The Philosophical Ascent of Contemporary Political Theory & Development Edicts: Quo Vadis Africa? CXXXIX, MMXV Costantinos Berhutesfa Costantinos, PhD Professor of Public Policy, School of Graduate Studies, College of Business & Economic, AAU,
[email protected] Seventh International Conference on African Development (7th ICAD) Challenges and Opportunities for Sustainable Development through Pluralistic Good Governance and Global Partnerships with African States, Jul 27-29, 2012, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, Michigan, USA, Abstract Africa heralded the birth of a new consciousness, a kind of non-identity that was based on determined bonding acts of human societal formations and not on geological precincts. More than millennia, the Axumites united into an Abyssinian kingdom, not by vouching their uniqueness but by exalting it and merging it in the new one. Today, of course, plaguing guerrilla-cum-military dictators, that openly deny and denounce the value of the rational dialogic, have isolated themselves, choosing to suppress citizens that have risen against deceit, betrayal and even treason. They shattered multi-ethnic human formations and replaced it with a series of war hawk ethnic regimes; spawning in the end, irredentist splinter groups. Philosophers from Marx and Adam Smith to contemporary pundits including Croce, McIlwain, Crowther, Azar Gat, Inglehart, Welzel, Avineri, and Birdsall have argued intelligently and scripted road maps for political change. This think piece in political theory is predicated on an analysis of pluralist societal transformation and developmentalism promoted by regimes and their Nobel Prize flaunting patriarchs, as against real politic in currency today that augurs on freedom from fear and want. It delves into the penury of ideological narratives of post-colonial regimes: developmentalism, which conformed to neither the delusionary neo-liberal camp nor the insipid venom of African Socialism. In combination with the vacuum in political theories and the resultant paradigmatic gridlock, the ills of governmentality were predicated upon the perpetuation of unbridled power. Hence, in political theory, openness of pluralistic liberalisation process can be understood as a dynamic two-way operation of generic forms on particular contents and particular contents on generic forms. Deployment of the conceptual and institutional machinery of pluralism is at the same time the representation of specific needs, interests, motivations, claims, rights and obligations by individuals and groups. Going beyond structuring or rearranging political actors and institutional activities in their spontaneous, often turbid reality, such operations should result in their transformation into transparent agency and practice within a plural political system. Key words: pluralism, developmentalism, neo-liberalism, generic vs. particular representations
Costantinos
1. Introduction Africa heralded the birth of a new consciousness, a kind of non-nationality that was based not on geographical borders and census data but on community bonding because of determined acts of human beings and historical societal formations. Almost three thousand years ago, the Axumites united into an Abyssinian kingdom, not by foreswearing their identity but by exalting and merging it in the new one, until of course colonial powers and the military-cum-aristocratic governments that replaced them started dismantling the very essence of nationalism. The new vision of an African union could lead to a process of incorporation that could be in tandem with the original vision of non-nationality and bloodthirsty nationalism, and elevate the continent to a higher ground of human interaction. Such a renaissance will indubitably spawn the liberal foundation of human interaction that could spin not only economic development but also renaissance in the arts, culture and humanism. Of course, conflicts, human poverty, and biological wealth are eternally locked in a tragic embrace in Africa. Continuing human interaction in civil strife, degradation in biological wealth and climate change, the global financial crises have become commonplace. Consequently, outsider-oriented and driven development has been a way of life for most rural Africans for at least the past thirty years. Africans have been actively encouraged by government to look to outsiders to provide the means for development. People have never been instilled with the confidence to look within themselves and their communities for positive development. More importantly, they have never been allowed to mobilise themselves for their own sustainable livelihoods. Yet popular mobilisation does occur in villages and has thrived despite many years of oppression. People will initiate and mobilise themselves for activities that provide personal and individual fulfilment; and when they are the direct beneficiaries of their actions -- religious ceremonies, traditional or cultural activities and in times of crisis. Values, attitudes, and identity within the community and with the outside world play a critical role in developing individual and community momentum for sustainable livelihoods. People’s aspirations create venues for popular participation and the material base of livelihood security in the village. People actively explore and discuss the identity systems that are the foundation for the activities in their daily lives and identify local organisations that are capable of undertaking effective planning and lobbying of local government for promoting local planning and action. To enhance a community’s vision of sustainable livelihoods, villagers must formulate community plans for activities and projects that will strengthen their livelihoods in a locally feasible manner. What do we learn from the history of political and development thought? From philosophers such as Karl Marx and Adam Smith to Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky, and tyrants such as Mussolini and Hitler; we have learnt the rise of ideologies as a vehicle to gain power; be it of the dictators or the proletariat. Many pundits including Croce, McIlwain, Crowther, Azar Gat, Inglehart & Welzel, Avineri, Birdsall, and Fukuyama in their papers Of Liberty, Freedom and Control, Reconstruction of Liberalism, The Return of Authoritarian Great Powers, Development Leads to Pluralism, The Strange Triumph of Liberal Pluralism, The Post-Washington Consensus, have argued intelligently why this happened and scripted road maps for political change. This article is designed as a 2012 dialogue starter think piece to develop consistency for an African shared vision on how Africa got here and where it should be going. As such, it explores the challenges and achievements of the African political transition and developmental changes under the microscopic analysis of earlier changes elsewhere narrated; the paper also provides pointers to where the roadmap of the discourse should lead. 1 | The Philosophical Ascent of the Contemporary politico-developmental edits
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2. Statement of the problem Beginning in the early 1990s, Africa has been experiencing a major ground swell of political changes. While the movement towards fundamental political change is remarkable, there are certain formidable challenges that will make the transition to a stable, pluralistic and pluralist system of governance very difficult. The cultural, historical, political and socio-economic conditions of the continent is not simply too conducive to the emergence of a strong pluralistic state. In this sense, the stewardship, management and administration of the reform process in Africa are marked by uniquely austere organisational-strategic issues. Even under pluralistically favourable contemporary global conditions, historical, ideological and strategic characteristics internal and external to the transition process still would exist that make the transition a costly exercise. Characteristics and problems of this sort can be identified and understood through critical, yet constructive, analysis focused on certain key elements of the reform strategy, in setting the stage for the evolution of political culture in Africa. There is no simple or immediate identification of transition strength, weaknesses, opportunities and challenges as they actually are; there is only a definition of them from a certain perspective and towards a certain resolution. An important focus of politics and development is on participation stemming from the fact that human and political development is both an individual and a collective action. It is individual because it requires people to look within themselves for the creative energy to initiate ideas for action. It is collective in that people will be more successful if they can work together for a common vision for lobbying government, local business and more importantly for sharing resources. When it comes to development, local people may not always feel that they are the direct beneficiaries, or they may feel that the means to affect a change in their communities are beyond their reach. This is because of fear of the unknown, suspicion and lack of the logic of collective action, ownership issues and poor local leadership, difficulties with unequal input to activities when action becomes collective, lack of time to devote to activities other than basic subsistence. 3. Methodology and research questions In designing the methodology for the studies, it was important that the researchable areas and analytical approaches be synthesised from the beginning to fit in into the investigative process led by the interviews undertook with the many individuals and organisations. In this connection, it was important to be aware of the specificity of the route of transition to pluralism of the political system. In establishing the analytical foundation for pluralistic liberalisation in Africa, it is important that that we understand the different permutations and trajectories of political transition take many forms – from society-led insurrections and state-led transitions (Costantinos, 1996:324-327) The design and methodology paper identifies various strands of the literature on political change. It starts by submitting that pluralistic governance derives from three distinct sets of factors (Ibid) Livelihoods reflecting long-term historical developments in the economy and society, determine whether there is a propitious environment for pluralistic liberalisation, such as the emergence of an independent middle class, the attainment of widespread education, and shared sense of responsibility among citizens of national unity. From the point of contingent actions of individuals, pluralism is installed because of the conscious reform by elite factions. The trajectory of transitions is driven by the short-term calculations and immediate reactions of strategic actors; with indeterminate outcome because all these actors have incomplete information, make hurried reactions to unforeseen events, and must struggle against one another. If predictable at all, the prospects for pluralism seem to depend on the relative strength and cohesion of a shifting set of conservative and reform coalitions within the state 2 | The Philosophical Ascent of the Contemporary politico-developmental edits
Costantinos and outside of it. Significantly, pluralistic liberalisation depends upon the emergence of supportive set of rules and institutions that shape and regularise politics. A study which seeks to employ all of the above perspectives and methods can be neither coherent not manageable. The power of a given set of factors to explain the need for such institutions and the susceptibility of concepts underlying the mission statement of the institution to empirical investigation is tantalising (Costantinos, 2011). By these criteria, the study was conducted from the perspective of political institutions augured on the following research questions: how did we get here ideologically? Is the endowment of rules and institutions in society and state conducive to pluralistic transition? 4. Africa in the 90’s: from cultures of subversion to pluralistic experiments It worth pointing out that on the whole, noticeable changes in the direction of pluralistic liberalisation process, or more accurately political liberalisation process, have occurred in Africa since the 1990s. However, this process remains constantly threatened by the exorbitant weight of the central power concentrated in the hands of the executive branch and the scale of the economic problems awaiting solution. During the 90’s, countries like Mali and Zambia have gone through a regime change whereas in Ghana, Cameroon and Mozambique the incumbents have managed to succeed to themselves through free and fair elections even if these electoral outcomes were at time contested by their opposition. The faith of others was still hanging on the holding of elections whose calendars will weigh heavy on the length and nature of the transition (Ibid, 255-289). Constitutional conferences and reforms are ridden with fallacies as nations has very little, if any, experience in Western pluralistic discourse and is unfamiliar with the critical values and practices that anchor pluralistic culture and tradition. In the face of the fact that past and present constitutions had never actually been effectively established, especially as pluralistic structures, they are criticised for failing to protect the rights of the citizenry. Such gross generalisations attempt to assess failure and make reference to a set of rules, which on the one hand are alien to the majority of the populace, had never been in place and in force, on the other. Pluralism must actually exist, take definite shape and structure and become a working process, before particular criticisms, claims and demands can be based on it (Ibid, 255-289). In this sense and generally speaking, constitutional reforms have been key elements in the transition period resulting in major restructuring of the polity. Such achievements notwithstanding, it would not be a gross violation of to say that, due to the presence of a majority parliamentary group of the party in power, parliaments have played and continue to play the role as rubber stamp chambers. Nowhere have an elected representative challenged the Executive. The judiciary has seen its role better magnified during the transition, if only by the judgements rendered to certain opponents in the regime’s bad books. Among the countries in transition, some nations remain where political party activities are still suspended surreptitiously, while other countries have established single party regimes using sundry parties as affiliates to fulfil international conditionalities (Ibid, 255-289). A lot has been said here and there about decentralisation yet the debate on federalism has not been deepened from fear of seeing national unity disintegrate. In Tanzania, for fear of a disintegration of the union with Zanzibar, the federation has been maintained with two governments against those calling for an additional government over Tanganyika. In Cameroon the Anglophone, who constituted the opposition’s hard core, frustrated by the presidential election results have been calling for a return to a federation that will highlight their specificity reactive to the rest of Francophone Cameroon. In Uganda, the Buganda kingdom partisans have forced the debate on federalism in the context of the drafting of the constitution, a major innovation of institutional arrangement. Elsewhere if the debate on federalism is not really the order of the day, talks are rather on decentralisation as a mean to satisfy the Tuareg independence movement or as a way to extend some power and resources to the frustrated elite of marginalised regions. Africa’s federal governments cut nations across ethnic enclaves (Ibid, 255-289)
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Costantinos 5. Ideological trajectories of the African Century: Africa has folklore, legends and narratives The cast to which the African state formation was to be moulded under the Western form of political domination failed miserably because of the resolute defiance of indigenous cultures which neither had a problem of character defect or ethical failure as it is one of misinterpretation arising from the deconstruction of society and its history. Such analyses are based on false correlation and false consideration on the separation of meaning from social context, behaviour from cultural milieu and action from social structures. Judgements are based on representations especially the perception that the Western state, and its correlates, market society and bureaucratic organisation ought to exist. What the colonisers of Africa established in the cause of the state project was not so much a state in the Western sense as an apparatus of violent repression. The colonial state needed a great deal of arbitrary power to subordinate the colonial territory, to exploit it, and to protect it from the hostilities unleashed by its dehumanising treatment of its victims that put it in a permanent state of war against indigenous society. The logic and assumptions of the colonial state were so different from those of the indigenous societies, that it was disconnected from their experience and so threatening that it has been fiercely resisted. Because of its licentiousness and the logic of the colonial interests, which controlled it, this force was replete with contradictions and kept the territory, which it was supposed to integrate disorganised. The alienation of state from society and the perception of the state as a hostile force have bred a crop of informal polities parallel to and competitive with the state. They have politicised local communities, loyalties, ethnic groups and nationalities as a political force to shield themselves against the state and to compete for the appropriation and exploitation of its power. The state is not really the quintessential public institution - a ‘res publicae’. It is not the state of all; it is at best, the state of some. Similarly, its administrative apparatus is not really a public service (Ake, 1990:4). Africans are inundated by the enormity of political challenges and overwhelmed by the magnitude of poverty and violence. They tend to go passive or to strike out in futile individual acts of rage; thus, maintaining the tyranny of those who benefit from the status quo. Hence, a deeply radical idea that is the definitive augmentation of shared values must be grounded on the fact that each cultural community has rights that deserve respect. Those who command a lopsided share of supremacy would not be content to hear this brainwave put forward, for it burdens them to account to those who are locked out by the current order as this sphere is a threat to their all-pervasive regulation of society. Africa folklore, legends and narratives through which its people invest in their history with meaning and value, have been subjected to ‘materialist’ criticism from the perspective of its ‘scientific’ standards of historical knowledge and truth as if they were simply epistemological categories. Africa is rich in the visual, literary, and performing arts, that strive to express subjective feelings and emotions and depict reality or nature objectively, which present emotional experiences in their most compelling form. They provoke sentiments that are frequently caricatured, exaggerated, distorted, or otherwise altered in order to portray them in their most penetrating and strenuous form (Costantinos, 1996:443). Cultural pluralism The concept of cultural pluralism comprises a set of related commitments. These are protecting and promoting cultural diversity and the right to culture for everyone in society, encouraging active participation in community cultural life, enabling people to participate in policy decisions that affect the quality of cultural lives and assuring fair and equitable access to cultural resources. Within Africa, the supply of ideas of education may be artificially deflated by particular strategies and mechanisms used by states to manage entire reform processes. Conceptual possibilities may be left unrealised, or sub-optimally realised, insofar as governing elite are preoccupied with filling out those spaces of uncertainty in quality thought, discourse, and action that alternative groups would occupy in the course of their own engagement. The crux of the challenge is creating an intelligent and critical mass 4 | The Philosophical Ascent of the Contemporary politico-developmental edits
Costantinos of human qualities active in the political process. It is about the ability and willingness to identify and execute human-centred priorities that would lead to nations that are active globally (Costantinos, 2011). Historically, there are two different and important theoretical and ideological strands in human development. The first concept was related to humanistic tradition as opposed to a neo-liberal concept, the theory of human capital, which had nothing to do with pluralism that prime shared values. The mass of men entrusted with political power must discover means of translating the will of an electorate into terms of statutes. It is possible that so long as the process of legislation can offer solid benefit, the transition to a new social order will be accomplished in peace. Nevertheless, the benefits must affect those who feel that they have now too small a stake in the present order to make its preservation a matter of urgency to themselves (Lewis, 1978:4 & Laski, 1923:3). Such an attitude is the more important because the desirability of social peace has recently been attacked from opposite directions. It consists in something, which any 19th century thinker with respect for the sciences would have regarded with genuine horror. These are such as the training of individuals incapable of being troubled by questions which, when raised and discussed, endanger the stability of the system; the building and elaboration of a strong framework of institutions, ‘myths’, habits of life and thought intended to preserve it from sudden shocks or slow decay.1 This is a truly far-reaching conception and something far more powerful than the pessimism or cynicism of thinkers who looked on the majority of humankind as unalterably stupid or incurably vicious and therefore concerned themselves with how the world might be made safe for the exceptional, enlightened or otherwise superior minority or individual. For their view did at least concede the reality of the painful problems and merely denied the capacity of the majority to solve them. Whereas the more radical attitude looks upon intellectual perplexity as being caused either by a technical problem to be settled in terms of practical policy, or else as a neurosis to be cured, that is made to disappear, if possible without a trace. This leads to a novel conception of the truth and of disinterested ideals in general, which would hardly have been intelligible to previous centuries. To adopt it is to hold that outside the purely technical sphere words like true, right, or free. The concepts which they denote, are to be defined in terms of the only activity recognized as valuable, namely, the organization of society as a smoothly-working machine providing for the needs of such of its members as are permitted to survive (Berlin, 1950:5). Other authors delve into the monstrous economic and social inequalities and iniquities, which permit and even foster the distress we see about us in the midst of plenty. In sharp contrast with the older notions of an inevitable progressive development that had best be let alone, or even with the recent naïve belief that depressions were a thing of the past, there is a determination among present day men, particularly the younger ones, to do something about this. Some would even go so far as to threaten the very existence of plenty itself, in their hatred of the glaring unevenness of its distribution. The dominant doctrines of the nineteenth century, if not dead, are so battered that they will not serve us any longer as our main props. We are living in a vacuum of faith. The trend away from liberal pluralism has been a drift towards totalitarian dictatorship and rigid state control exercised in the interest of a war economy a move from the sovereignty of the nation-state towards the concentration of aggressive strength in the hands of a few Great Powers. At present, the central dilemma is that we can no longer rely on the old principles alone, but that we abominate the alternatives that time and tide, if it is left to them, will produce (McIlwain, 1937:3 & Crowther, 1944:1). 1
Despite the contempt and ridicule heaped upon it, liberty still endures in many institutionalised customs and exercises a beneficent influence upon them. More significant still, it abides in the hearts and minds of many noble humans who though scattered and isolated, reduced to a small but aristocratic respublica literaria, still keep faith with it, reverently hallow its name and love it more truly than ever they did in the days when no one questioned its absolute sovereignty, when the mob proclaimed its glory and contaminated it with a vulgarity of which it is now purged (Croce, 1932) 5 | The Philosophical Ascent of the Contemporary politico-developmental edits
Costantinos It is true that the opposing principles of economic freedom and of economic organization have generated frictions, which have perceptibly slowed down the progress of the pluralistic economy. However, this is because they have been stupidly handled and the frictions would not arise if the object of all parties were to avoid them, instead of, as at present, to seek battle on all occasions (Ibid: 3). Hence, today's global liberal pluralistic order faces two challenges; the first is radical ‘religion’. The second, and more significant, challenge emanates from the rise of nondemocratic great powers: the West's old Cold War rivals now operating under authoritarian capitalist, rather than communist, regimes2 (Azar Gat, 2007:1). Nevertheless, the raison d'être for the conquest of the pluralistic system were more contingent than is usually assumed. Repressive capitalist states may represent a viable alternative path to modernity, which in turn suggests that there is nothing inevitable about liberal pluralism's ultimate victory, in the last several years; the move to pluralism has given way to a pluralistic decline (Ibid). Scores of countries have made the transition to pluralism, but more recently, pluralism has retreated. These developments, along with the growing power of China and Russia, have led many observers to argue that pluralism has reached its high-water mark. It is no longer on the rise. That conclusion is mistaken. The underlying conditions of societies around the world point to a more complicated reality. The bad news is that it is unrealistic to assume that pluralistic institutions can be set up easily, almost anywhere, at any time. Although the outlook is never hopeless, pluralism is most likely to emerge and survive when certain social and cultural conditions are in place. The good news, however, is that the conditions conducive to pluralism can and do emerge. The process of modernization, a syndrome of social changes linked to industrialisation, once set in motion, it tends to penetrate all aspects of life, bringing rapid economic growth. These create a self-reinforcing process that transforms social life and political institutions, bringing rising mass participation in politics and making the establishment of pluralistic political institutions increasingly likely. Today, we have a clearer idea than ever before of why and how this process of democratization happens (Inglehart & Welzel, 2009:2) 6. Discussion: analytical models and development schools of thought 6.1. Strategic and processual elements The discourse and action through which the political contestants translate specific organisational elements into a broader pattern of ideas and apply them generally to pluralistic transition consist of a description of the central component of the transition strategy in objective terms. This involves noting problems of political change identified and solutions offered, i.e., the articulation of transition issues, goals, task, mechanisms and activities. The second step is analysis of the strategy: examination of its sources, elements, features and limitations and its implications for pluralistic transition process in Africa. Nonetheless, current analyses of transition to pluralism in Africa generally are marked by several limitations (Costantinos, 1996:233-239). There is always a tendency to narrow pluralistic thought and practice to the terms and categories of immediate, not very well considered, political and social action, a naïve realism, as it were and The first is radical ‘religion’. Although its proponents find liberal democracy repugnant, the societies from which it arises are generally poor and stagnant. They represent no viable alternative to modernity and pose no significant military threat to the developed world. The second, and more significant, challenge emanates from the rise of nondemocratic great powers: the West's old Cold War rivals now operating under authoritarian capitalist, rather than communist, regimes... Capitalism's ascendancy appears to be deeply entrenched, but the current predominance of democracy could be far less secure. Capitalism has expanded relentlessly since early modernity, its lower-priced goods and superior economic power eroding and transforming all other socioeconomic regimes, a process most memorably described by Karl Marx in The Communist Manifesto. The triumph of the market, precipitating and reinforced by the industrial-technological revolution, led to the rise of the emergence of mass society and ever-greater affluence. Today, more than half of the world's states have elected governments and close to half have sufficiently entrenched liberal rights to be considered fully free. 2
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Costantinos inattention to problems of articulation or production of pluralistic system and process within established political structures and processes rather than simply formal or abstract possibilities. When it is not dissolved into the immediate reality of political, often partisan or ethnocentric activity, pluralism is likely to be represented as pure principle that needs only proper application. Practitioners and analysts of pluralistic liberalisation in the continent tend to pass over the particular nature of pluralism in fragmentary presence, adjusting it against an ideal-general conception of what it might be. On the implicit, theoretically complacent assumption that formalistic, rhetorical modes of circulation of pluralistic values in Africa nearly exhaust their articulation there, one often rushes to matters of implementation. Consequently, critical issues of the philosophical and practical entrenchment of pluralistic system receive scant attention. The fundamental issues of how concepts, standards and practices of pluralistic rule could be generated and sustained under historically hectic conditions and the manner in which they are likely to gain systemic integrity, autonomy and broad social currency are inadequately addressed (Ibid). A major problem inherent in the political transition in other African is failure social movements to develop coherent strategies for promoting broad based and well organised citizenry. The contemporary reality of Africa is that the various social, economic and political organisations such as trade unions, selfhelp groups, NGOs, professional associations, etc. are very weak and generally dominated by the state. Rather than offering agents and arenas of transitions to pluralism, civil societies are generally seen as objects and problems of reform. Indicators of their weakness include low levels of economic, technological, professional and cultural development and high levels of illiteracy. On this view, the state assumes a large role in pluralistic liberalisation. It is assigned the task of nothing less than cultivating civil society itself through political education and mobilisation and other means. Government is not pushed to the background as society leads the struggle for reform. Rather, the former acts on the latter, promotes and manages the participation of individuals and groups in pluralistic liberalisation (Ibid). 6.2. Concluding the analytical discussions Institutional approaches to the study of pluralistic reforms in Africa call for analysis of the effectiveness of government and non-government organisations in contributing to the reforms in terms of the generic characteristics of the organisations. The characteristics include autonomy, capacity, complexity, cohesion and a combination of these. Presumably, the more organisations and institutions are endowed with these attributes, the greater their strength, and the more likely are to promote pluralistic transition. Let us then look at the hypotheses. The stress on standard organisational dimensions and traits in explaining pluralistic transitions, which borders on over-emphasis, is problematic. We can here identify three problems with it. First, it assumes or requires a level of development and strength of institutions in African societies (prior to pluralistic transition or maturity) beyond that of the developing societies in question. Second, in assessing the effectiveness of indigenous organisations in contributing to pluralistic change, the measure of the ideas and practices articulated by the organisations and the strategies and forms of that articulation must not be neglected. One should be alive to the possibility that actual performances of autonomous and complex institutions may be indifferent, or even contrary to pluralistic principles, notwithstanding the formal profession of such principles by the formal profession of such principles by the institutions in question. Third, the stress on generic traits of institutions largely overlooks substantive gaps in organisations' knowledge of pluralistic ideas and practices as a source of problems of pluralistic liberalisation along with structural incapacities of organisations. While differences in general institutional characteristics provide a significant measure of effectiveness of contribution to political reform, they cannot account for improvements in pluralistic impact, which can be made within through institutional learning and practice (Ibid). These, then, are some of the analytical limitations that characterise existing perspectives on transition to pluralism. African governments and societies undoubtedly depend on international
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Costantinos assistance in their projects of reform. Such assistance is vital for the projects in many areas and at many levels. Yet it must be recognised that external support creates problems as well as opportunities for pluralistic liberalisation on Africa. An confronting the imperatives of political change, nothing is more challenging for African polities than the strategic co-ordination of diverse global and local elements, relations and activities within themselves, nor has anything greater potential for enabling them achieve successful transitions to pluralism (Costantinos, 2011). What does this leave the transition to pluralism in Africa? Practically nothing! The African nationstate needed to be built and built pluralistically, virtually from scratch. Politically, its past is more a liability than an asset. The brutal military dictatorships, which in the end brought the continent to the edge of disintegration, were in essence a continuation of all kinds of previous colonial and feudal dictatorial regimes. In the above review, the attempt has been to identify some of the impediment for the consolidation and preservation of pluralism. Economically, socially, politically there exist almost insurmountable obstacles to the flourishing of pluralistic governance. The influence of decades of Marxist-Leninist legacy over African transition politics is also manifested in an activist impulse of organisations self-assertion, which calls for states to be highly polemical and combative and to be sensitive but not particularly responsive to criticism of pluralistic liberalisation goals and strategies. The upshot is undue partisan closure on the formulation of the ends of transition, which, potentially, could be marked by greater openness and variability belonging to a complex universe of pluralistic thought. In terms of the articulation of strategy and process in the African transition, a major problem is that there is too much readiness on the part of the democratising forces for unilateral action without meaningful and adequate understanding, let alone agreement, on critical issues with organisations and constituencies outside the state. The rather intrusive manner in which the Governments promote positions on vital issues of reform contravenes the ideals, standards and rules of pluralism, which seemingly they uphold. This detracts from the openness, credibility and effectiveness of the African pluralistic liberalisation process. It also encourages the opposition to alienate themselves from the process, rather participate in it and work to improve it. Recognition of this problem would constitute a significant development of its pluralistic practice (Ibid). 7. Quo Vadis Africa in the ideational paradigmatic gridlock: 7.1. Development theories The criticism of Marxist and neo-Marxist development theories as well as of modernisation theories led to a theoretical vacuum in the 1980s, which for many Third World countries was a decade of economic crisis. In the past five decades when Africa was freed from the shackles of colonial oppression, Africans have realised an improvement in life expectancy, child mortality and literacy rates. However, these are averages are less valid for poor groups. In the 1980s, there was actually a reversal in these indicators. From the mid-1970s, this development ideology enjoyed increasing popularity. The oil crisis at the beginning of that decade and the subsequent restructuring of international capitalism led to a redefinition of the role of the state. What started in the 1970s as a neo-monetarist vision on the problem grew into a new development ideology. State interference in the market was considered ineffective, counterproductive and inconsistent (Sunkel, 1969, Furtado, 1977, Lipton, 1977, Lewis, 1978 & ILO 1976-1977). Limiting the role of the state, a liberal economy and a strict monetary policy according to the guidelines of the IMF are the major policy options in many Third World countries. However, the structural adjustment package of the IMF can increasingly be considered as the cause rather than the solution to the economic problems experienced in the Third World (Lipton, M. 1977). As a development ideology, neo-liberalism most resembles the well-known modernisation paradigm, but in fact, it has less to offer because the role of the state has been minimalized. After so many years of
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Costantinos neglect of their people, many Third World countries have currently entered a process of transition to pluralism, which could create the conditions for states finally to start caring for the poor and the excluded. However, the neo-liberal trajectory denies them the policy tools to intercede actively in favour of those without jobs, houses, health care, schooling and food. The status of the concept of modernisation theory seems to refer only to political aspects of the transition to pluralism in the Third World (Apter 1987:3). Consequently, The Washington Consensus has been the target of sharp criticism by those who argue that it is a way to open up less developed countries to investments from large multinational corporations and their wealthy owners in advanced First World economies, which the critics would view as a negative development (Williamson John, 2002:1). As of 2007, several Latin American countries are led by socialist or other left wing governments. Some of which have adopted approaches contrary to the Washington Consensus set of policies. Critics frequently cite the Argentine economic crisis of 1999-2002 as a case in point of why they believe that Washington Consensus policies are flawed, as they argue that Argentina had previously implemented most of the Washington Consensus policies as directed. Some economists, by contrast, question how closely Argentina had in fact followed the Consensus policies. It is difficult even for the creator of the term to deny that the phrase "Washington Consensus" is a damaged brand name. Audiences the world over seem to believe that this signifies a set of neo-liberal policies that have been imposed on hapless countries by the Washington-based international financial institutions and have led them to crisis and misery. There are people who cannot utter the term without foaming at the mouth. My own view is of course quite different. The basic ideas that I attempted to summarize have continued to gain wider acceptance over the past decade... For the most part, they are motherhood and apple pie, which is why they commanded a consensus (Williamson, 2002:4). The acceptance of Washington Consensus was a reaction to the macroeconomic crisis and economic stagnation and loss of access to foreign credit, that many governments could no longer sustain high levels of public spending without igniting hyperinflation. Some specific factual premises of the critique as phrased above are not accepted by defenders, or indeed all critics, of the Washington Consensus. Economic growth in the last few years has been at historically high rates and debt levels, relative to the size of these economies, are on average significantly lower than they were several years ago. Despite these macroeconomic advances, though, poverty and inequality remain at high levels. Neo-Keynesian and post-Keynesian critics of the Consensus have argued that the underlying policies were incorrectly laid down and are too rigid to be able to succeed. Nancy Birdsall & Francis Fukuyama, (2011) argue that, Western democracies are the ones that have highlighted the risks of relying too much on market-led globalization and called for greater regulation of global finance. Emerging-market and low-income countries are likely to modify their approach to economic policy further, trading the flexibility and efficiency associated with the free-market model for domestic policies meant to ensure greater resilience in the face of competitive pressures and global economic trauma. The consolidation and legitimacy of their fragile pluralistic systems will depend on their ability to deliver a greater measure of social protection. 7.2. Possibilities and problems of transition openness: Beyond the sphere of political agency, possibilities and problems of pluralistic transition openness can be grasped in terms of the related domain of ideology. Ideological elements and constructs might be seen as the very constitutive structure of process openness and closure. Political transitions will commonly be characterised by a number of distinctive and shared additional elements, including concepts and rules of government, national and cultural values, traditions of political discourse and arguments, and modes of representation of specific interests, needs and
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Costantinos issues. These elements, or complexes of elements, will tend to assume varying forms and to enter into shifting relations of competition, co-operation and hegemony during political reform. Generally, the broader the range of ideological elements at plays in a transition to pluralism, and the more varied and uncertain their relations are, the greater the possibilities of process openness and transparency that exist. Like the transitional political organisations and activities to which they are often tied more or less closely, transitional ideological constructs tend to be unsettled and, at times, unsettling. Particularly at the initial stages of transition, they are more likely to be uncertain rather than stable structures of ideas and values. This has the effect of opening up the reform process, of freeing the process from simple domination by any one organised actor or coalition of actors. Yet ideological elements and relations take shape and come into play within a hierarchy of global and local agencies and groups. A determinate order of institutions, powers, interests and activates operates through complexes of transition ideas and values, filling out, specifying, anchoring and, often shortcutting their formal content or meaning. Moreover, this may impose ideological as well as practical limits on the extent to which and how pluralistic reform processes in Africa can be opened up or broadened. Within African countries, the supply of ideas of pluralism may be artificially deflated by particular strategies and mechanisms used by incumbent governments to manage entire reform processes. Conceptual possibilities may be left unrealised, or sub-optimally realised, insofar as governing elite are preoccupied with filling out those spaces of uncertainty in transition political thought, discourse and action that alternative or opposition parties would occupy in the course of their own engagement. In the sphere of ideology, openness of pluralistic transition process is concerned in part with allowing free expression of diverse ideas and beliefs and permitting unrestricted taking of positions by citizens on specific issues. It has to do with creating conditions for the existence of the broadest possible range of opinions and sentiments. Are all ideas and values allowed to contend? Are there codes, which prevent or hinder intellectual and cultural freedom? Do the views and perspectives of opposition groups have a significant and legitimate place in politics? Is good faith criticism construed question as negation of pluralistic liberalisation as such? Questions such as these are important in examining and assessing the ideological openness of transitions to pluralism in Africa. Nevertheless, as important as it is, this is only one context, level or analysis of the breadth and depth of transition process on the terrain of ideology. There is another level of analysis, concerned with the extent and nature of openness of distinct ideological constructs to one another, with modes of articulation of given sets of ideas and values and of representations of specific issues relative to others. The concern here is not so much the number and diversity of ideas, values and opinions allowed to gain currency during transition as modes of their competitive and cooperative articulation (Costantinos, 2011). For example,
Does pluralism enter transition processes in Africa as an external ideology, constructing and deploying its concepts in sterile abstraction from the immediacies of indigenous traditions, beliefs and values? Do ideas of pluralistic liberalisation come into play in total opposition to, or in co-operation with local values and sentiments? In the struggle over the establishment of pluralistic rules of political engagement, do leading parties in transitional regions in Africa equate the articulation of their ethnocentric agendas with the production of broad-based concepts, norms and goals, which should govern their leadership of transitions to pluralism? Do transition processes signify change in terms of the transformation of the immediate stuff of politics into a new kind of political activity - an activity mediated and guided by objective standards, rules and principles?
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Costantinos In the light of these questions, it is possible to draw a conceptual distinction between two levels of articulation of ideology in pluralistic liberalisation processes and to note the implications of their relations for process openness. There are first, representations of specific interests, identities, needs, wishes, goals, claims and demands, different in diverse individuals, groups and communities. These are to be distinguished from a second level of production and circulation of ideology where broad-based concepts, principles and rules take shape and come into play. For convenience, we can designate ideological elements at the former level of particular representations or contents, and those at the latter level of perspicuous general forms. Particular representations have to do with ideologically loaded articulations of interests, needs and activities, which may appear or become so immediate as to be taken for spontaneous realities. General forms refer to systemic categories and institutional mechanisms; they objectively, mediate and generalise particular representations. In examining or assessing the ideological possibilities of openness of transition processes, general forms and particular representations need to be addressed in terms of their relation, even as they retain their distinct conceptual status. For the two levels of ideology formation, tend to incorporate each other in a more or less uncertain and complex process, as well as constituting relatively autonomous coherence in internally. The breadth and depth of generic pluralistic forms cannot be grasped or judged simply on their own worth, i.e., on their theoretical correctness or the rigour of their formal construction. Our comprehension should not overlook the matter of how far particular constructs inform and condition pluralistic rules; but has to conceptualise the relation between the two levels of production of ideology and its implications for openness of political transitions? One way is to think of it in terms of concrete instances and abstract systems of political concepts, principles, rules and procedures that provide objective standards to which every instance of representation of interests, needs, demands and intentions must conform. In this light pluralistic liberalisation appears as a process in which a global structural model of ideology is applied to local, African, contexts. It is seen as the extension of the ideological and institutional contents of the model toward African projects of pluralistic reform. This conceptualisation may not be entirely mistaken, but it is far from satisfactory. Generic pluralistic forms are not simply pure ideology devoid of practical content; and particular constructs are not merely points of application of systemic pluralistic elements, which are wholly external to them in whose articulation they have no role to play. If general forms are seen as pre-given standards to which every instance of representation of particular interests must conform, the effect will constrain transition openness. For that will mean pushing ideas and values produced in the plenitude of social experience to the background and accord primacy to a mere system of abstract categories. It will mean giving primary place to the ideologies of politicians, activists and intellectuals. It must also be noted here that the conceptual and institutional mechanisms of pluralism cannot come alive in local contexts merely as generic forms. They make themselves felt only to the extent individuals, groups and communities address through them their felt needs and concerns and the circumstances they face or particular political actors. Alternative way of looking at the relation between general forms and particular contents in pluralistic transition process would give precedence to the latter over the former. Within this perspective, specific organisations and groups appear to have more leeway articulating systems of abstract categories according to their particular interests and intentions. Pluralism as a system of universal concepts and practices will necessarily be instantiated in African contexts, but only in line with the specific transition aims and strategies of political cabals rather than within a simple application of its concepts in their pre-given abstract form. Instead of being applied to local 11 | The Philosophical Ascent of the Contemporary politico-developmental edits
Costantinos contexts, global forms or models of pluralism provide ideological materials for pluralistic construction in those contexts. This perspective has merits. It can work as a corrective to the view of pluralistic liberalisation in Africa as a mere extension of a system of abstract categories to concrete instances. However, the issue here is not one of simply giving primacy to specific contents over general forms. The concepts and principles of pluralism may allow particular interests and intentions to permeate them, yet should take shape through such particularities as distinct, relatively autonomous articulations. It is important to recognise here that there are various ways of connecting particular interests and goals to global concepts and principles of pluralism, and that certain ways may be restrictive of transition process openness and transparency. In some cases, to tie pluralistic systems to specific ideological intentions and constructs, like projects of ethnic self-determination in Africa, is not to appreciate the systems’ inherent breadth and complexity; it is, rather, to operate at levels and within forms of knowledge of pluralism that encompass only a limited part of the systems’ full range. The relation between perspicuous general forms and particular representations in transition processes can best be grasped as their dynamic, mutually constitutive or regulative articulation. It is well to recognise that the former do not have effective generality or objectivity of their own, independently of particular elements and contents. If they were wholly autonomous, the forms will be vacuous and practically irrelevant. In addition, specific representations are not passive external targets of application of generic forms of pluralism but in part constitutive of them. In other words, neither one nor the other level of pluralistic liberalisation has elements, features and functions that it owes entirely to itself. Articulation and structuring of pluralistic elements occur, or should occur, continually across the two levels. Thus, pluralistic liberalisation here entails conceptualisation in global categories that are invested with varying local meanings that are themselves in part actualisation of trends in international political (and development) thought. Openness, transparency and complexity of pluralistic liberalisation in Africa will hence depend on the extent to which and how global and local levels or dimensions are articulated with each other. This means that the attempt to subsume pluralistic transition by some particular political agenda or ideological intention (indigenisation, ethnic self-determination) must, therefore, limit rather than enhance openness of transition process. If what perspicuous general forms signify is no particular transition strategy but the very process of pluralistic liberalisation itself, then any particular agenda or intention must, to the extent it is pluralistic, allow general forms to work themselves out through it. Conversely, pluralistic transition strategy or strategies must take on generic elements, dimensions and functions of pluralistic process. In order to have significant constitutive or regulative effects on the plenitude of particular representations, pluralistic transition process itself must be allowed to attain coherence and integrity even as it comes into play in varied contexts of activity. While it may be tied to the initiatives and leadership of assignable political cabals in its emergence and development, it nonetheless gains currency as a relatively autonomous system that other, competing, organisations can also participate in and operate. As a set of distinctly general categories and mechanisms of pluralistic thought, discourse and practice, transition process takes the diversity of particular political ideas and activities into itself and makes them a vital part of its conceptual and institutional economy. It mediates and channels specific actors’ activities by means of an objectification and generalisation that works on and through them. In this light, openness of pluralistic liberalisation process in Africa can be understood as a dynamic two-way operation of generic forms on particular contents and particular contents on generic forms. This is in which the deployment of the conceptual and institutional machinery of pluralism is at the same time the representation of specific needs, interests, motivations, claims, rights and obligations by individuals and groups. Going beyond structuring or rearranging African 12 | The Philosophical Ascent of the Contemporary politico-developmental edits
Costantinos political actors and institutional activities in their spontaneous, often turbid reality, such operations should result in their transformation into forms of transparent agency and practice within a plural political system. The relative inattention to problems of articulation or production of pluralistic system and process within established political structures and processes rather than simply formal or abstract possibilities leads analysts and practitioners to make internal observations and assessments in terms of the pluralistic or unpluralistic performances of African polities. This is without raising the question of setting up or securing the polities as pluralistic systems in the first place. Existing perspectives on political reform in Africa neglect to pose the problem of articulation of pluralism as a relatively autonomous mode of analysis in which pluralism projects impose ideology upon governments and socialites from the outside. Pluralistic liberalisation would consist of a set of activities in which universal mainly Western, concepts and standards of governance that are nearly applied to, as distinct from produced or re-produced in, African contexts and conditions. Even at the level of application alone, it is largely overlooked that international models may enter governments and societies through a proliferation of programmes and mechanisms that hinder the growth of open and effective transition process, that they may retard the development of indigenous pluralistic-system experience and capacity. Whether pluralism is defined in terms of individual freedom or collective rights, government policy or citizen action, private value or public norm, the upshot of the relative inattention to problems of articulation of open pluralistic systems and processes is to make pluralism at once the most concrete and reefed of idea systems in Africa. Within current projects of political reform, pluralism is either conventionalised or sterilised on terrain of theory and often vacuously formalised on the ground of practice. It enters African politics and society in relatively abstract and plain form, yet is expected to land itself to immediate and vital social and political experience. It suggests itself and seems within reach only to elude, appears readily practicable only to resist realisation. This is manifested in the mitualizing of the goals, objectives and discourse of transition to the extent where they gain currency less as constitutive elements of an open public arena for pluralistic debate and discussion and more as ingredients of a political recipe pre-cooked by a particular political organisation or coalition of organisations. It shows up in the tendency to offer transition solutions in tight, formulaic terms, for the most part avoiding the uncertainty of their pluralism, negotiated framing, and to resist the opening up of its reform aims and purposes for alternative formulations. Under these circumstances, interpretative possibilities within concepts and goals of pluralism are pre-emptively frozen or shortcut, turning immediately into the actualities of revolutionary pluralism formulae. In combination with the vacuum in development theories and the resultant paradigmatic gridlock, the ills of pluralism were predicated upon the realisation that the gap between poor and rich countries continued to widen and that the developing countries were unlikely to be able to bridge that gap whatever strategy they would follow. Hence, individual nation-states are assigned an increasingly frustrating function of dealing with socio-economic transformation on the one hand and building pluralistic systems of political reflection and practice.
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Costantinos References Azar Gat. The Return of Authoritarian Great Powers (in Foreign Affairs, How We Got Here, accessed Feb. 26, 2012http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/136961/how-we-got-here?cid=nlcthis_week_on_foreignaffairs_co-022312-how_we_got_here_3-022312&page=show,) Bagwahati, J.N. The New International Economic Order, the North South Debate, (Cambridge: MIT press. 1977) Baran, P. The Political Economy of Growth, (1968 edition ) New York : Monthly Review Press 1957) Barry, B. Transition to Pluralism in Africa. Cross national analysis (Dakar-Washington, ALF/GCA, 1996) Benedetto Croce, Of Liberty (in Foreign Affairs, How We Got Here, accessed Feb. 26, 2012, http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/136961/how-we-got-here?cid=nlcthis_week_on_foreignaffairs_co-022312-how_we_got_here_3-022312&page=show,) C. H. Mcilwain. The Reconstruction of Liberalism (in Foreign Affairs, How We Got Here, accessed Feb. 26, 2012http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/136961/how-we-got-here?cid=nlcthis_week_on_foreignaffairs_co-022312-how_we_got_here_3-022312&page=show,) Costantinos, Berhutesfa., Political Transitions in Africa, Washington DC:GCA, 1996) Costantinos, Berhutesfa., Developmental States and Developmentalism in Africa, (AAU, 2011, retrieved on April 12, 2012 from https://sites.google.com/site/doncosty/graduate-lectures Furtado, C. Development under Development (Berkeley: Berkeley University Of California Press. 1971) Geoffrey Crowther. Freedom and Control (in Foreign Affairs, How We Got Here, accessed Feb. 26, 2012, http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/136961/how-we-got-here?cid=nlcthis_week_on_foreignaffairs_co-022312-how_we_got_here_3-022312&page=show, Inglehart Ronald & Welzel Christian How Development Leads to Pluralism (in Foreign Affairs, How We Got Here, accessed Feb. 26, 2012http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/136961/how-wegot-here?cid=nlc-this_week_on_foreignaffairs_co-022312-how_we_got_here_3022312&page=show,) Isaiah Berlin, Political Ideas in the Twentieth Century (in Foreign Affairs, How We Got Here, accessed Feb. 26, 2012. http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/136961/how-we-got-here?cid=nlcthis_week_on_foreignaffairs_co-022312-how_we_got_here_3-022312&page=show,) Lewis, W.A. The Evolution Of The International Economic Order (Princeton : Princeton university Press. 1978) Laski, Harold J., Lenin and Mussolini, http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/136961/how-we-gothere?cid=nlc-this_week_on_foreignaffairs_co-022312-how_we_got_here_3022312&page=show, in Foreign Affairs, How We Got Here, accessed Feb. 26, 2012 Lipton, M. Why Poor People Stay Poor : Urban Bias In World Development (Cambridge Mass : Harvard University Press. 1977) Nancy Birdsall Francis, F., The Post-Washington Consensus (in Foreign Affairs, How We Got Here, accessed Feb. 26, 2012http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/136961/how-we-gothere?cid=nlc-this_week_on_foreignaffairs_co-022312-how_we_got_here_3022312&page=show,) Kuczynski P.P and Williamson, J. ed., After the Washington Consensus (Washington DC:IIE, 2003) Sunkel, O. National Development Policy and External Dependence in Latin America, Journal of Development Studies, Vol.6, no.1. 1969. Tylor, J.G. From Modernisation to Modes of Production (London : Macmillan, 1979) Williamson, J. Did the Washington Consensus Fail? (Washington, DC: The Peterson Institute for International Economics, Center for Strategic & International Studies, November 6, 2002)
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