continent.

In classical African communitarianism, individual rights have
tended to be accorded a secondary status to the good of the community.
What is prioritised are the duties and obligations the individual has to
the whole as opposed to the entitlements one can expect to derive from
a community qua individual. I seek to show that this view, by its own
standards and assumptions, is erroneous in framing rights as secondary
to the good of the community. I attempt to show that individual rights
are an inherent component of classical African communitarian accounts.
Further, I seek to argue for a non-communalist view of African communitarianism
which takes into full account the multiple factors that constitute
modern African communities. Such a view, I suggest, will avoid the
unnecessary dichotomisation of rights which has become synonymous
with the classical African communitarian account.

Abstract
The disagreement over what was responsible for arriving at consensual positions, in traditional African polities, is best captured in the classic debate between Kwasi Wiredu and Emmanuel Eze. The former holds that rational persuasion was the sole informant of decision-making while the latter argues that non-rational factors played a crucial role in securing a consensual decision. If Wiredu is correct then consensus could work in modern society as it can be argued that it does not rely on traditionalistic scaffoldings. If, on the other hand, Eze is correct, then consensus cannot work in modern largely urbanised Africa as its traditional underpinnings have largely disappeared. While Emmanuel Ani's intervention in this debate is welcome for its earnest search for a system that could work, his support for Eze is not bold enough to undermine Wiredu's rationalistic orientation in consensus.

Africa's current democratic outlook is a relic of the crowning vestige bequeathed by the colonial metropolis as a sign of the African's attainment of political freedom. As if to suggest that at the occasion of the attainment of that freedom, the African had become human, the metropolis demanded that formerly colonised territories had to democratise. This democratisation had to be of the same hue as of the metropolis. A particular aspect of Western democracy that has been deemed problematic on the African continent is its adversarial form crystallised by open and vicious competition for power between political parties. First to reject this party-polity were the first generation of African leaders. Disastrously for them, both their theories and practices were to be discredited, and as the personae fell so did their theories. The prominent African philosopher Kwasi Wiredu has led a sustained onslaught on the party-polity. He has attempted to show that this polity has several problems including that it is a poor version of democracy as well as that its structures promote considerable harm in the form of unb ridled competition for power, which all result in exclusionary politics. In the process of arguing for a more inclusive polity, consensual democracy, Wiredu has set his sights on outlining the precise nature of how such a polity is more democraticwhile at the same time shunning party politics. What I seek to do here is to present an assessment of some of Wiredu's arguments in support of consensus as a non-party polity. I wish to argue that the attempt of doing away with party politics is not very compelling. I also wish to show why those who read Wiredu's position as a return to a one-party state should receive a sympathetic hearing.