African Anarchism : The History of A Movement

Chapter 6 : Obstacles to the Development of Anarchism in Africa

Anarchist theory, to put it mildly, is seen in Africa as a fringe, leftist ideology ; one indication of this is that anarchism usually receives no more than a passing nod in the syllabi of African university classes. This is paradoxical because in no other continent have anarchist tendencies been as strong as in Africa, and because in modern times the prospect of turning mass action into class struggle remains brightest in Africa. We shall now consider some of the factors that have worked against the development of anarchism in Africa.

Colonial Education

One of the unpleasant realities we encountered while writing this book was how little the contemporary African, including the African political or social scientist (who has probably taken a course or two on comparative political ideologies), knows about anarchism. In terms of literature, virtually nothing is to be found on the bookshelves of universities and bookstores. This is not surprising, however ; in his critique of marxism, Ron Taber points out that for over 70 years, anarchism was eclipsed by marxism. Nowhere has this subordination of anarchism to marxist “socialism” been more profound than in Africa.

Much of the dearth of anarchist literature in Africa is a result of the colonial educational system and the concomitant hegemony of Western imperialist literature in Africa. Colonial education in Africa did not seek to educate large numbers of students ; rather, European educators selected what they considered the cream of the crop for advanced schooling. One result of this is that only a relatively small proportion of Africa’s population has been and is literate. A corollary of this was the emergence of an academic elite who considered themselves superior to the rest of the people. Because its philosophical and ideological assumptions were taken from European class societies, and not from communal and relatively unstratified African societies, colonial education was disintegrative rather than unifying.

Traditional African education, in contrast, emphasized the interdependence of individuals within the community rather than competition between them. It instilled a group social consciousness and fostered an egalitarian spirit ; this in turn naturally led to an emphasis on common endeavors and the sharing of the products they generated. On the other hand, colonial education emphasized individualism and made social existence competitive. The communal spirit was supplanted by the concept of the isolated self and greed, materialism, and an unbridled desire for domination. Consequently, Africa has become a continent of atomistic, antagonistic, and competitive groups strongly committed to tribal loyalties and dominated by ethnocentric views.

In sum, colonial education has led to a high level of illiteracy in Africa combined with very low political consciousness, even among the educated. Neither Eurocentric nor Afrocentric scholars have researched anarchism as it relates to Africa. This has ensured that anarchism as a systematic body of thought remains an esoteric, if not unknown, subject to many Africans.

The Legal System

African legal systems are a hangover from the colonial past. For example, as in other former British colonies, the legal system in Nigeria is simply an imitation of British common law and equity. It views native laws and customs as barbarous to the extent that they do not reflect European standards and value systems.

Colonial laws were formulated essentially to maintain “law and order,” and this remains the cardinal aim of post-colonial African laws. This contrasts sharply with the pre-colonial African system of rights and freedoms. Traditional African societies had an intense sense of humanity and respect for human dignity. Pre-colonial Africans enjoyed most of the rights that today would fall under the rubric of civil and political rights, such as freedom of association, freedom of movement, and freedom of expression. Basic economic and social rights, like the right to the use of a piece of land, the right to work, and the right to an education, were also common in traditional African societies. And these rights were recognized and protected. “Adjudication,” if it can be called such, typically consisted of a fair “hearing” for opposing parties before the entire village or a council from it ; the decision reached was respected and usually considered final. Post-colonial African legal systems, though, conceive of law as a body of rules for the preservation of the state and the perpetuation of order and stability. In many places any advocacy of the overthrow of the state is considered treason and is punishable by death.

In an attempt to humanize African legal systems, in June 1981 the 18th assembly of heads of state and government of the Organization of African Unity adopted the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights. (Their collective conscience had been pricked by Idi Amin’s Uganda, Jean Bedel Bokassa’s Central African Republic, and Marcias Nguema’s Equatorial Guinea.) This charter sought to nudge Africa’s legal systems away from their heavy colonial influences ; it was somewhat influenced by African tradition with its emphasis (relative to Western traditions) on the individual as part of a group and the correlation of rights with duties. However, the Charter falls far short of prescribing new laws that could guarantee the rights, liberty and economic well-being of the majority of the people.

For instance, Article 13(1) of the Charter guarantees as follows the right to participate in government : “every citizen shall have the right to freely participate in the government of his country, either directly or through freely chosen representatives in accordance with the provisions of the law.” In analyzing this proviso, we can see that the accommodating clause, “in accordance with the provisions of the law,” strips the article of any meaningful human rights content. Equally, “the right to freely participate” is vague and meaningless and is of no consequence. The objective interpretation of the clause is that one is “free” only to the extent specified in the applicable national laws. Kotey argues that against the background of the African experience of one-party states, military dictatorships, and “revolutionary” autocracies, to offer the African people the right to participate in the governance of their countries within the parameters established by national law is to offer nothing at all.

In sum, African legal systems remain an impediment to the development of anarchism in Africa. The extant body of laws is capitalist inspired and is designed to perpetuate the status quo and the state system. In most parts of Africa, military dictatorships and civilian autocracies have introduced decrees and statutes that prohibit workers from organizing themselves into unions. In some countries, in fact, strikes and other forms of workers’ actions are absolutely prohibited. To the extent that it sees nothing fundamentally wrong with the state system in Africa, The African Charter cannot address the issue of class antagonisms and oppression on the African continent.

And at the same time, as long as Africans continue to support the Western/colonialist-inspired legal system — and, importantly, to accept its underlying philosophies and rationale — African legal systems will remain an important obstacle to both human freedom and the development of anarchism in Africa.

The Military Class and the Status Quo

As discontent continues to heighten and the possibility of revolutionary action increases, the African military continues to act to maintain the status quo. Roger Murray explains military intervention as an attempt to prevent the radicalization of the people and revolutionary situations. Underlying this is the fact that the military is a central component of the national ruling class in all African countries and thus benefits from both continued government rule and from alliances with foreign investors and, in many cases, bribes from them.

The military itself perceives its function as protection of the state from both internal and external threats. This becomes obvious when one examines military coups. Professor Nnoli notes that in the January 1966 coup in Nigeria, the coup plotters had no intention, either stated or implied, of advancing the interests of the poor. “Their interest was [in] the reformation of the system, in other words, to achieve the interests of the privileged classes without imposing undue strains on the system.” Yet some commentators have dubbed this particular military coup as “revolutionary.” To dispel such illusions, all one needs to do is to look at the concrete economic, social, and human rights results of African military coups. The results are invariably enrichment of the military, continued impoverishment of the majority, and woeful abuses of human rights.

To summarize : as the radicalization of mass consciousness increases, the military intervenes under the guise of attempting to stop society from sliding into a state of “anarchy” — a deliberately misused catchword for chaos and disorder. What the military succeeds in doing is to temporarily roll back the gains of working people and peasants in their attempts to build better lives for themselves.

Ethnic Versus Class Consciousness

The national question in African politics derives from Africa’s colonial history and present-day neo-colonialism. The process of colonialization in Africa in which ethnic groups were arbitrarily regrouped into artificial political bodies has resulted in increased ethnic tensions and social and economic discrimination. Onigu Otite has noted that unequal access to political and economic resources among the various ethnic groups inevitably transforms ethnic divisions into antagonisms. Capitalist competition over control of the machinery of government plays on ethnic sentiments and sets groups against each other. Thus issues are distorted and simplified as ethnic- rather than class-based. In a paper presented to the Nigerian Anthropological and Sociological Association, Dr. Inyang Eteng exposes the successes of the Nigerian ruling class in utilizing ethnicity and religion to conceal “the class basis of most of the country’s basic problems.” According to Eteng, “the pernicious consequence of ethnic [consciousness] is to encourage communal hatred, corruption, violence, religious manipulation, interethnic conflict and to undermine the growth of class consciousness in favour of ethnic/state consciousness.”

All of this makes it difficult for anarchism to take root in Africa because the bosses find it easy to atomize the working class by fanning the embers of ethnicity. The labor movement, for instance, becomes polarized along ethnic lines, and issues are seen through ethnic prisms. In Nigeria, when the National Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) called a general strike in 1994 to demand an end to military dictatorship, the leadership of NUPENG branches in the northern part of the country resisted the strike. Their reason ? They felt an ethnic identification with the military dictator, who is a northerner.

Religious and Cultural Factors

Religion is a profound feature of African life. Long before the earliest contact with Europeans, Africans had developed religious belief systems and ritual practices. This religious belief pattern was culture-based to a great extent, and it found expression in myths surrounding life and death questions. As we saw in Chapter three, certain beliefs and rituals actually solidified the communal nature of traditional African societies. But, like all religions, traditional African religions had conservative/reactionary aspects. The preeminent place accorded the supreme being or god in the affairs of men required every member of society to act and think in prescribed manners ; holding beliefs perceived to run contrary to mainstream societal mores and values led to dire consequences.

Despite the compatibility of anarchism and the traditional African way of life, African culture still frowns on any set of ideas that conflict with religious beliefs or that promote values that lie outside the so-called mainstream, especially if they involve the overthrow of the existing system. This is not surprising, however, given the close affinity between spiritual and temporal powers.

Religion will continue to be an inhibiting factor despite such material factors as capitalist exploitation, social and economic inequality, and governmental tyranny — all of which inspire despair, upon which religion, especially imported Western religion, feeds. If war is the health of the state, despair is the health of religion. Until African workers and peasants find belief systems that provides them with real hope of happiness in the here and now, they will continue to grasp at religion’s false hope of happiness in the hereafter.

International Solidarity

As stated earlier, anarchism as a systematic body of thought is only now beginning to find adherents in Africa. Much remains to be done. High in priority is the need to make people aware of the theoretical bases of anarchism, and to understand that anarchism is at the least as credible as other ideologies. In Africa today, as in too many other places, the word anarchism is synonymous with violence and chaos. But the image of anarchism will change if sufficient literature becomes available on the subject. To this end, anarchist groups in Africa need to set up a press to produce leaflets, pamphlets, and newsletters. There is also the need for alternatives to the state electronic media, which along with state- and corporate-controlled newspapers is almost the only source of information for workers at present.

Africa remains a continent where no single ideological model can be judged to have been successful. Unlike America and Europe, where capitalism and “communism” have been institutionalized and practiced with qualified and limited successes, Africa presents an historical opportunity for any ideology capable of lifting people out of their present-day misery. Existing anarchist groups on the continent must and will play an important historical role in this regard.

Africa also needs international support for its emerging anarchist groups, which have only begun to challenge the state/capitalist system. Without international support, these groups, whom the governments view simply as troublemakers, stand little chance against the organized terror of the state. Because of the alliance between the state and international capital, local ruling classes are bound to receive the support of their international collaborators in crushing any perceived threat to the status quo.

In the last resort, will the local ruling classes call in foreign troops in an attempt to maintain their privileges, as occurred in Shaba Province in the Congo in the 1960s ? Of course they will. Clearly the fight against international capital and against the state system must proceed internationally if it is to have any hope of success.