In a struggle to rediscover their identity beyond colonialism, Africans have sought to find a philosophy, which characterises their unique identity, beyond the anthropological horizons and Eurocentric perspectives of humanity, imposed upon them by the colonisers who defaced the personhood of an African. In this process, African philosophers have discovered that at the core of African philosophy is communitarianism philosophy. Thus, the personhood of an African is constituted by communal reality, which is influenced by communalism and communitarianism. In making a distinction between the two forms of communitarianism – radical communitarianism and moderate communitarianism – this article makes a case for moderate communitarianism as an essential contributor to the formation of an African identity.
Moderate communitarianism engenders an understanding, which takes the individuality of a person seriously, and locating that individual within a community which influences his/her identity; thus involving an integration of individual thought and communal tradition. Thereby, recognizing the dialectic of both the individual thought and communal tradition. Individual thought confirmed by insights that were a production of individual ingenuity and communal thought is known to be the concepts that are derived from traditional knowledge, and the moderation of both accounts for a balanced form of communitarianism, through the dialectic of both individual and community, which contributes to the formation of an African identity. Moderate communitarianism reflects the accurate thought of African philosophy, and accounts for a common feature within the diversity of different African communities. Therefore, moderate communitarianism is an essential contributor to the formation of an African identity!
It has become axiomatic to say, ‘do not throw out the baby with the bathwater with the Baby’, particularly within the discussion of ideas – whether to integrate or refute old or new ideas within the philosophical landscape, perhaps also the theological landscape, as the theological discipline is important for understanding identity, even African identity. Bediako (
In a world that has been characterised by individualism,
African philosophy is generally defined as arising from a thought pattern, which is communal; therefore, African folk philosophy is a mediation of the thinking from the whole society, even though there may be key thinkers in the community, such as reputed sages, who are known for their wisdom; however, although these sages were individual thinkers, they also developed their wisdom by engaging with the community, and this dialectic gave birth to the African philosophy.
This philosophy came to be defined as communitarianism; hence, the communitarian concept of a person is considered as a standard view by many African thinkers. This view is predicated on the argument that personhood is constituted by communal reality as opposed to the Western view defined by unrestricted individual autonomy.
Thus, according to Menkiti (
[
Moreover, Menkiti (
Both these concepts have their roots in the idea of a community: the idea of people living together as a group in a specific location and sharing some commonalities of history, ideology, belief system, values, lineage, kinship, or political system. Both concepts seem to emphasize, in various degrees, the normative idea that the community has some kind, degree, or level of moral or logical priority over the individual. (p. 1)
Moreover, to avoid confusion between these two concepts, Ikuenobe (
Communalism, for some, describes an informal sociological or anthropological phenomenon regarding a group of people living together and sharing common values and lineage or kinship. Such a group may or may not have a formal political or governmental structure that is based on such values or lineage. This idea may be contrasted with communitarianism, which describes for some, a formal or governmental structure and system in which people live together as a group, in virtue of sharing overriding set of moral, social, and political values or principles. The fundamental idea behind communitarianism, especially in the political sense, involves an affirmation of the logical or moral priority of the community or its interests over those of individuals with respect to issues involving public policies. (p. 2)
Such a distinction is interesting in a sense that it shows there are commonalities between these two concepts, and also there are differences only with regard to the context in which each of these terms are used – the former is an informal orientation, whereas the latter is a formal orientation. Thus, because both these concepts have a common root in the idea of a community, this article uses both terms interchangeably as denoting the same idea, but mostly uses the term communitarianism. This article explores the idea that the right understanding of communitarianism takes the individuality of a person seriously in its articulation of communitarianism, and this position is referred to as moderate communitarianism. It is contrasted with radical communitarianism which, to some extent, ignores individual autonomy expressed through the ingenuity and creativity of the individual in its philosophical reflections.
One of the key proponents of moderate communitarianism is Gyekye (
Moderate communitarianism was the result of an extreme or an ‘unbalanced’ view of communitarianism, which was considered radical because it did not acknowledge the rational autonomy of an individual in the construction of a community, and this undermining of the individual destroyed individual potential.
Morality in African cultures is, for the most part, communal, because moral principles and moral thoughts are fundamentally predicated on human well-being in the context of communal needs and interests. However, Ikuenobe (
Therefore, the needs and interests of the individual must also be considered as important and integrated into the formation of common norms, as they contribute to the well-being of everybody in the community. Thus, this article presents both positions of radical communitarianism and moderate communitarianism through the descriptions of its key proponents and evaluates both these positions in light of the African experience in determining which position makes an accurate philosophic reflection of an African experience. Therefore, this article presents both the position of radical communitarianism and moderate communiteranism; however, it also makes a strong case for moderate communitarianism as the essential contributor to African identity!
One of the key proponents of this school of thought is Tempels (
There is a sense that radical communitarianism is based on the assumption that an individual is a person only if she/he belongs to a community and adheres to the rules and rituals of that community. Mbiti (
According to Mbiti (
Indeed, this sense of kinship binds together the entire life of the ‘tribe’, and is even extended to cover animals, plants and non-living objects through the ‘totemic’
Kinship allows individuals to identify with everybody belonging to the community, and so everybody is related, and this connection is likened to family members. Mbiti (
These are, as their names imply, ‘alive’ in the memories of their surviving families and are thought to be still interested in the affairs of the family to which they once belonged in their physical form. Moreover, the ‘African concept of the family also includes the unborn members who are still in the loins of the living’ (Mbiti
Man’s ontology is derived from the existence of the community; hence, Mbiti (
He owes his existence to other people, including those of past generations and his contemporaries. He is simply part of the whole. Mbiti (
The community must therefore make, create or produce the individual, for the individual depends on the corporate group. Physical birth is not enough: the child must go through rites of incorporation so that it becomes fully integrated into the entire society. (p. 141)
Menkiti (
[
These social rules are introduced to individuals at every stage of their lives. Thus, according to Mbiti (
These rites continue throughout the physical life of the person, during which the individual passes from one stage of corporate existence to another. The final stage is reached when he dies and even then he is ritually incorporated into the wider family of both the dead and the living … Only in terms of other people does the individual become conscious of his own being, his own duties, his privileges and responsibilities. (p. 141)
Therefore, the individual is only an ‘it’ until it has been incorporated through the rites and rituals of the community. The problem with the ‘it’ status of an individual, which characterises the unborn and the dead, is that it confuses the whole description of attaining personhood because such a phenomenon has to present the degree to which the ‘it’ status of the unborn differs from the ‘it’ status of the dead.
To make a point, Menkiti (
[
Later on, Menkiti (
Further, Menkiti (
Thus, according to Menkiti (
[
To be born does not automatically afford one the opportunity – or the privilege – to be a person according to the radical views of communitarianism, as Menkiti (
Thus, it is not enough to have before us the biological organism, with whatever rudimentary psychological characteristics as seen as attaching to it. We must also conceive of this organism as going through a long process of social and ritual transformation until it attains the full complement of Excellencies seen as truly definitive of man. And during this long process of attainment, the community plays a vital role as catalyst and as prescriber of norms. (p. 172)
Mbiti’s (
[
Therefore, according to Ikuenobe (
Moral principles in African cultures function as semantic and epistemic criteria. They are predicated on the attempt to address the fundamental question, ‘what ought
Thus, ‘it is in rootedness in an ongoing human community that the individual comes to see himself as man’ (Menkiti
One of the key drivers of this ‘movement’ of moderate communitarianism is Gyekye (
[
In his defence of moderate communitarianism, Gyekye (
The most appropriate type of relation that should exist between the individual and society has been an intractable problem for social and political philosophy. The problem arises because we believe, on one hand, that the individual human being has autonomy, freedom, and dignity – values that are considered most worthwhile and ought therefore to be respected by the society; we believe, on the other hand, that the individual not only is a natural member of the human society but needs society and all that it makes available for the realization of the individual’s potential, and for living a life that is most worthwhile. (p. 35)
It is interesting to notice that moderate communitarianism – when contrasted with radical communitarianism, which begins its focus on the community and afterwards, perhaps, considers the individual – begins by focussing on the individual and what he/she possesses outside being part of the community, as Gyekye has noted above that the individual possesses characteristics of autonomy, freedom and dignity, and he adds to this by noting that, ‘questions raised by intellectuals, especially the moral and political philosophers amongst them, relate, in this connection, to the metaphysical and moral status of a person (or self)’ (Gyekye
Gyekye (
[
Therefore, moderate communitarianism takes into consideration the potential of individuals because it is the individuals that make up the community, and, realistically speaking, any idea in its primal form is a construction of an individual, although through mediation with other members of the community, it is developed and eventually adopted as a norm that belongs to the community. Thus, moderate communitarianism involves an integration of individual and communal thought. Communal thought is known to be the concepts that are derived from traditional knowledge, and individual thought is confirmed by insights that were a production of individual ingenuity. Wiredu (
There is a recognition that among the traditional folks of Africa uninfluenced by modern education, there are genuine philosophers, people capable of fundamental reflection on man and the world. Such people are able to subject the folk philosophies of their own communities to criticism and modification. Earlier students of African traditional philosophy do not seem to have noted the existence of this class of traditional thinkers; they seem to have only sought information as to the folk worldviews of various African peoples. And as far as they were concerned, all those who gave them information were simply ‘informants’. The information they gathered in this way, without further ado, was labelled ‘African philosophy’, and this is largely responsible for the impression that African philosophy is a monolithic body of non-argumentative communal beliefs, and nothing else. (p. 95)
Wiredu (
Therefore, according to Wiredu (
There is an intimate relation between the thought of the individual, traditional sage-philosophers and the communal world outlook of their people. The communal philosophy provides the point of departure for the sage-philosopher. It provides, in fact, his philosophical education and must, in many ways, determine his theoretical options. On the other hand, a little reflection must show that the communal thought itself is the pooling together of these elements of the thought of the individual philosophers of the community that remain stuck in the common imagination. (p. 96)
In this line of thought, Gyekye (
[
The above statement already proves that Gyekye (
What is common in these two schools of thought is ‘the fact that the individual human being is born into an existing community first’, and according to Gyekye (
[
However, this must not be interpreted as suggesting that because the individual is born into a community, then his personhood should be derived from the community; hence, Gyekye (
‘One tree does not constitute a forest’. That is to say, for there to be a forest, there will have to be several individual trees … Although communities can vary in size, not even the smallest is constituted by only one individual. A community emerges, that is, comes into existence, according to the proverb, with the congregation of several individuals: the priority of the individual,
The individual ontology or philosophy concerned with the nature of being must have pre-eminence over the ontology of the community not only because the community is made of individuals who are autonomous but also because individuals seem to survive in any environment, and because our world is constituted by many different communities, that one individual is able to adapt to any given situation. Thus, Gyekye (
People are therefore members of many different communities, different in size and operating at different levels, and are likely to develop different aspects of their sociality in the various communities. Consequently, a person’s well-being may be tied up with the existence of social relationships at many different levels, some of which extend far beyond her proximate community. (p. 43)
What constitutes communitarianism? Gyekye (
Communitarianism immediately sees the individual as an inherently communal being, embedded in a context of social relationships and interdependence, never as an isolated individual. Consequently, it sees the community as a reality itself – not a mere association based on a contract of individuals whose interests and ends are contingently congruent, but as a group of persons linked by interpersonal bonds … What distinguishes a community from a mere association of individuals is the sharing of an overall way of life. (p. 42)
For this community to flourish, it must allow the individuals who are part of it to exercise rational autonomy, and use their freedom to think of new ideas to contribute to the already existing community for the betterment of all individuals. Thus, rational autonomy is indispensable for a flourishing society because it allows individuals to question existing social norms to see if they are still relevant or if they have been contributing positively to the community, because some communities have been driven and characterised by social norms that treated some of the individuals without human dignity, and these norms were accepted by many on the grounds of compliance to the community’s social norms (for instance, apartheid). Therefore, it is important to highlight the place of the individual as a person in African thought, irrespective of whether that individual has been incorporated through the rites and rituals practiced in a community or not.
Nevertheless, the community must have as its goal an intention to help enhance the growth of strong individuals who are able to reason rationally, so that the community does not become abusive, for some communities could be characterised by systems that are harmful, as Gyekye (
[
It is interesting to realise that most of these imperfections in the institution of a community are a reflection of defective individual thought, which is able to persuade others to support such an immoral system.
In the same manner, the destruction of such immoral systems was begun by individuals who used their rational autonomy and challenged the immoral and unjust systems, and also challenged the other members of the community to evaluate the accepted norms of society and discard them if they were harmful to human flourishing.
Thus, the community must develop individuals with high moral standards and must also encourage individuality. Hence, ‘the community constitutes the context for the creation and development of a person’s identity. A person comes to know who she is in the context of relationships with others’ (Gyekye
In order to confirm the significance and primacy of individual ontology in African thought, Gyekye (
Hence, moderate communitarianism’s view of personhood is clearer and seemingly adequate in comparison to that of radical communitarianism; Gyekye (
Moderate communitarianism first of all considers every individual as a human being – not as an ‘it’ according to radical communitarianism – and being a human being already affords one the potential to be a person. Therefore, personhood is another level of being a human being. Hence, Gyekye (
The individual to whom the judgement ‘he is not a person’ is applied would be one whose conduct is known to the community to be generally unethical, not one who occasionally experiences moral lapses or failure of moral commitment. There is no implication, however, that an individual considered ‘not a person’ loses her rights as a human being or that she loses her citizenship or that she ceases to be an object of moral concern from the point of view of other people’s treatment of her. Only that she is not a morally worthy individual. (p. 50)
Therefore, personhood depends on the individual’s growth in character, which is reflected through the exercise of moral capacity. Every individual – whether a child or an adult – has the potential to be a person and that personhood is intrinsic in every individual, for every individual is a human being. To emphasise, no individual is an ‘it’, and an individual does not have to practice the rituals and rites set by the community for incorporation to be a person, but rather, personhood is intrinsic.
Hence, according to Gyekye (
[
And this is possible through both individual autonomy and communal practices.
Moderate communitarianism emphasises individual autonomy as a priority because, it seems that the fact that a human being is a social being is already a given; however, it is still secondary.
According to Gyekye (
Now, despite the natural sociality of the human being, which at once places him in a system of shared values and practices and a range of goals, there are, nevertheless, grounds for maintaining that a person is not fully defined by the communal or cultural structure … besides being a social being by nature, the human individual is, also by nature, other things as well. By ‘other things’, I have in mind such essential attributes of the person as rationality, having a moral sense and capacity for virtue and, hence, for evaluating and making moral judgements: all this means that the individual is capable of choice. (p. 53)
Gyekye (
If the mental feature plays any seminal role in the formation and execution of the individual’s goals and plans, as indeed it does, then it cannot be persuasively argued that personhood is
Supposedly, there is a dialectic process involved between the expression of the intrinsic, essential attributes that the individual possesses, and the influence of the community’s norms, values and practices, for the formation and execution of personhood. Let me conclude by saying that all the attributes that are necessary for transforming a human being into a person – like those already mentioned in the above quotation – already exist potentially inside every human being, hence intrinsic, and are not acquired externally. If these attributes were acquired externally, then the essence of moral capacity would diminish because people find themselves in different communities, and different communities demand compliance to different norms and this would make us resort to relativism, which is incoherent.
Thus, moderate communitarianism provides a balanced view of communitarianism in that it acknowledges both individuality and community and sees the effectiveness of both as necessary for personhood. Hence, it takes into consideration both ancient wisdom and current thinking of philosophers, as representative of individuality, and the existence of a community as it evolves, and through this mediation, personhood is formed.
According to Gyekye (
Moderate or restricted communitarianism gives accommodation to communal values as well as to values of individuality, to social commitments as well as to responsibilities to oneself. In its basic thrust and concerns, it pays due, and adequate, regard to responsibilities to the community and its members and would consider the so-called supererogatory acts as belonging to the category of moral responsibilities, though not to the detriment of individual rights whose existence and value it recognizes, or should recognize, and for a good reason. (p. 76)
Moderate communitarianism reflects the accurate thought of African philosophy and accounts for a common feature within the diversity of different African communities. Therefore, moderate communitarianism is an essential contributor to the formation of an African identity!
This article resulted from the post-doctoral research of Walter Phumzile Maqoma, under the supervision of Vhumani Magezi, in the Faculty of Theology, at the North-West University.
The author declares that he has no financial or personal relationships which may have inappropriately influenced him in writing this article.
I declare that I am the sole author of this research article.
This article followed all ethical standards for a research without direct contact with human or animal subjects.
This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors.
Data sharing is not applicable to this article as no new data were created or analysed in this study.
The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any affiliated agency of the author.
‘The term individualism refers to the tendency across a broad array of spheres – politics, religion, psychology, philosophy – to make the individual person and the individual’s fulfillment the locus of concern and measure of success’ (Dufault-Hunter
The English word ‘worldview’ finds its origin from the German term
Notwithstanding the false notion and the idea of a monolithic homogeneous society and the lack of appreciation for the multifacetedness within the African continent, there are values and a sense of humanity represented throughout the continent – North, East, South, West and in-between. To read more on the background to the Hermeneutics of Africanness, see Ngwena’s (
Matolino (
Totemic – an adjective derived from the word ‘totem’, which is defined as ‘a natural object or animal believed to have spiritual meaning and adopted as an emblem by a particular society’ (Oxford Paperback Dictionary and Thesaurus
However, Matolino (