Reviewed by Ronald Elly Wanda
Tuesday, September 15, 2015.
When we think of ethical problems involving the
nature of democracy in Africa, probably none is more paradigmatic than the
issue of social justice. The linkage and interface between democracy and social
justice in the continent remains such a heated subject. In a new book by
American scholar Carol Gould that traces the social roots of global justice, Interactive Democracy (October 2014), we
learn that these frictions have international dimensions and are as such a
global problem. At the first instance this may appear simplistic, perhaps even
strictly unnecessary, given the thousands of books already dedicated on the
subject. However, upon scratching the ethical surface, it is in fact a very
useful contribution. Barely a year since its publication, the book has already
received the 2015 Joseph B. Gittler Prize from the American Philosophical
Association.
In Africa at the moment, there is an ongoing mediumistic
hallucination in some government quarters with an extravagant appetite for
political autocracy. This has triggered a critical public debate as to whether
mandated power alternation ought to still be a crucial tenet of democracy,
making Gould’s contribution timely indeed. In eastern Africa for instance, save
for Tanzania that has a general election slated for 25th of October
2015 and Kenya some time in 2017, the entire region’s political leadership has
consistently violated the concept of ‘term limits’ as a very basic yet crucial democratic tenet - contrary to what
American political theorist Robert Dahl had observed in his 1961 classic Who Governs?
The bone of contention revolving around rulers such as Yoweri
Museveni of Uganda (in power since 1986); Paul Kagame of Rwanda(in power since
2003); Pirre Nkurunziza of Burundi(in power since 2005); Joseph Kabila (in
power since 2001), ironically of “Democratic” Republic of Congo – to name but a
few, is that democracy is a serious nuisance if not an outright inconvenience
to the ‘big man’ whose interests are somehow served by a perpetually crippled
Africa – an environment where the big man’s word is final. Arguably, such
leaders remain a major but often neglected cause of the continent’s demise.
Term limits aside, the struggle for democracy in
Africa championed largely by civil society groups has managed to tease out the
interconnectedness between politics and (in)justice by raising questions of
human dignity, respect and sustainable human development. By recovering and uncovering the links in
theory and practice between democracy, human rights, and social justice,
Professor Gould’s book opens a gateway into these connections in a way that
reclaims democracy by refreshing its emancipatory promises.
For Gould,
as for Aristotle, one of the godfathers of European philosophy, justice is a
concept of complex structure within which we should distinguish a constant
formal element and a varying material element. Drawing inspiration from earlier
thinkers, including Emile Durkheim, Karl Marx, and Iris Young among others,
Professor Gould advances what she calls the principle of "equal positive
freedom" by incorporating it into human rights theory as a guiding
normative perspective in the context of democracy and global justice. The
principle, she argues, helps create balance between democratic participation at
the local, national and international levels.
Section one of the book lays out Gould’s
integrative theoretical framework, and as the book progresses, its normative
perspective is rooted in the fundamental recognition of “people's equality as
agents"(see page 17). Agency we are told is the affirmation of one's
“personal identity, or subjective existence, through concrete action in the
world." With the introductory principle in view, human rights and
democracy fall into place in an integrated theoretical framework, thus creating
the justice claim to "equal
positive freedom" that she had discussed earlier on (see page 3).
The second section of the book titled "The
Social Roots of Global Justice” contains an extensive discussion of social and
cultural realities and practices beyond the political aspects of human rights
and justice, which connect abstract norms of global justice to concrete
interactions and anchor normative principles in existing practices, and
resistance to them. An impressively broad spectrum of issues unfolds in the
chapters - from gender inequality to the sociality of humor. Among them, my
favourite topic the discussion of ‘community solidarity’ is particularly
valuable. Her discussion, corresponding to the outstanding work on restorative
justice by the late Ugandan scholar Professor Dani Nabudere in his book Afrikology (2011), re-conceptualizes
solidarity beyond a cohesive local and national community in terms of the
supportive relations - given the interconnections that are being established
through work or other economic ties, through participation in Internet forums
and especially through social media, or indirectly through environmental impact
(see page 99). She argues that these solidarities are important due to their
potential contribution "to the emergence of more democratic forms of
transnational interaction" and
because they are a condition that enables the recognition of human rights as well
as their fulfillment on a global scale (chapters 6 and 7). An immense advantage
of this conceptualization of solidarities, in Gould’s view, is in its ability
to make sense of how justice, democracy and the fulfillment of human rights
might be advanced. She points out that it does not leave individuals,
associations and social groups overwhelmed in the face of an impossible task
but rather helps break up a gigantic and highly complex struggle for human
rights and global justice into interconnected parts that seem to fall within
the range of human possibilities in as far a place as my wife’s village in Maua
in Kenya to hectic New York, where Gould herself is a distinguished professor
at the Hunter College, City University. The discussion of transnational solidarities
in chapters 5 and 6 relates solidarity to the suffering of others and the
ability to feel empathy with them.
Transnational interactions urge the better off
to recognize the suffering of the worse off parties to the interaction and take
joint action to alleviate their suffering. Though in most cases the better off
provide assistance to the worse off, solidarity is importantly seen a mutual
process, with a reciprocal dimension. The provision of assistance is not a
one-sided act of charity but is informed by the hypothesis that, were pertinent
circumstances to arise, the aid would be reciprocated. Indeed, the wrongs that
transnational solidarities seek to rectify are shaped, to an extent, by
international and global structures and powers that bring about wellbeing for
some and deprivation for others, the distributions of benefits and burdens are
unfair and often arbitrary. Therefore, it is indeed important that the
connection between the better and the worse off through structures of power is
recognized and aid given under these circumstances is not seen as an act of
benevolent altruism but as a mutual action urged by the interconnection (see
page 116).
The third section of the book draws on the
discussion and insights from the first two parts of the book outlining the
vision of "interactive democracy", where local, national,
transnational and global modes of participation, decision-making, and
deliberation interact. In this section, we find perceptive analyses and
discussions of constitutive parts of a long-term and massive project of
creating interactive democracy through an internal web of the International
Labor Organization, for example.
Conclusively, with careful optimism Professor
Gould’s book makes a compelling case that there is room for progressive social
movements, civil society associations, and ordinary citizens that rise against
oppression, repression and dire inequality even in the darkest corners of
Africa. Although it is anachronistic to point out that the colonized mindset in
Africa is still a major factor impeding democratic development concerns, the
stark reality is that since independence African states focused policies at
addressing economic obstacles to development and deliberately ignored or
disregarded ideas about the need to create autonomous spaces in public
discourses.
Sadly, today in Africa degrading and outdated
stereo-types are still dominant in public policy discussions to which elected
leaders, civil servants, political commentators, and even community activists
themselves subscribe and at times even contribute. On the scale of things, Gould is hopeful that the increased new forms
of cultural creativity and interconnections facilitated by communications
technologies and cooperation that communities across the world have a reason to
start counting the ‘big man’s days.
(Carol C.
Gould, Interactive Democracy: The
Social Roots of Global Justice, Cambridge University Press, 2014,
293pp., $29.99 (pbk), ISBN 9781107607415).
Ronald Elly Wanda is the Director of Grundtvig Africa House,
Nairobi, Kenya.
Email: ronald2wanda@yahoo.co.uk, Twitter:
elly_wanda