African Humanism and Ethics: The Cases of Ubuntu and Omolúwàbí

Abstract

In this chapter, Dauda offers a realistic summary of Africa’s governance predicament. African nationalist leaders have searched in vain for an appropriate political system and a relevant constitutional arrangement for socioeconomic development. Also inspired by the post-World War II development in the Union of Soviet Socialist Russia, African leaders have experimented to no avail with different socialist systems of government, but a breakdown of law and order, electoral riggings and violent changes of government, political instability, economic and financial corruption, and a general breach of human rights remain prevalent throughout the continent of Africa. The tragedy of the African nation-states is that the presumed political institutions for governance and socioeconomic development have become the problem rather than the solution itself. Dauda deploys the significance of African humanism to argue that the Ubuntu and Omoluwabi values can fill in the philosophical gaps for governance in Africa.