BOTHWELL MSIMANGO
57898812
PLS1502 – ASSESSMENT 2
ESSAY QUESTION : OPTION A
Why is the definition of African philosophy an inherently political exercise?
The subject of philosophy is a complex and difficult field of self-discovery in a world of
multiplexed differences across all areas of life in general. To pin the word philosophy to
a single definition will suggest an encapsulating stance on the vastness of the
philosophies that have since developed from its inception as a stand-alone discipline.
By the assertions of philosophy alone being a massive term to unpack, the contextual
applicability of African philosophy in political exercises casts a bleak light of capability
to put a stamp on its meaning. This essay thusly aims to explain how, since the end of
colonial rule in Africa, the continent has had as many democratic celebrations as
contestations. This writing will probe and attempt to set a dormant standpoint around
the democratic transition in South Africa by citing the remitting outcome of the
prospection of its democracy by stating a hypothesis of textual resolute.
According to Imbo (1998: 5), “there is no one philosophical school or method that is
always dominant, completely confident in its conclusions. There is simply no single
method of dealing with philosophical problems.” This suggests that the greatest and or
supreme cause for contestations, regardless of the topic, arena, or field of debate, is
disagreement. African philosophy as a topic well within the nascency of its
establishment as a renowned pool of knowledge, school of thought and doctrinal pillar,
is primordially the cause for contestations. The determinant factor of whether the
democratic era in South Africa has built or unbuilt the expectation of its formation comes
from the unbalanced and biased closure of an African philosophy that really is not yet
universally dubbed as a founded philosophy (Wiredu 1980, p. 36). In the context of
South African post-colonial sociocultural progressions pertaining to democratized
imperatives of liberating measures, African philosophy is arguably not rooted and or
footed on the wisdom from an implicit African disposition, as per the true definition of
the word. Imbo (1998, p. 9) denotes this idea by upholding the European dominance of
philosophical reasoning for a building, structuring of a world that is systematized by its
defacto speaking for all humanity. It thereby set the tone for the manner in which the
prime determiner of the democratic turn of South Africa’s formulative administration
being the government has adopted philosophy and deemed it African.
Post-colonial rule in Africa has fundamentally been the driver of cohesion towards
Eurocentrism by merit, as it were, of the idealization of progressive socio-political-
economic development with the modernization of the total African person and part.
Additionally, and complementarily, a study by the South African Labour and
Development Unit (SALDRU) illustrates that the demising plight of continual disagreeing
creeds and dogma from different ideologies, traditions and generic ordinances because
of identity, ethnic and social differences, has deepened its grounding for post-
democratization contestations (Hino et al 2018, p. 13). The study also found that one
highly contributing factor, of course, to the social contestations surrounding the political
climate of disagreements, disunity and factional segments is the fear of blindly
enthroning a party player for continued extreme inequality which creates an overall
ambience of dissatisfaction that resultantly brews contestations (2018, p. 5).
57898812
PLS1502 – ASSESSMENT 2
ESSAY QUESTION : OPTION A
Why is the definition of African philosophy an inherently political exercise?
The subject of philosophy is a complex and difficult field of self-discovery in a world of
multiplexed differences across all areas of life in general. To pin the word philosophy to
a single definition will suggest an encapsulating stance on the vastness of the
philosophies that have since developed from its inception as a stand-alone discipline.
By the assertions of philosophy alone being a massive term to unpack, the contextual
applicability of African philosophy in political exercises casts a bleak light of capability
to put a stamp on its meaning. This essay thusly aims to explain how, since the end of
colonial rule in Africa, the continent has had as many democratic celebrations as
contestations. This writing will probe and attempt to set a dormant standpoint around
the democratic transition in South Africa by citing the remitting outcome of the
prospection of its democracy by stating a hypothesis of textual resolute.
According to Imbo (1998: 5), “there is no one philosophical school or method that is
always dominant, completely confident in its conclusions. There is simply no single
method of dealing with philosophical problems.” This suggests that the greatest and or
supreme cause for contestations, regardless of the topic, arena, or field of debate, is
disagreement. African philosophy as a topic well within the nascency of its
establishment as a renowned pool of knowledge, school of thought and doctrinal pillar,
is primordially the cause for contestations. The determinant factor of whether the
democratic era in South Africa has built or unbuilt the expectation of its formation comes
from the unbalanced and biased closure of an African philosophy that really is not yet
universally dubbed as a founded philosophy (Wiredu 1980, p. 36). In the context of
South African post-colonial sociocultural progressions pertaining to democratized
imperatives of liberating measures, African philosophy is arguably not rooted and or
footed on the wisdom from an implicit African disposition, as per the true definition of
the word. Imbo (1998, p. 9) denotes this idea by upholding the European dominance of
philosophical reasoning for a building, structuring of a world that is systematized by its
defacto speaking for all humanity. It thereby set the tone for the manner in which the
prime determiner of the democratic turn of South Africa’s formulative administration
being the government has adopted philosophy and deemed it African.
Post-colonial rule in Africa has fundamentally been the driver of cohesion towards
Eurocentrism by merit, as it were, of the idealization of progressive socio-political-
economic development with the modernization of the total African person and part.
Additionally, and complementarily, a study by the South African Labour and
Development Unit (SALDRU) illustrates that the demising plight of continual disagreeing
creeds and dogma from different ideologies, traditions and generic ordinances because
of identity, ethnic and social differences, has deepened its grounding for post-
democratization contestations (Hino et al 2018, p. 13). The study also found that one
highly contributing factor, of course, to the social contestations surrounding the political
climate of disagreements, disunity and factional segments is the fear of blindly
enthroning a party player for continued extreme inequality which creates an overall
ambience of dissatisfaction that resultantly brews contestations (2018, p. 5).
