07_Alienation and the Problem of Loyalty in Africa.pmd


ALIENATION AND THE PROBLEM OF LOYALTY IN AFRICA

Dipo Irele

University of Ibadan, Nigeria

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Abstract

The problem of loyalty is important for understanding the crisis of

the nation-state in postcolonial Africa.  This paper examines the reason

why people are attached to their ethnic units rather than the nation-state.

In the first part it analyzes loyalty and the weakness of the state in attract-

ing it.  The second part it uses Rawls’ theory of overlapping consensus to

show how certain principles can be agreed upon which would form the

basis of social morality.

Since independence many African countries have been bedeviled

with the problem of the loyalty of their citizens.  The problem of loyalty

has been ascribed to the primordial attachment which people have for

their ethnic units which has precluded them to have loyalty to the nation-

state.1  In fact weaving together the heterogeneous ethnic groups in Africa

has become a critical problem in most African states.1  In this paper, I shall

Prajna Vihara, Volume 12, Number 1, January-June, 2011, 97-112 97

2000 by Assumption University Pressc

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dwell on the reason why the people are attached to their ethnic unit rather

than the nation-state.  In the first part I shall analyze loyalty and then go on

to proffer reasons why the citizens of most of African countries have not

willingly given their loyalty to the nation.  In the second part, I argue that

there is the need to have an agreement or consensus on certain basic

principles.  I utilize Rawls’ theory of overlapping consensus to sketch how

an agreement could be reached embodying certain principles which would

form the basis of social morality.

In a stimulating paper, Oldenquist argues that loyalty is different

from fanaticism.2 He contends that loyalty is not a bias or bigotry. He goes

on to argue that loyalty exhibits certain characteristic features which are

different from bias and bigotry.3 Although loyalty can degenerate into fa-

naticism or bigotry, it does not necessarily have the features of fanaticism

because loyalty to one’s country is predicated on rational assessment of

one’s country. He claims that in the case of fanatical loyalty to one’s coun-

try this “is usually dependent on ignorance” and “can be rationally faulted”.4

This kind of loyalty depends on emotional and ideological appeals.

Oldenquist contends further that our loyalty to a country depends on cer-

tain benefits and protections that the country provides for its citizens.5 In

other words, our loyalty to a country is predicated on certain basic needs

the country can provide for its citizens.

Oldenquist further argues that there is a relationship between loy-

alty and shared moral values. According to him, loyalty presupposes shared

values which the citizens have as background norms. In any society, these

shared values define the common good and adjudicate among competing

claims of different groups.6 These shared values are also important be-

cause, according to Oldenquist, they define the moral community.

Oldenquist further claims that these shared values or, what he

calls at times, “social morality”, must have the feature of universalization.

The basic tenet of universalization is that moral language is reasonable.

When we say that something is good, for example, we must have in mind

some features of that thing in virtues of which we hold it to be good.

Furthermore, our judgment must be universalizable. That is, whatever our

reason may be for holding that ‘X’ is good, it must be such that we would

agree that anything else like ‘X’ with respect to that reason would also be

good. If I say that my child is good, I must have a reason for saying so,

98 Prajna Vihara
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and if this is the case, any child that has the same characteristics as my

child would also be a good child. In other words, I am committed to the

view that any child that exhibits that same characteristics as my child ought

to be a good child.

The interpretation I have given above of universalization might not

have caught the essence of this metaethical theory properly. But we can

get the crux of the tenet of universalization by adapting Hare’s suggestion

for our purpose.7 Someone might claim that the assertion, “all children

with blonde hair ought to be protected” is universalizable if and only if

there is a type of action O such that (i) the person believes that “all chil-

dren with blonde hair ought to be protected” is for the type O, (ii) the

person accepts the general principle the actions of type O are obligatory,

(iii) this general principle can be formulated without using proper names or

personal names or personal pronouns. This can be formulated thus:

U: You ought to do O = if there is action O and A falls

within action O and A ought to be done.

Or it could be put thus, taking over Nagel’s conception of objec-

tive reasons: (p(x) (Px) ought to do x) where the property must contain an

occurrence of the variable p which is bound only by the universal quanti-

fication which governs the entire formula.8  The person who made this

assertion if she were to be consistent would agree that she is also duty

bound to abide by the principle. She cannot require others to abide by this

principle while she excuses herself from this requirement. Thus the univer-

salization theory yields something like the golden rule.

However, another person might adopt a principle that is different.

She might claim that everyone has a similar non-universalisable obligation

to protect her own child which is more fundamental than protecting other

people’s children. This case is similar to the more familiar case of egoism

or fanaticism. An egoist would claim that she ought to perform an act if

and only if it would maximize her benefits. This can be put starkly in this

schema:

E: An act is morally right if and only if it maximizes my

benefits.

Dipo Irele 99



Thus the egoist does not perform an act to benefit others however

similar other people would be to her because it is not a matter of similari-

ties. Like its twin sister, egoism issues in absurdity: it cannot be consis-

tently held.

Oldenquist has pointed out that normative judgments based on

egoism and those based on loyalty at times, share the same uneliminable

egocentric characteristics or, put differently, individualistic hedonism.9 They

are based on self-dependent normative judgements.10 If I say I love my

country, I am claiming that there is a putative loyalty to my country. But if

I replace my country with a characterizing expression which is peculiar to

me only, I have an egoistic ideal, not loyalty. As Oldenquist says, “What I

am committed to is a kind of thing, not some particular things”.11 In other

words, there are no certain features which others could share with me.

But if I am willing to replace my country with any characteristic expression

which others share with me, I have a genuine loyalty and not an ideal; my

normative judgment is not individualistic.

As I have pointed out above, an egoist does not recognize simi-

larities, hence he cannot replicate himself. This, according to Oldenquist,

is what separates his position from that of shared social morality. He is

inclined towards an entity only by means of a singular term.12 But he can-

not replicate the singular term. He cannot say he values this more than that

because there will be no intelligible ground for him to decide which of

them he favours. He will favour himself and then the confusion that attends

his “favouring ‘this’ or ‘that’ sets in”.13 This equally characterizes, at times,

a person with a banal form of loyalty because his loyalty is self-depen-

dent.  He cannot employ any general feature in characterizing his loyalty, it

must be ‘my group’, and this becomes meaningful to him alone; hence he

lives in a solipsistic world.14

Loyalty, according to Oldenquist, is an object of noninstrumental

value in virtue of having certain characteristic features which appeal to all

people. In general, people care about the object of their loyalty and they

acknowledge obligations towards it, which they would not feel towards

any object which they do not have loyalty to. Loyalty, as earlier pointed

out, towards an object could be shared by a number of people unlike

object of pure self-interest.  In this regard, we talk about “our country”,

and not just ‘my country’.15 What distinguishes this from pure egoism is

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that there is a shared value or social value.16 I shall return to this issue of

shared value later.

The foregoing, I trust, would have given something of the flavour

of Oldenquist’s position on loyalty even though I have had to give only the

barest sketch of it and sacrifice much of the more detailed analysis.  What

emerges from the discussion is that there must be a shared value or social

morality before we can have loyalty towards a nation.

The overwhelming consensus on loyalty in Africa is that the na-

tion-states in Africa have not been able to secure the loyalty of their citi-

zens.  Rather their loyalty has been to their ethnic groups and this has led

to political instability in most African countries.17 This ethnic loyalty or

primordial sentiment, it is claimed, started with colonialism and the

colonialists played this up in order to pursue their strategy of divide and

rule.18 The nation-states that emerged after colonialism have not been

able to weld these disparate ethnic groups together into a cohesive nation.

Further the elites in these states in Africa after colonialism have also played

the issue of ethnicity up in order to have access to power.19 In other words,

they have manipulated the issue of ethnicity in order to protect their vested

interest.

As I pointed out above, some scholars believe that the integration

of these ethnic groups into nation-states in Africa and the loyalty of the

citizens to these states have become difficult to achieve.  They believe that

national integration and loyalty could be achieved only in a homogenous

society.  In other words, a state with different cultural and linguistic back-

grounds would find it impossible to achieve national integration and have

the loyalty of its citizens.  This conception of a nation seems to me to be in

line with Friedrich Herder’s conception of it.  This older romantic belief is

that before we can have a nation the people must have the same language

and share the same common ethnic origin.20 I wish to state that this

Herderian conception of a nation seems to me inadequate.  A nation,

according to Benedict Anderson, is imagined; it is a fiction.21 So, except

perhaps for a face-to-face community, there cannot be a nation which

completely satisfies Herder’s definition. This definition of nation is there-

fore not complete because it describes only homogeneous communities.

One may ask, cannot heterogeneous communities constitute a nation?  I

think we can supplement our conception of a nation by stipulating that

Dipo Irele 101



multiple ethnic groups can constitute a nation if they are brought together

on the basis of mutual consent based on certain principles or shared val-

ues.  I shall return to this later.  I need to add that the existence in a nation

of much cultural and linguistic diversity has been an historical fact.  Cul-

tural and linguistic heterogeneity has been far more common to political

units than homogeneity.  Indeed heterogeneity has been a factor favoring

political, social, economic and cultural development.  The existence of

diversity in a nation should not be a problem.  The reason militating against

loyalty and national integration in Africa has to be sought elsewhere.

What has emerged from the above consideration is that a nation

may be made up of an aggregate of persons not belonging to the same

linguistic and cultural groups but they should be held together by mutual

consent and agreement.

Most African countries with different groups were legislated into

existence by the colonial powers in different African countries.  The con-

stitution imposed on the people, for example in Nigeria, from the colonial

period to the present one did not enjoy widespread acceptance among

the different ethnic groups.  This points to the fact that there was no prior

agreement on certain fundamental issues which could have reflected in the

constitution.  This has been the reason why the citizens have been alien-

ated from the state and their loyalty has been to their ethnic groups.

In a perceptive paper, “Colonialism and the Two Publics in Af-

rica: A Theoretical Statement”, Professor Peter Ekeh explains the dynam-

ics that have militated against loyalty in Africa.22 Ekeh contends that there

are two public realms in African social and political universe.  He charac-

terizes one of the realms as primordial and the other civic.  He claims that

the primordial is the “communal” or “sectional” and this is identified with

“the primordial groupings, sentiments, and activities….”23 He goes on to

say that “the primordial public is moral and operates on the same moral

imperative as the private realm”.24 On the other hand, the civil realm “is

amoral and lacks the generalized moral imperatives operative in the pri-

vate and in the primordial public”.25 There is a sense of belonging to the

primordial, while the civil realm lacks this sense of belonging. He claims

further that the civic public derives from the colonial administration and

“has become identified with popular politics in post-colonial Africa”.26

According to him, it is grounded in civil structures: the military, the civil

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service, the police etc.  Ekeh points out that the individual is linked morally

with the primordial realm: “he sees his duties as moral obligations to ben-

efit and sustain a primordial public of which he is a member”.27

The individual does not think he has to benefit from the primordial

realm.  Ekeh says that the concept of citizenship in Europe in which rights

and duties of the citizens are structured does not operate in the African

context in terms of the civic realm.  In this realm, there is no duty corre-

sponding to right hence the individual does not have any sense of obliga-

tion or duty to the civic realm.  Indeed, the attitude to the civic realm is

measured in material terms.  As he puts it, “while the individual seeks to

gain from the civic public, there is no moral urge on him to give back to the

civic public in return for his benefits”.28 In other words, there is no corre-

sponding duty to the right which the citizens get from the civic public.

There is no moral urge in the citizens to give back to the state.  In short,

the civic public is amoral.  In fact, there is the urge to exploit the civic

public for the benefit of his/her primordial group since there is no sense of

belonging.  Ekeh has put it graphically: “The individual seizes largess from

the civic public in order to benefit the primordial public”.29 Ekeh then goes

on to point out the negative effects this has had on the political process in

Africa __ corruption and lack of loyalty to the wider political unit. Ekeh

believes that the civic public needs social morality.

It should be pointed out again that Ekeh's analysis is highly illumi-

nating and it brings out one important point which has been mentioned

earlier. This is that loyalty depends on social values or social morality

which must be the guiding principle in the nation. Besides, the citizens'

basic needs have to be catered for. I shall come back to this issue pres-

ently but before that I wish to point out that Ekeh’s position does not

square with certain facts with the present reality of African politics. It is

not the case that individuals seize largess from the civic public and benefit

their primordial groups. The truth of the case is that individuals seize from

the civic public without benefiting their ethnic groups.  As previously pointed

out, the ruling elite in Africa use the primordial sentiment when it suits them

to protect their vested interest.

The various strifes in many African countries had ethnic colouration.

The civil war in Nigeria was as a result of this. The recent conflict in

Kenya after the elections has ethnic colouration. The Ivorian, Rwandan,

Dipo Irele 103



Liberian, Sierra Leonean conflicts and to some extent the conflicts in So-

malia and Darfur were and are ethnically motivated.

Ekeh’s analysis of citizenship has to be deepened by bringing it up

to date to accommodate the existing reality in Africa.

The discourse on citizenship has had a long history,30 but it is in

recent times that the discourse has become more important due to certain

events in the world: the democratization experiment in Eastern Europe,

parts of Africa and Latin America; the rise of vicious ethnic and national

conflicts, especially in Africa. These events have thrown up challenges to

the discourse of citizenship and various views have been expressed.31 In

the specific case of Africa, the multi-ethnic nature of many African states

has made the theme of citizenship an urgent one in recent years. The eth-

nic groups conceive each other as the Other and there is what could be

termed the politics of difference in these African states. In what follows I

will discuss the concept of citizenship within this context. I need to point

out that the discourse of citizenship has to be reconfigured to accommo-

date the situation in African multi-ethnic states.

The problem of citizenship could be traced to colonialism. Al-

though the idea of citizenship in the colonial period in most multi-ethnic

African countries was grounded on the liberal idea of individual rights.

Colonialism promoted the politics of difference through its policy of divide

and rule. This brought about tension in the post __ colonial African states

since politics was rooted on ethnic lines. The predominant ethnic groups

marginalized the smaller ones and this led to agitations for group rights

rather than individual rights. This demand for group rights has brought into

the fore another dimension to the discourse of citizenship.

The discourse of citizenship in its liberal variant gives priority to

the individual rights: the individual has rights which are sacrosanct, and

which the state cannot infringe upon. From the earlier social contractualists
__ though Rousseau might be an exception __ to Rawls and the British

sociologist Marshall, to some extent, the emphasis has always been on the

rights of the individual as a citizen of a political community.32 Despite the

merit of Marshall’s work in extending the rights __ civic and political __ to

include social rights the focus of his work on citizenship is still the indi-

vidual rights.33

The liberal conception of citizenship rights has to be reconfigured

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in such a way that social institutions have to be refashioned that allow or

accommodate the distinctiveness of each ethnic group. In this way of con-

ceptualizing citizenship rights, these rights are not only bestowed on indi-

viduals as found in the liberal perspective but on ethnic groups as well in

the state. These rights which would be conferred on ethnic groups would

be a recognition of the diversity or the plural nature of the state, and will

lead to an inclusive politics. This could be termed a fourth citizenship right
__ that is, extending the Marshallian three scheme rights of civil, political

and social rights. I shall still come to this issue when I discuss Rawls’s

overlapping consensus.34

Let me quickly traverse the terrain we have covered so far. The

analysis of loyalty has shown that loyalty has to depend on certain social

values or social morality which defines certain principles which guide the

conduct of the citizens. It is in this connection that I have pointed out that

a nation which has these principles which are universalisable would have

the loyalty of its citizens. The most tragic dilemma of our time is how we

can bring about or fashion certain principles and norms, social values (or

social morality) which are binding on all citizens. Colonialism succeeded

in utterly destroying the traditional social values (or consensus) without

succeeding in laying new foundation of any new social value or social

morality, which is why in most African countries it has been difficult to

have loyalty of the citizens.

Furthermore, the citizens in most African countries see the state in

a praetorian fashion.  Hence they are alienated from the government. The

state does not seem to care for them and thus they see it as a hostile force.

In other words, they do not derive any benefits from the state. They see

the state as an aggressive and oppressive one hence they are alienated

from it and seek the solace of their ethnic groups. Since the basic func-

tions of the state which are protection and security of its citizens have

been eroded, and ethnically based militias have taken over and the territo-

rial state has become “a universe of negativity”.  In some African states,

the state has collapsed. Thus, the difficulty in eliciting the loyalty of the

people lies in the alienating nature of the social system. So let me turn now

to the concept of alienation.

There are many definitions of alienation which, as Lukes has

pointed out, “have achieved considerably and widespread contemporary

Dipo Irele 105



currency”.35 But it was through the work of Marx that alienation became

fixed in contemporary consciousness.36 Alienation, for Marx, occurs when

the products and creations __ all those things that are extensions of man’s

personality which should serve to enrich him __ are controlled by external

forces.  They acquire an independent life of their own and they dominate

him.  In its consummate form (i.e. in capitalist society), alienation takes

place in four ways:

1. Man is alienated from his own products

2. Man is alienated from other men through the competitive na-

ture of the economic system which is based on private prop-

erty

3. Man is alienated from nature, a thing that should have en-

riched his creative power

4. Man is alienated from society, which expresses a collective

power that oppresses him.

We can extend the concept of alienation to cover the phenom-

enon of loyalty.  Let us say provisionally that someone is alienated from an

object (A) (a country) when, given his situation, he would normally have

expected to show a sense of loyalty towards A (the country) but in fact

does not.  He will normally be expected to show a sense of loyalty to that

object (A) (a country); that is if he lives within a defined geographical

boundary.  But if he is alienated he does not view the country as his own,

and as a result does not care much about what happens to it.

Anything that one is loyal to he can also be alienated from. If I

come to view an object as mine I feel ashamed about it if it deteriorates,

and hence I can be alienated from it. I have this feeling because I have

created a link between myself and the object which I see as being worthy

of my loyalty. On the other hand absence of any feeling toward an object

which one should, in a normal situation, have a feeling for could also be a

sign of alienation.

There are some casual conditions that normally create loyalty and

lead us to expect it, and of alienation as undesirable state of affair which

exists when these conditions are not present. When do we expect loyalty,

or, what are the conditions that foster loyalty in a nation? It is difficult to

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answer the question in a neat manner, but it is easy to say when people

could be alienated and hence not loyal to their nation.

In these later regard, I'll say that loyalty does not occur in a vacuum.

People would expect a government to be responsive to their minimal needs

before their loyalty could be won. Furthermore, people would wish to see

that they participate in the decision process which affects their lives, that is

not seeing the government in a praetorian fashion, to repeat this phrase

again. The elites in most African countries have turned the state into their

fiefdom and have pauperized their citizens.37

Moreover I pointed out earlier that there are no social values (or

social morality) which would be a guiding principle in African social sys-

tem. The constitutions of most African countries that should embody so-

cial values have in fact been fashioned in such a way that they do not

possess any such thing. There is, therefore, the need to evolve new guid-

ing principles which define the rights and duties of the citizens as well as

the various groups within the social system. These principles would have

to be by mutual consent of various interest groups as well as ethnic groups

and would be the basic principles which would animate the public interest

and promote the public good rather than the interest of a few elites.38

There should be a consensus on these principles __ indeed they have to

consist of what I would call overlapping consensus, to borrow Rawls’s

phrase.39

Rawls in his book, Political Liberalism, develops the idea of over-

lapping consensus which is an extension of his seminal work, A Theory of

Justice.40 I want to utilize his view of overlapping consensus to see how

we can have an agreement on some basic principles which will bring about

a sense of belonging of all the various groups and individuals in the polity.

I need to say that Rawls’s theory is specifically addressed to liberal demo-

cratic societies but I believe that his theory has relevance to African situa-

tion since most African states are also evolving or trying to adopt a proper

democratic system in Africa.

Roughly speaking, Rawls’s account of overlapping consensus

centers on how agreement could be achieved in a society with divergent

views. An overlapping consensus is an agreement on central political, so-

cial and economic issues by individuals and groups who subscribe to con-

flicting comprehensive moral, religious, economic, social and political views.

Dipo Irele 107



Rawls says that a comprehensive view, like many moral or religious views,

contains direct answers to difficult and controversial questions, such as

what is of value in human life?, and what is the nature of the good soci-

ety?41

Again Rawls says a comprehensive view “covers all recognized

values and virtues within one rather precisely articulated scheme of

thought”.42 Rawls believes that in an appropriate setting (original position)

proponents of divergent comprehensive views would accept a common

set of political precepts, although they would be approached in different

ways.  This, according to him, is possible if there are intuitive ideas that

appeal to the different proponents of these comprehensive views. In or-

der to have an overlapping consensus, Rawls believes, there should be a

shared principle of toleration. Through the adoption of the principle of

toleration different views can be harmonized and an overlapping consen-

sus reached among the proponents of different views. Rawls argues that

the overlapping consensus must be acceptable to the members of the

society. He claims that members of the society striving to achieve an over-

lapping consensus must be ready to revise their views on some controver-

sial issues since they will adhere to the principle of toleration and strain of

commitment.

This is supported by the principle of reflective equilibrium dis-

cussed in A Theory of Justice. Rawls claims that dialogue is Socratic in

nature. He argues that our views are justified by being shown to fit into an

integrated web of beliefs and principles.  Through reflective equilibrium,

participants in a dialogue try to achieve consistency between their prin-

ciples and specific cases to which the principles apply. To achieve equilib-

rium they must revise their principles if they do not fit into particular web

of beliefs of which they are certain. They shuttle back and forth until there

is an equilibrium among the various principles.

Though the overall focus of Rawls’s theory is individual’s rights,

these individuals would share the virtue of cooperation that would allow

them to have a bond between themselves. There will be social unity and

they will share the same conception of justice through the overlapping

consensus that has been reached.

This summary omits many details of Rawls account but should be

adequate for our purposes though there are objections which could be

108 Prajna Vihara
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pressed against Rawls which I cannot go into here since they are beyond

the scope of this paper.43 If the different ethnic groups and other divergent

groups could adopt this Socratic method then an agreement could emerge

and consensus reached over principles which would lay down the social

values of the state. The rights and duties of the citizens would be defined.

Additionally, the duty of the state would be defined vis-?-vis its citizens

and its various ethnic groups. In this way the state would no longer be

seen as a hostile force by the people and the tendency to look to one’s

ethnic group for protection would disappear. Further, the domination or

hegemony of one ethnic group over others would disappear and the fierce

contest for state power between the different ethnic groups would also be

eliminated since there would be an equality of opportunity and equitable

sharing of rewards and burdens in the society among the different groups

either ethnic or individual groups. In short, the agreement would embody

social values (or social morality), and these would be the guiding prin-

ciples in the society. The alienating social system that makes loyalty to the

state a mirage would be replaced with a humane system that caters for the

citizens.

Let me conclude by noting that the solution proffered here is a

magical panacea or single solution which can solve all problems pertaining

to ethnic conflicts in Africa. Neither will it bring about utopian harmony

amongst the different ethnic groups but it is considered simply as a way of

negotiating and dealing with ethnic differences and conflicts in a construc-

tive manner.44

Endnotes

1Bruce Berman, Dickson Eyoh & W. Kymlicka (eds). See the text Ethnicity

and Democracy in Africa (Oxford: James Currey; Athens: Ohio University Press,

2004) for the papers on this issue; see also Tunde Zack- Williams, “African Leader-

ship, Nationstate and the Weberian Project”, The Constitution, vol. 8, no. 1, March

2008; Patrick Chabal and Jean - Pascal Daloz, Africa Works: Disorder as Political

Instrument. (Oxford: James Currey; Bloomington, In: Indiana University Press, 1999,

pp. 17-30; Michael  Bratton and Nicholas van Walle, Democratic Experiments in

Africa; Regime Transition in Comparative perspective. (Cambridge; Cambridge

University Press, 1977).
2A. Oldenquist, “Loyalties’ Journal of Philosophy”, Vol. LXXXIX, No 4,

Dipo Irele 109



April 1982, pp. 173-193. I have also gained a lot from the work of S. Keller, The Limits

of Loyalty (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007); See also M. C. Nussbaum,

Patriotism and Cosmopolitanism in J. Cohen (ed.) For Love of Country (Boston:

Beacon Press, (1966).
3Oldenquist, op. cit, p.178: for this point see also M. Billig, Banal Nation-

alism. London: Sage, 1994; see also Craig Calhoun, Nationalism (Buckingham:

Open University Press, 2002.
4Oldenquist, p.177, see also S. Keller, op. cit.
5Oldenquist, p.184.
6Ibid, p. 178.
7R. M. Hare, “Universalizability”, Proceedings on the Aristotelian Soci-

ety, pp. 295-312. See also his books, The Language of Morals, (Oxford: OUP, 1964);

Freedom and Reason (Oxford: OUP, 1965).
8T. Nagel, The Possibility of Altruism (Oxford: OUP, 1974).
9A. Oldenquist, op. cit, p. 175.
10Ibid.
11Ibid.
12Ibid.
13Ibid.
14Ibid.
15Ibid.
16Ibid, p.176.
17For this view see, P. Ekeh, “Citizenship and Political Conflict” in J. Okpaku

(ed), Dilemma of Nationhood (N. Y.: NOK Press,). 1974.
18For this line of position, see O. Nnoli, Ethnic Politics in Nigeria (Enugu:

Fourth Dimension, 1980); see also Tunde Zack - Williams, op. cit.
19P. C. Rosenblatt, “Origins and Effects of Group Ethnocentrism and Na-

tionalism”, Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 8, No. 2, 1964. Cf also Calhoun, op.

cit.
20For a lucid elaboration of Herder’s position, see J. Plamenatz, “Two types

of Nationalism” in Nationalism, E. Kamenka (ed) (London: E. Arnold, 1976), pp. 24-

47; cf also Calhoun op. cit. see also John Hutchinson & Anthony D. Smith, Ethnicity

(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996).
21I am inclined towards Anderson’s position that any nation is an imag-

ined community. For this position, see B. Anderson, Imagined Communities: Re-

flections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism, rev. ed. (London: Verso, 1991).
22P. Ekeh, “Colonialism and the Two Publics in Africa: A Theoretical State-

ment”, Comparative Studies in Society and History Vol. 117, No. 1, 1975.
23Ibid, p.92.
24Ibid.
25Ibid.
26Ibid.
27Ibid, p. 106.

110 Prajna Vihara
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28Ibid, p. 107.
29Ibid, p. 110.
30For an historical trajectory of the concept of citizenship, see, J.G.A. Pocock,

“The Ideal of Citizenship since Classical Times”. Queens Quarterly no.1, 1999; see

also Gerard Delanty, Citizenship in a Global Age: Society, Culture, Politics

(Buckingham & Philadelphia: Open University Press, 2000); see also Said Adejumobi,

“Identity, Citizenship and Conflict” in W.A Fawole and Charles Ukeje,  The Crisis of

the State and Regionalism in West Africa: Identity, Citizenship and Conflict (Dakar:

Codestria, 2005).
31There are liberal, communitarian and radical views on the concept of

citizenship. For an analysis of these various views, see G. Delanty, op. cit.; see also

Macedo’s text, Liberal Virtues: Citizenship, Virtue and Community in Liberal

Constitutionalism (Oxford: Clarendon, 1990) for a perceptive view on the issue of

citizenship.
32See, J. Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap, 1971),

Pars. 1, 68; Political Liberalism (N. Y.: Columbia University Press, 1993) ; T. H.

Marshall, Citizenship and Social Class and other Essays (Cambridge: Cambridge

University Press, 1950).
33For a survey and evaluation of his work, see J.M. Barbalet, Citizenship:

Rights, Struggle and Class Inequality (Milton Kaynes: Open University Press,

1988).
34I have relied and appropriated some of the ideas from Will Kymlicka’s

text, Multicultural Citizenship: A Liberal Theory of Minority Rights (Oxford: Ox-

ford University Press, 1995); For a similar position, see Partha Chatterjee, “Reli-

gious Minorities and the Secular State: Reflections on an Indian Impasse” Public

Culture. Vol. 8, no. 1.1995.
35S. Lukes, “Alienation and Anomie” in Philosophy, Politics and Society in

P. Laslett and W. G. Runciman (Oxford: Blackwell Press,1975).
36K. Marx, Early Writings (London: Penguin, 1978).
37For the failure of leadership in most African countries, see, Chinua

Achebe, The Trouble with Nigeria (London: Heinemann, 1993); see also these

texts which give vivid accounts of how the elites have behaved in most African

countries, Jean -Fran?ois Bayart, The State in Africa: The Politics of the Belly

(London: Longman, 1993); B. Ayittey, Africa Betrayed (N. Y.: St. Martins Press,

1992); Jean-Fran?ois Bayart, Stephen Ellis, and Beatrice Hibou, The Criminalization

of the State in Africa (London: Zed Books Ltd, 2006), see especially chapter 5; see

also some papers in Africa Now S. Ellis (ed) (Oxford: James Curry Ltd, 1997). I need

to add here that there is massive corruption perpetuated by the elites in most

African countries; for this  see P. Bond, Looting Africa: The Economics of Exploi-

tation (London: Zed Books Ltd, 2006), Chapter 5. cf. also Tunde Zack-Williams.

Op.cit.
38I am quite conscious of the ambiguity of the concept of public interest.

For an interesting analysis of the concept see, Brian Barry, Political Argument (N.

Dipo Irele 111



Y,: Humanities Press, 1965).
39For an elaboration of this idea, see John Rawls, Political Liberalism (N.

Y.: Columbia Press , 1996), pp. 133-168; For a position along the same line, see David

Gauthier, Morals by Agreement (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1986); See also Brian

Barry, Justice as Impartiality, (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995): John Rawls (Oxford:

OUP, pp. 60-77.
40J Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Cambridge, Mass; Harvard University

Press, 1971).
41J. Rawls, Political Liberalism, p.134.
42Ibid. p. 152.
43I cannot go into the various objections here but for some objections see

Brian Barry’s text; op. cit. Rawls’s version of original position has been improved

upon by T. M. Scalon. For Scalonian text, see, “Contractualism and Utilitarianism”,

in A. Sen. and B. Williams (eds), Utilitarianism and Beyond (Cambridge: Cam-

bridge University Press, 1982). and also The Cambridge Companion to Rawls in S.

Freeman (eds), (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003). For a critique of

Rawls from a radical perspective in recent times see  Suman Gupta, The Theory and

Reality of Democracy  (London & N. Y.: Continuum, 2006).

*I wish to thank Prof. Abiola Irele of Harvard University, U.S.A for his

comments and suggestions which have improved the paper and members of the

Premiere Circle __ group of scholars and writers - at the University of Ibadan, Nigeria
__ for their comments on the paper when it was presented at the group’s seminar.

44For another position that could help in solving ethnic strife in Africa see

the text of Kwasi Wiredu, “Democracy and Consensus” in Cultural Universals and

Particulars: An African Perspective (Bloomington, In: Indiana University Press,

1996).

112 Prajna Vihara
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