Relational Autonomy, Personhood, and African Traditions

Abstract

feature of communalism in African traditions is its normative conception of personhood, which indicates how a community, based on its values, obligations, and social recognition, may shape an individual’s identity and choices. Some have argued that this communal view of personhood is inconsistent with or vitiates autonomy because the community strongly determines the choices that individuals make, and in some cases it imposes its will on individuals such that they are prevented from freely making their own choices. I argue that the conception of personhood and the relations between community and indi viduals in African traditions are not inconsistent with the idea of autonomy. Such inconsistency exists only if we assume falsely that autonomy must be construed negatively and in an extreme individualistic metaphysical sense of the free will of an isolated and non-relational individual. I argue that the idea of personhood in African traditions implies a relational and positive sense of autonomy, which involves the community helping or guiding one to use one’s ability and knowledge of one’s social relations and circumstance to choose freely the requisite goods for achieving one’s life plan. In contrast, a negative sense of autonomy involves simply leaving one alone to make free choices and not to interfere with one’s ability to make free choices. The idea of ‘relational autonomy’ is understood in philosophical literature as an alternati ve conception of what it means for one to be a free and self-governing person, in that such a person is socially constituted and embedded in a social environment, culture, or tradition that indicates value commitments, social obligations, interpersonal relationships, and mutual dependencies. 3 The African view of relational autonomy is defined and bolstered by communal realities, relationships, values, interests, obligations, and modes of meaning. These social relationships and obligations not