For those who are unfamiliar, there is an Afrikaans proverb – which is a slight, and closer to home, variation of the story of the story of the tortoise and the hare and the subject of my peculiar linguistic affinity to grouped vowels – “ Agteros kom ook in die kraal ” (eng. the last ox eventually gets into the pen), which speaks to the eventuality of all good things. Post-independence, western traditional theories of international relations infantilised Africa; painting it as a continent that was genuinely lagging behind, was in need of foreign assistance and one that would need to adopt a ready-made guide to modernization.
But what is up with that? What is modernization theory? What consequences did it have for early African development? And why do I think the metaphorical “agteros” places Africa in a particularly advantageous position?
As a scholar, I adopted a personal theoretical typology of African socio-political eras; a four-fold one, consisting of four distinct phases: 1. Africa undisturbed, 2. Africa interrupted, 3. Africa deconstructed and 4. Africa re-imagined. The phases, which I will discuss in a future blog post, follow the linear progression of the African socio-political identity, starting from Africa’s pre-modern era and evolving into the current epoch.
Using this typology, modernization as we know it (based on a western developmental model) began during phase two, the time in history during which colonial forces descended upon the continent and set up their own bodies of control. We all know that this changed the established social, economic and political systems on the continent, introducing an oppressive and exploitative system. The justification for colonialism was the self-imposed European moral and philanthropic burden to civilize the continent - a desire to usher a 'dark continent' towards the world. Modernity with a heavy price. However, it continued when Africa post-colonially entered the third phase - with the prescription of a western path to other newly-independent geo-political spaces. This is because a popular theory of international relations (and other schools of socio-political inquiry), modernization theory, encouraged the foreign facilitation of African nations towards modernity.
Because modernization was (and still continues to be linked) to the European led revolutions into a post agrarian world, there was a desire to directly transplant that developmental framework to the African continent. Unfortunately, the adoption of a ‘modernization’ framework was problematic. This because it involved an initial pressure to break the chains of traditional society and then the subsequent human control of the social and physical environment. Moreover, it sought to homogenize the global space, creating cookie-cutter versions of the same country. However, taking into consideration the uniqueness of each nation state, whether geographically, ecologically, socially or historically, or even an analogy on why high schools have at least 3 different academic streams, can help you to understand why the shoe did not fit. All in all, the western industrial based framework has even proven not to be sustainable enough for both the environment and the human pyscho-social configuration - not only in Africa but in its geo-political origins.
Now, at the brink of societal collapse caused by structural faults, we are forced to reconsider this entire framework and Africa, who has been internationally criticized for lagging behind in the race to modernization, stands in a peculiarly advantageous place: it gets the chance to asses its current trajectory and redraft its plan to move into the post-industrial modern era – and to prevent repeating the same mistakes.
This turning of tides will likely be shaped by two main factors; firstly, a pan-African approach to sustainable development with firm roots in Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK). TEK is a cumulative and dynamic corpus of traditional African knowledge, practices and beliefs of sustainability. Sought after by academics and environmentalists alike, the TEK framework can help to foster sustainable technological development in the form of green cities, dualistic villages to preserve traditional lifestyles while incorporating important elements of Information and communications technology and set a precedent internationally. Secondly, the reconfiguration of social systems and norms that encourage and prioritize well-being and revolutionary educational systems that reinforce these new thought systems. Here, the potential is genuinely limitless and African peoples engaging from every sector have the job to innovate and disrupt. The 226 Million youth in Africa have the chance to take the reigns and forge a new global destiny.
"The potential is limitless and African peoples engaging from every sector have the job to innovate and disrupt."
Finally, constructivists conceptualize the world as being fueled by ideas. What we think of our selves in the geo-political realm is more important than the powers that be, because ideas and concepts are ephemeral and mutually constructed and reconstructed across aeons. Thus, re-evaluating how Africa perceives its delayed immersion in the modern world is the first step to utilizing the unique position we find ourselves in.
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