Albert Kasanda - Böcker

This book explores what constitutes contemporary African social and political philosophy with regard to its meaning, aims, sources, and relevance for today’s Africa. Kasanda denounces conventional approaches considering these either as a subcategory of general philosophy or as the ideological attempts of individual African leaders and professional philosophers, such as Nkrumah, Nyerere, Senghor, Fanon, Hountondji and Towa. On the contrary, Kasanda defines contemporary African social and political philosophy as an inclusive reflection of African communities with regard to power and equitable modes of social and political organization in order to promote human excellence for everyone. This perspective also includes the criticism of social and political concepts in use within African communities.The author postulates that contemporary African social and political philosophy relies on the legacy of precolonial African societies, as well as on the contribution of the diaspora throughout the world. Contemporary African social and political philosophy is rooted in the daily lives of African people, and it expresses itself through multiple modalities including, for example, art, religion, literature, music and the policy of urbanization of African cities.This book sheds new light on debates concerning topics such as ethnophilosophy, negritude, pan-Africanism, democracy, African civil society, African cultures, and globalization. It aims to ward off the lethargy that strikes African social and political philosophy, taking a renewed and critical approach.

This book explores what constitutes contemporary African social and political philosophy with regard to its meaning, aims, sources, and relevance for today’s Africa. Kasanda denounces conventional approaches considering these either as a subcategory of general philosophy or as the ideological attempts of individual African leaders and professional philosophers, such as Nkrumah, Nyerere, Senghor, Fanon, Hountondji and Towa. On the contrary, Kasanda defines contemporary African social and political philosophy as an inclusive reflection of African communities with regard to power and equitable modes of social and political organization in order to promote human excellence for everyone. This perspective also includes the criticism of social and political concepts in use within African communities.The author postulates that contemporary African social and political philosophy relies on the legacy of precolonial African societies, as well as on the contribution of the diaspora throughout the world. Contemporary African social and political philosophy is rooted in the daily lives of African people, and it expresses itself through multiple modalities including, for example, art, religion, literature, music and the policy of urbanization of African cities.This book sheds new light on debates concerning topics such as ethnophilosophy, negritude, pan-Africanism, democracy, African civil society, African cultures, and globalization. It aims to ward off the lethargy that strikes African social and political philosophy, taking a renewed and critical approach.

The book analyses how Africans and Africa relate to other parts of the multilateral world, and to the world in general, and how these relations stem from local, national and regional interactions in different parts of Africa, as well as Africa as a whole. The first part focuses on the assumptions that are necessary to understand the role of Africa on the global stage, especially from the perspectives of political philosophy and global and international studies. The second part of the book looks at both Afropolitan trends and the limits of Afropolitanism. In the third part the authors focus on specific African global tendencies stemming from the local conditions in several case studies. Traditional and modern politics is connected, problematically, with the current Jihadist organisations in the local African conditions related to unilateralism and global war on terror, for example. The fourth part deals with the relevance of the language ambivalence in relation to global interactions. It examines various views of African philosophy and lays bare the perception of earlier colonial languages in view of their current strength of global action. This book will be of interest to scholars of African studies, political philosophy, politics and global studies.