Transcending the Conventional Development Paradigm in Africa: What about the Afro-modernism Way?

Abstract

Abstract While empirical evidence evinces that the conventional development model has significantly yielded desired socioeconomic impacts in the North, the same has virtually failed to demonstrate similar scores in Africa. Today, poverty, in its dimensionality, constitutes the lives of many people on the continent. According to this paper, this situation calls for a new philosophical and pragmatic shift – the Afro-modernism model. Therefore, this paper aims to examine the potential and relevance of this theory insofar as Africa’s development impasse is concerned. This analytical paper has benefited from a systematic review of empirical and theoretical literature. It argues that despite inherent intricacies, the theory presents the continent with a unique opportunity to genuinely engage with and draw from a communally-informed framework – “ubuntu” in the process of reimagining and reinventing the community’s aspirations and goals, but at the same time, making use of the most relevant attributes present in the prevailing dominant conventional model for a comprehensively desired outcome.