“SANKOFA”:
REBRANDING AFRICA
http://www.google.ca/imgres?imgurl=http://chroniclesofharriet.files.wordpress.com/2013/01/
A Focus on the Homogeneity in the
Heterogeneity
© Dr. Francis Adu-Febiri 2013
CONTENTS OF PRESENTATION:
Key Concepts
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Sankofa
Ubuntu
The Human Factor
Superficial Diversity
Superficial Commonalities
Pre-colonial Deep Commonalities
Colonial and Postcolonial Deep Commonalities
Conclusion
INTRODUCTION: “SANKOFA”

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Most non-African scholars of Africa tend to emphasize
the heterogeneity of the African continent and to imply
that the differences that exist outweigh the values and
institutions that Africans share in common, but also that
these differences are somehow unbridgeable” (Khapoya
2010, p. 21).
However, the facts are 1) many of these diversities are
superficial and therefore bridgeable and 2) there are
values, institutions and characteristics that Africans and
their countries have in common at a deeper level.
THE SANKOFA SOLUTION: The revival of the UBUNTU
philosophy to guide the development and application of
human factor competency (HFC) could provide the bridge,
eliminate the deep commonalities fostered by colonialism,
and re-reconstruct the pre-colonial deep commonalities to
make Africa work for Africans and their allies.
UBUNTU

Racialized enslavery and colonization of Africa and Africans
succeeded in creating and reproducing superficial
diversities and negative deep commonalities African
societies. This is mainly because these invasive social
engineering systems broke down the high human factor
competency (HFC) and its foundational philosophy of
UBUNTU in African societies, and consequently unleashed
the liberal ideology of scarcity and zero-sum. Therefore, the
re-invention and application of high HFC and the UBUNTU
philosophy in contemporary African societies are likely to
minimize, if not eliminate, the superficial diversities that
overshadow the deep commonalities and prevent Africans
and their allies from successfully creating their own
capacities to initiate and do their own development .
UBUNTU

Ubuntu is a classical African concept and
humanistic philosophy that embodies
people's allegiances and empowering
relations with each other.
UBUNTU: DESMOND TUTU’S
DEFINITION

…It is the essence of being human. It speaks of the fact that my
humanity is caught up and is inextricably bound up in yours. I am
human because I belong. It speaks about wholeness, it speaks
about compassion. A person with ubuntu is welcoming, hospitable,
warm and generous, willing to share. Such people are open and
available to others, willing to be vulnerable, affirming of others, do
not feel threatened that others are able and good, for they have a
proper self-assurance that comes from knowing that they belong
in a greater whole. They know that they are diminished when
others are humiliated, diminished when others are oppressed,
diminished when others are treated as if they were less than who
they are. The quality of ubuntu gives people resilience, enabling
them to survive and emerge still human despite all efforts to
dehumanise them (Tutu 2004. God Has A Dream: Published by
Doubleday).
NELSONMANDELA’S
COMMENTS ON UBUNTU

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Experienc
e_ubuntu.ogg
PRINCIPLES OF THE UBUNTU
PHILOSOPHY

There are three maxims that shape the Ubuntu
philosophy: The first maxim asserts that 'To be human is
to affirm one's humanity by recognizing the humanity of
others and, on that basis, establish respectful human
relations with them.' And 'the second maxim means that
if and when one is faced with a decisive choice between
wealth and the preservation of the life of another human
being, then one should opt for the preservation of life'.
The third 'maxim' as a 'principle deeply embedded in
traditional African political philosophy' says 'that the king
owed his status, including all the powers associated with
it, to the will of the people under him‘ (Samkange 1980).
HUMAN FACTOR COMPETENCY (HFC)


The individual and societal capacity to acquire
and apply appropriate knowledge, skills, abilities,
potentials and principles to successfully identify
and solve problems that work against
productivity, profitability, equity, social justice,
cultural development, environmental
preservation, and de-centered power (Adu-Febiri
2001, 2002, 2006).
This capacity encompasses peoples’
mental, emotional, moral, spiritual,
cultural, social, and aesthetic
connections to our common
humanity (Adu-Febiri 2011).
HUMAN FACTOR: WHAT IS IT?
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1. Economics : defines the HF as the labour dimension of the
factors of production.
2. Human Agency: Selective, synthesizing activities of human
beings (Kottak and Kozatis 2008, p. 44).
2. Conscious and reflective interaction of employees (excluding
managers) of organizations (Jaffee 2001: 22-28).
3. Senyo Adjibolosoo (1995: 33 and 36): The human factor (HF)
refers to “a spectrum of personality characteristics that enable
social, economic, and political institutions to function and remain
functional over time.” These include human capital, spiritual
capital, moral capital, aesthetic capital, human abilities, and
human potential.
4. Analyzing the existing definitions of the HF, Adu-Febiri and
Rubin (2004) concluded that these definitions are rigid and
narrow. Hence their redefinition of the HF as the human capacity
and conduct resulting from a complex interaction of knowledges,
skills, habits, principles, policies, institutional structures and
normative practices that work for the betterment or debasement
of the individual, organizations, institutions and society.
THE HUMAN FACTOR AS A DYNAMIC SET OF HUMAN
QUALITIES (see Durkheim 1954 and 1961; Hochschild 1983; Pierre
Bourdieu 1977, Adjibolosoo 1996, Adu-Febiri 2011)
HUMNAN QUALITY
COMPONENTS
Human Capital
Knowledge and skills used to enhance human productivity,
and have market value.
Cultural Capital
Values, beliefs, traditions, customs, practices/rituals, skills,
knowledge, attitude, education, and language to connect to
people, community, institutions, material world, and life.
Social Capital
Durable network of more or less institutionalized
relationships; group membership, relationships, networks.
Spiritual Capital
Insight into human condition, the world, and cosmos
beyond the five senses; advanced capabilities to create,
invent, innovate, and connect to the universal laws and
principles of human life.
Moral Capital
Principles relating to right and wrong; ethics;
conscience.
Emotional Capital
Feelings; sentiments; affective connections to self,
others, and the world.
Aesthetic Capital
Sense and love for beauty; passion for the arts that
connect to people and the physical environment.
Human Abilities
Acquired and naturally endowed abilities beyond
skills and knowledge; talents.
Human Potential
Unused dimensions of the HF
SUPERFICIAL DIVERSITY

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Differences that are only of degree rather
than in kind.
Inconsequential Differences:

Differences that don’t matter to human and
societal well-being.
SUPERFICIAL DIVERSITY:
“Superficial Differences Exaggerated” (President Nkrumah,
1963)
 Economic Diversity
 Level of Economic development
 Political Diversity
 Level of Political Stability
 Ideological Diversity
 Capitalism – Communism Continuum
 Colonial Diversity
 Ties to former colonial masters
 Ethnic [tribal?] Diversity
 Core values, beliefs, and practices
 Cultural Diversity
 Inheritance
 Language
 Technology
SUPERFICIAL DIVERSITY

Economic Diversity
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Level of Economic development
There is not much substantive difference
between the economies of Nigeria, Kenya,
Botswana, Libya and South Africa on the
one hand and that of other African
countries on the other?
SUPERFICIAL DIVERSITY

Political Diversity
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Level of Political Stability
Does the political stability in Botswana,
Ghana, and Senegal make a big difference
in the lifeworlds of their citizens than that
of the citizens in politically unstable
African countries such as Central African
Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo,
Somalia, and Sudan?
SUPERFICIAL DIVERSITY

Ideological Diversity
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
Capitalism – Communism Continuum
How substantive is the difference in the
leadership practices and the lifeworlds of the
citizens of African countries that espouse the
neoliberal or free market ideology (Kenya,
Nigeria, Ghana), socialist ideology (Libya,
Burkina Faso), monarchical ideology (Morocco,
Lesotho, Swaziland), and mixed ideologies
(Algeria, Zambia, Zimbabwe)?
SUPERFICIAL DIVERSITY

Colonial Diversity
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Ties to former colonial masters
Is there any substantive difference in the
contemporary political, economic and social
experiences among African countries who
remain neo-colonially tied to Britain (Ghana,
Nigeria, Kenya), France (Senegal, Cote d’Ivoire,
DRC), the United States (Liberia), and those
African countries who claim to have severed
their neo-colonial ties (Libya), and the ones that
don’t have colonial ties (Ethiopia)?
SUPERFICIAL DIVERSITY
Ethnic [Tribal?] Diversity:
 There are so many similarities in the
core values, beliefs, and practices of
the various ethnic [tribal?] groups in
Africa that tend to render ethnic
diversity superficial.


The significance of “tribalism” in Africa is more
political than the fact of diversity. It is a
“superficial difference exaggerated” (President
Kwame Nkrumah 1965 speech)
SUPERFICIAL DIVERSITY
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Cultural Diversity
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Descent
Language
Is there any big difference in the quality of life in
the African societies that practice patrilineal
inheritance (Yoruba, Berber, Luo), matrilineal
inheritance (Ashanti, Bakongo), bilateral
inheritance (Fanti, Hausa)?
To what extent is linguistic diversity of Africa a
barrier to migration, interaction, and social
integration of the peoples on the continent?
SUPERFICIAL DIVERSITY, BUT
CONSEQUENTIAL

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The similarities in the social-cultural
conditions of Africans, the physical
environment in which they live, their past
and contemporary experiences, and their
collective needs tend to render as
superficial the diversities in Africa that
some scholars, development practitioners
and activists highlight.
The socially constructed diversity in Africa,
however, is not inconsequential.
POLITICS OF DIVERSITY:
DIVIDE AND CONQUER
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The socially constructed diversity in Africa
has serious implications for:
Political Integration
Political Stability
Economies of Scale
Social Integration and solidarity
Human Rights
DEEP DIVERSITY
 1.
Gender diversity in educational
and political representations.
 2. Social Classes?: The gap
between the Rich and the Poor;
the gap between the Privileged
and the Oppressed

These diversities are a problem for Africans
only in the absence of UBUNTU and high HFC
index.
SUPERFICIAL COMMONALITIES

Colonial Constructs:
 “African women are oppressed”.
 “Africa is the poorest continent”.
DEEP COMMONALITIES
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Africans’ feelings towards one another
Marriage
Collectivist Ethos/Extended Family
Significance of marriage and having children
Marriage arrangements and payments
Respect for old people
Spirituality
The Youth Culture
The Economy
The State
The Human Factor
PRE-COLONIAL DEEP
COMMONALITIES
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a) Africans’ feelings towards one another
b) Marriage
c) Collectivist Ethos/Extended Family
d) Significance of marriage and having
children
e) Marriage arrangements and payments
f) Respect for old people
h) Spirituality
a) FEELINGS TOWARD ONE
ANOTHER

There seems to be a deep affinity among
African’s that is not easily amenable to
quantitative measurement or description.
That is, somehow Africans from different
parts of the continent tend to be very
much at ease when interacting with each
other either on the continent or in the
diaspora.
b) MARRIAGE
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1. POLYGAMY:
Polygyny is practiced in all African
countries/societies where it has not been
outlawed by legislation (Khapoya 2010).
 Nigeria: 30% of marriages are polygynous
 Benin, Chad, Congo, Gabon, Ghana, Kenya,
Mali, Senegal, Tanzania, Togo, and the DRC:
Polygynous marriages range from 20.4% to
36.4%
Polyandry is absent from all African
countries/societies (Khapoya 2010).
MARRIAGE

2. TRANSFER OF BRIDEWEALTH
All marriages in African societies
involve the transfer of bridewealth
(cattle, goats, sheep, money, drinks,
labour, etc.) from the groom’s family
to Bride’s family.
 Dowry, as gift to the bride from her
own family, is virtually non-existent in
African societies.

MARRIAGE

3. SIGNIFICANCE OF MARRIAGE AND
HAVING CHILDREN
 African
societies generally elevate
the status of a married person
with children above that of
unmarried persons and married
persons without children.
c) COLLECTIVIST ETHOS


AFRICAN SOCIETIES ARE COLLECTIVIST
SOCIETIES:
 Community-focused:
A popular African proverb comes to mind here to express the
African sense of community. It says: "Go the way that many
people go; if you go alone, you will have reason to lament"1. The
African idea of security and its value depends on personal
identification with and within the community. Communalism in
Africa is a system that is both suprasensible and material in its
terms of reference. Both are found in a society that is believed by
the Africans to be originally "godmade" because it transcends the
people who live in it now, and it is "Man-made" because it cannot
be culturally understood independent of those who live in it now2.
Therefore, the authentic African is known and identified in, by and
through his community. The community is the custodian of the
individual, hence he must go where the community goes
c) COLLECTIVIST ETHOS
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Language, Proverbs and Community:
For the African, if an individual is not able to
communicate with the native language, the
individual, ideologically, puts himself outside the
community. Speaking a language, does not, in
the African sense, depend on the peripheral
knowledge of the language. It depends on the
ability to express oneself adequately in the
proverbs and idioms of the language
community. These proverbs, idioms, riddles are
based and determined by the culture of the
community (http://www.emeka.at/african_cultural_vaules.pdf.)
c) COLLECTIVIST ETHOS

THE EXTENDED FAMILY:
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The extended family is the most prevalent
family system in African countries/societies.
Marriage is a relationship between
two extended families than just
between a man and a woman.
c) COLLECTIVIST ETHOS
LOOSE PARENTAL POSSESSIVENESS
OF CHILDREN:
 In African societies children do not
belong to parents only, but also
belong to community of relatives.
 The kind of parental possessiveness
towards children that one finds in the
Western world is very rare in African
countries/societies.

d) RELATIONSHIPS
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At the African grassroots, relationships take
precedence over all other things.
Life in the African community is based on the philosophy
of live-and-let-live. This principle is based on the concept
of the ‘Clan vital’ and applies to a concrete community...
Chieka lfemesia sees Humane Living among an African
people as a concept which is defined as “...a way of life
emphatically centred upon human interests and values;
a mode of living evidently characterized by empathy,
and by consideration and compassion for human beings”
(http://www.emeka.at/african_cultural_vaules.pdf)
e) DEFERENCE TO OLD PEOPLE
 Old
people are respected for their
age and wisdom presumed to
come with age.
 Young people usually don’t call
older people by their names but
by kinship status.
f) SPIRITUALITY
Africans have a deep sense of their
connectivity with their kin groups—
ancestors, the living and the
unborn—the environment and the
cosmos.
 Syncretism is deeply rooted in subSaharan African communities.

g) Sacredness of Life

Furthermore, the sacredness associated with life goes to explain
the rigidity with which the Africans treat and regard sexual
intercourse and the sex organs. In fact sex taboos and the demand
for virginity before marriage stems from the fact that Africans
believe that: “The blood of virginity is the symbol that life has
been preserved, that the spring of life has not already been
flowing wastefully, and that both the girl and her relatives have
preserved the sanctity of human reproduction”. Also, "The sanctity
of human reproduction" derives from the sanctity of life in the
African concept. This idea of sanctity of life makes it an
abomination for anyone, under any circumstances to take his own
life. Suicide was never permitted. Punishment for it was such that
the person was not buried since his corpse was also believed to be
abominable to mother earth. The Africans prize life above every
other thing. The Igbo saying: Nduka - life is supreme - is
expressive of the African regard for life. Any form of materialism
which ultimately leads to the destruction of life is alien and
destructive of the African culture and concept of human life and
should therefore be avoided
h) Hospitality

The African sense of hospitality is one of the African
values that is still quite alive. The Africans easily
incorporate strangers and give them lands to settle
hoping that they would go one day, and the land would
revert to the owner... Dr. Festus Okafor has summarised
the African attitude to strangers thus: “In traditional
African culture, whenever there is food to be taken,
everyone present is invited to participate even if the
food was prepared for far less number of people without
anticipating the arrival of visitors. It would be a height of
incredible bad manners for one to eat anything however
small, without sharing it with anyone else present, or at
least expressing the intention to do so.
(http://www.emeka.at/african_cultural_vaules.pdf)
COLONIAL & POSTCOLONIAL
DEEP COMMONALITIES
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A) Youth Culture
B) The Economy
C) The State
D) Disenfranchisement, Suffering, Pain
and Poverty
E) Human Factor Decay
A) YOUTH CULTURE
 The
“Cheetah” generation is
virtually westernized:
 Westernized youth culture is
growing in all countries of Africa.
B) THE ECONOMY
 1.
MERCANTILE CAPITALISM:
 African countries engage in buy
and sell economic activities at the
expense of manufacturing.
B) THE ECONOMY
 2.
PRIMARY SECTOR:
 A focus on agricultural and
extractive industries at the
expense of manufacturing.
B) THE ECONOMY

3. THE INFORMAL ECONOMY:
African economies have very large
informal sectors where a large
percentage of the population engage
in petty trading, crafts, fishing, small
scale trades and vocational activities,
etc., that are not captured by the
taxation system.
 This sector is what really sustains
African societies.

B) THE ECONOMY
4. THE FORMAL SECTOR:
 This parasitic sector only accumulates
money and properties for the political
and bureaucratic elite.
 It is the battleground of the elites
creating repression and political
instability—circulation of the elite—in
African countries.

C) THE STATE
 VAMPIRE
STATES; FAILED
STATES
 African countries are operated by
state functionaries such as
politicians and bureaucrats that
convert state resources into
personal wealth.
D) Disenfranchisement, Suffering, Pain and
Poverty.

Beyond the racialized and superficial
cultural diversities, the experiences of
slavery, colonization, westernization,
globalization, and the vampire/failed state
have created for most Africans shared
history and experiences of
disenfranchisement, suffering, pain and
poverty.
E) HUMAN FACTOR DECAY


HUMAN FACTOR DECAY: ABSENCE OF
UBUNTU
Most African elites, particularly politicians,
bureaucrats, professionals, and business
tycoons, lack the mental, emotional,
moral, and spiritual connections to their
countries and their communities. They are
therefore bankrupt in relational
accountability, responsibility, dedication,
commitment, caring, sharing, and
selflessness, beyond the extended family.
CONCLUSION


Projects/programs and actions that focus on the
superficial diversities of Africa such as race,
ethnicity, language, colonial history, political
ideology, etc., weaken Africa and Africans,
making communities vulnerable to neo-colonial
social engineering. Thus preventing Africans to be
empowered to create their own capacities to
initiate and do their own development.
A focus on the revival of deep commonalities—
UBUNTU philosophy and HFC of pre-colonial
Africa would eliminate the superficial diversities
and the colonial deep commonalities that works
against Africa and most Africans.
References
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Adjibolosoo, Senyo. 1995. The Human Factor in Developing Africa. London:
Praeger.
Adu-Febiri, Francis. 2011. “Inviting Emotions, Morals and Spirit into Our
Classrooms: A Sociological Perspective on the Human Factor Model of
Education”, Review of Human Factor Studies, Volume 17, Issue. 1., pp. 4078.
Adu-Febiri, Francis. 2001. “Human Factor Competence and the Performance
Effectiveness of Hospitality Professionals.” In Senyo Adjibolosoo, ed.,
Portraits of Behavior: The Human Factor in Action. Lanham.
Ayitey, George. 2007. “Cheetahs vs Hippos”.
http://www.ted.com/talks/george_ayittey_on_cheetahs_vs_hippos.html
Kaphoya, Vincent B. 2013. The African Experience. Boston: Pearson
Nkrumah, Kwame. 1963. “Superficial Differences Exaggerated” . Addis
Ababa: OAU Summit.
Samkange, Stanlake. 1980. Hunhuism or Ubuntuism: A. Zimbabwe
Indigenous Political Philosophy. Graham Pub.
Tutu, Desmond. 2004. God Has A Dream. London: Doubleday