Democracy,African intellectuals and African Renaissance

Abstract

This article argues that democracy is a prerequisite for the African Renaissance. The role of African intellectuals is crucial in making the dream of the African Renaissance come true. This article revisits the discourse on the African Renaissance, its history and content before dealing with the issue of democracy. Democracy is closely related to human rights and development and is a sine qua non for the African Renaissance. The current discourse on the African Renaissance is not new. The first international conference on the African Renaissance was held in Dakar, Senegal, from 26 February to 2 March 1996 where African intellectuals gathered to celebrate the works of Professor Cheikh Anta Diop, ten years after his death. The theme of the conference was ‘African Renaissance in the Third Millennium’. The first African Renaissance Conference in South Africa took place from 28 to 29 September 1998. Thabo Mbeki ‐ then, Deputy Pesident of South Africa ‐ read the keynote address on ‘Giving the Renaissance content: Objectives and definitions’. This article complements efforts at redefining the roles of African intellectuals in fostering democracy through a conscious application of the framework of African Renaissance.     

African Music

The writer, of St. Mark's College, Mapanza, Northern Rhodesia,is the author of an essay on African music published by theRhodes-Livingstone Institute at Livingstone. He is a keen supporterof the African Music Society recently founded at Johannesburgby Mr. Hugh Tracey. Although he deals specifically with musicin Northern Rhodesia, he suggests there is evidence to showthat his statements apply in principle also to South and toWest Africa.     

Our African Territories

This article represents the second half of a speech made ata combined meeting with the Royal Empire Society, on the 27thFebruary. Mr. Creech Jones was deputising, at short notice,for his chief, Mr. George Hall, with Lord Harlech in the chair.The first part of the address was devoted to a general statementof British Colonial principles.     

An African Review

This article represents the bulk of a lecture on 27th May. Thespeaker, a former Governor of Tanganyika and Governor-Generalof the Sudan, paid a visit last winter to South, Central, andEast Africa.     

African Mental Ability

No question is more vital to the future of Africa than the mentalcapacity of its original inhabitants, whose two main groupingsare the Negro and the Bantu-speaking peoples. Nor is any questionless exactly known. It was therefore with surprise that manypeople learned earlier this year that Colonel Deneys Reitz hadmade the following statement in a war review at the Guildhallin London: "I am not an anthropologist and therefore not qualifiedto say whether our native tribes will ever be capable of evolvingup to European standards. Indeed the balance of scientific evidenceappears to lean to the contrary opinion." The Union High Commissionerin London speaks with the authority of a former South AfricanMinister of Native Affairs. Nevertheless this statement hasnot gone without challenge. The following article was writtenat our request by the Principal of the Adams Native Collegein Natal, who also represents the Natives of Natal and Zululandin the South African Senate. But the subject is of such importanceand such complexity that we have added an extended summary ofa book by Dr. S. Bieshcuvel, a psychologist now working withthe R.A.F., on "African Intelligence".Dr. Bieshcuvel‘swork, which has been delayed by the war, is a reply to someof the "scientific evidence" cited by Colonel Reitz. Althoughin his article Dr. Brookes mentions other work (by Dr. van Rensburg)more recent than Dr. Fick’s, the summary may give someidea of the complexity of the work of investigation requiredbefore it acquires a true scientific validity.     

West African Voices

A new literary programme has been started in the West AfricanService of the B.B.C., and this article is a reprint of oneof the talks. The Ibo speaker was formerly in the Customs, andqualified as a barrister last November: he is also the authorof numerous poems in English, and of a novel, The Prince ofUtete. The other two are schoolmasters working as Assistantsat the School of Oriental and African Studies. For technicalreasons, the orthography is not quite complete.     

East African Development

This article represents the bulk of the speech by the Kenyapolitician now member of the E. African Central Assembly, toa joint meeting with the Royal Empire Society, under the Chairmanshipof Roger Norton, C.M.G., O.B.E., the East African Commissionerin London.     

African indigenous ecology control and sustainable community livelihood in southern African history

Abstract

Based on sources for African Indigenous Ecology Control and Sustainable Community Livelihood in Southern African history this article argues that political independence in the Southern African region has altered the historiography of the region and the African continent as a whole. Black Africans are now looking to the past for inspiration to constitute the foundations of sustainable livelihoods using their own indigenous knowledge systems (IKS) and resources. The indicatives of the African Renaissance also demand that we draw on the significance of the control by pre-colonial African communities of their ecosystems. Existing testimonies show prosperity among pre-colonial African communities in the region. The argument is that, in order to restore the historical achievements of Africans in the region, IKS should form a constitutive part of education.     

South African Native Policy

This defence of Union policy is part of a lecture given by theUnion High Commissioner at a combined meeting with the RoyalEmpire Society under the chairmanship of Lord Clarendon on the28th February. Mr. Heaton Nicholls has had long practical experienceof administration both in British Colonies and in South Africa,where he is recognised as one of the principal architects ofthe prevailing liberalism in Government policy. He opened bystressing three cardinal facts. (I) Union native policy is partof the whole concept of national government. (2) The Union isa nation in full control of its own destiny. (3) Past clasheshave left both European and Bantu in certain clearly definedareas of their own choosing.     

African Affairs at Westminster

From our Parliamentary Correspondent     

African Affairs At Westminster

From our Parliamentary Correspondent     

The Southern African unipolarity

Despite the tectonic changes that have taken place in Southern Africa since the demise of apartheid, South Africa is still widely considered a hegemonic regional power by scholars, practitioners and pundits. This article challenges this interpretation, asserting that both Pretoria’s foreign policy and that of its neighbours fit the concept of regional unipolarity with more precision. Since the early 1990s, South Africa has pursued leadership within binding regional institutions and invested resources in order to reinforce the sovereignty of second-tier states such as Angola, Mozambique and Zimbabwe, which have in turn disputed its diplomatic and military primacy, achieving impressive results. This behaviour is characteristic of unipoles rather than hegemons. In this article I revisit the evolution of South African relations with its more proximate neighbours in a transition from hegemony (1961–1990) to unipolarity. I start by defining both concepts and clarifying the behaviours that regional powers and small states are expected to have under hegemonic and unipolar settings. Then, I examine inter-state relations in the region, showing that the concept of unipolarity best describes power distribution and best predicts foreign policy in Southern Africa since the 1990s. Finally, I show that this exercise in concept rectification illuminates comparisons with other regional unipoles, and provides a useful framework to forecast the consequences of an eventual Southern African bipolarity, if Angola continues to catch up.