This article offers a historical but critical perspective on the influence of colonisation on political cultures in African states. It seeks to interrogate how colonialism has influenced Africa’s political systems. There is little literature that exists to explain the influence of colonialism on contemporary African politics. As an oppressive system, colonialism was rooted in white dominance, “racial hierarchy”, and exploitation. This led to the setting up of coerced institutionalised colonial systems of government. Notable examples were the British indirect rule system and assimilation by the French. This encounter led to the dismantling of Africa’s precolonial traditional systems of governance and their replacement with oppressive colonial systems. This article argues that colonial structures led to the instituting of, among other things, ethnic fragmentation, one-party states and military takeovers. This underpins “contemporary” discourse as it relates to democratic and non-democratic political cultures in Africa. The main sources used in this study are literature studies, but the article also uses a variety of other sources to investigate political cultures. This includes analysing reports and historiographical and postcolonial theorising. The article makes a unique contribution to colonial, postcolonial and, more so, contemporary discourse on Africa’s political culture. Using the framework of Almond and Verba (1963), the article identifies three classifications of political culture: participant, subject and parochial. Thus, the article not only to applies this theoretical framework as it is but adapting it to the African context. It includes a salient focus on The Gambia’s 2016 presidential elections, which led to the democratic transition from autocracy.
Introduction
An understanding of political culture helps us to understand what influences relations between the ruler and the ruled, and how. In this context, how has colonialism led to the implanting of coerced systems of governments in Africa? In other words, what does this relationship mean in the context of explaining how African states are governed, especially in postcolonial Africa? The concept of political culture is widely attributed to Almond and Verba’s (1963) study The Civic Culture. They identified three working criteria to relate to how democracy operates within a given political system. These are, first, participant culture, which entails citizens’ full participation in the political life of their country; second, subject culture, in which citizens take part rather as subjects than as participants; and third, parochial culture, wherein citizens do not have an interest in or participate in politics. These three classifications are centred on civic orientation and thus speak to the political culture of a given country. This article stresses the influence colonialism has had on postcolonial and contemporary African politics. How did the colonial legacy influence Africa’s political systems? The article demonstrates that the continent of Africa had long had its precolonial systems of governance. However, they were dismantled because of colonial occupation. This occupation led to the replacement of Africa’s traditional systems and imposed colonial administrative systems of governance. In the contemporary context, these metamorphosed into what are now known as “Western” systems of governance. The article goes further, to explain what led to growing authoritarian systems of governance as well as the gradual shift from the normative one-party state and autocracy to a more democratic and inclusive political system that allows for citizens’ engagement. Simply put, political culture entails citizens’ civic engagement in the political life of their country. Within the African context, this article argues that citizens’ participation in politics as inherited from colonialism is largely about tribalism, imposed one-partyism and resource monopolising. In this understanding, Africans became mere observers as “subjects” of white control, dominance and exploitation. This changed with the spread of nationalist movements across the continent in the 1950s and 1960s. Nationalism then took centre stage to fight against white rule. Its triumph gave Africans the opportunity to govern themselves as opposed to being under the colonial system that had previously been in place. Political participation therefore shifted from Africans being parochial and subjects to full participation. Against this background, this article also offers a critique of Almond and Verba’s selected case studies, as African countries were totally exempted. Despite the fact that countries such as Ethiopia and Liberia (which were never colonised), Egypt (1922), and Ghana (1957) were fully independent by the time of publication (1963), only European and American countries (Mexico, the UK, Italy, Germany and the USA) were discussed. This speaks to the larger discourse that ignores Africa despite its central role in the citadel of knowledge production (see Nzally, 2020). The irony is that the oppressed former colonies were sidelined while colonial powers were rewarded and portrayed as champions of “civilisation”. Structurally, the article goes further, to give a political history of the African continent. This is done by explaining precolonial Africa’s traditional systems and their subsequent fall to European dominance. It highlights how nationalist movements in turn gave birth to independent African states. This takes us to the section on “postcolony” African states to delve into the challenges of newly independent Africa. The future of Africa’s democratisation trajectory is then discussed. The article essentially explains the drivers as well as the need for democratic change across the African continent. It also strengthens the growing call for democratisation in the different corners of the continent. Finally, as a case study, the article delves more deeply into the December 2016 presidential elections in The Gambia in which autocratic leader Yahya Jammeh, who had been in power for 22 years, lost to coalition leader Adama Barrow.
Methodological Approach
The main methodological approach used in this article is discourse analysis. This entails primarily the use of literature studies, reports and online sources. This variety of sources helps to uncover the discourses around political culture. Literature study helps to undertake a “comparative analysis” of the subject matter. Furthermore, as observed by Mahrool (2020: 3), a literature study “permits the researcher to enter into a critical engagement with the existing body of theories, concepts, analysis, information and relevant authors”. This includes citing online sources and reports that build on the other materials available. It is therefore not surprising that the internet has become an important resource for research. This is because, as noted by Fielding, Lee and Blank (2008: 5), “it offers technological means to address some previously intractable problems of social sciences methods and because it provides a picture of the overall contours of contemporary human knowledge”. On the other hand, case studies are also cited to contextualise the growing regime changes taking place in the African continent. The case study research method is relevant for the “how” and “why” questions. This approach, as argued by Yin (2003), is especially relevant when focusing on contemporary events. Overview of Africa’s Democratic Trajectory The concept of political culture is the focus of an interesting debate among scholars of social sciences, including historians and political scientists. The emergence of the concept can be traced back to the 1960s (Formisano, 2001). This historical claim is further strengthened by the claim of Henke and Reno (2003) that the primacy of political culture has re-emerged after decades of emphasis on free-market rhetoric. And Welch (2013: 7) argue that “it is the ever-intensifying specialization of the social sciences that impedes adequate theorizing, even as it encourages the proliferation of research programs each with its justificatory theoretical paradigm”. The concept of political culture has made an evolutionary contribution to society, politics and the economy and has become increasingly important for social scientists and historians. Therefore, a critical view on this subject matter is relevant to theorising its fundamental core contributions to the literature and society. A key feature of political culture is people-centred governance. As noted by Inglehart and Welzel (2003: 64), political culture and governance must emphasise “freedom, tolerance of diversity, and participation”. This includes citizens’ beliefs, values and attitudes towards politics as well as the system of politics (Obeidi, 2001) in a given country. In the literature, this assertion is often left unchecked. Since political culture is seen in the context of governing people based on their beliefs and values, one of the questions that could come up is: how was it that Africa’s political systems were weakened by European colonialism? This question guides this article as it seeks to explain the influence of European colonialism on Africa’s political systems. Concretely, how did the people resist colonialism through nationalist movements to be free, after which the leaders of those nationalist leaders often went on to entrench themselves in power? To define political culture, this article views the term as it relates to the way of life of people within a political system. In other words, it poses the obvious question: how consciously oriented or engaged are citizens within the political system of their country? The theoretical framework is influenced by Gabriel Abraham Almond and Sidney Verba’s (1963) work on political culture. The article uses their adopted definition in their famous book The Civic Culture: Political Attitudes and Democracy in Five Nations. The term “political culture” there refers to the “specifically political orientations – attitudes toward the political system and its various parts, and attitudes towards the role of the self in the system” (Almond and Verba, 1963: 12). Such a way of life in a political system has the power to influence people’s political ideology and orientation towards the state, which forms the basis for political culture. Democracy is therefore a key component of political culture. Various factors explain how democracy is consolidated. As outlined by Cheeseman (2015), these are a coherent national identity, strong and autonomous political institutions, a developed and vibrant civil society, the effective rule of law, and a strong and well-performing economy. Such a theoretical outlining of key factors underscores what are deemed cardinal features in a democratic political culture. It thus speaks to the broader understanding of political culture in a democratic and open society. What is missing here is how historical factors, such as colonialism, explain this influence on political culture – for instance in the case of African countries. After colonisation, African states and nations gave birth to certain self-governing democratic concepts, often rooted in African values, customs and belief systems. These African concepts were often used within the framework of development theory to enhance the developmental conditions of both the people and the state. These non-Western theories (see Haastrup, Mah and Duggan, 2021; Cooke, 2022) included, for instance, the harambee of Jomo Kenyatta (1964–1978), which advocated pulling resources together for mutual assistance. There was also ujaama under Julius Nyerere in Tanzania (1964–1985), which called for “familyhood” and is regarded as more socialist than harambee. Another governance approach was “Zambian humanism”, which is a combination of African socialism and Christian values, a hybrid system introduced by Kenneth Kaunda of Zambia (1964–1991). These various development approaches to Africa’s state governance propelled the spirit of “familyhood”, “neighbourliness” and “faith”. Therefore, Africa’s political culture of that time was built upon familyhood as it emphasised pulling resources together, strong bonds and togetherness, and humanism. This is to highlight the fact that a democratic political culture existed right from the start in Africa’s postcolonial political systems.
However, the continent of Africa has long been characterised as a hub for dictatorial regimes. In postcolonial Africa and among “newly” emerging African states, four types of rulership were present. Hyden (2012) presented these four regimes: the Prince’s Rule involves a “soft” ruler, who is viewed to be governing jointly with others by “presiding over their struggle for benefits” for his/ A Historical Perspective on Political Culture 297 afrika focus 37 (2024) 292–314 her legitimacy, like Léopold Sédar Senghor of Senegal (1960–1980); Autocrats command and manage others at their discretion, such as Félix Houphouët-Boigny of Ivory Coast (1960–1993) or Daniel Moi of Kenya (1978–2012); Prophets are visionary and socialists leaders such as Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana (1957–1966) and Julius Nyere of Tanzania (1961–1964); and finally, Tyrants rule through fear, such as Idi Amin of Uganda (1971–1979) and Omar Bashir of Sudan (1989–2019). Going by this classification, the continent has long been perceived to have been undemocratic. This is why a look at what explains this, as well as the shift into the contemporary context, is relevant.
To be continued
