Science, Ideology and Development- A Book Review
Reviewer: Aminu Saleh Adamu
Author: Achie Mafeje
Publisher: Scandinavian Institute of African Affairs
Publication Date: 1978
Price: Not stated
The
book is a composition of three different essays written by the author and these
were an outcome of observations which were part of first hand experiences he
had in Tanzania while he was a university teacher in Dar el- Salam University.
Mafeje had observed that socialist ideology was rife in Tanzania, yet they were
mainly taken at face- value. In his book, Mafeje seeks to explain that African
development is shaped by a history peculiar to Africa alone. Although he hinges
his ideas on the Marxian materialist conception of history and the dialectical
method, he offered that the African experience negates the exact Marxist
suppositions as they were stated. He looked at the main causes of
underdevelopment and dependency in Africa and elsewhere in other third world
countries across the world and found out that compared to all other third world
outside the continent, the African case had been grossly misunderstood, not
just by classical Marxists, but also, by African Socialist scholars and
practitioners as well.
To
buttress his argument, Mafeje organised his three essays on development theory
in reverse order of preference considering the date which they have been
written prior to their compilation into a book. In this sense, the papers were
arranged in their capacity to put forward Mafeje’s points in a systematic and
logical whole. The main aim of the book therefore, is to prioritise the
importance of essence, that is the true form of things, which he calls
(noumenon) over their appearances which readily surface to us, which he
ascribed as (phenomenon). What he tried to point out in this book is that
things are not always what they seem on the basis of mere appearance, hence the
underdevelopment of third world countries, most especially Africa are often
misinterpreted as being caused by some factors which are not the true factors
responsible for this underdevelopment. Mafeje equally contended that ideology
propels development, and this submission runs contrary to bourgeois social
science, which claims there is no connection between both, as ascription of
development to ideology is as irrational as it is superstitious. In this
regard, he chastised African socialist for not realising that ideology
facilitates rapid growth leading to development. In the same vein, he accused
these same socialists of not fully understanding how ideology could be put to
action for the realisation of developmental goals of society, for theory has no
significance without action.
Furthermore,
he clarified on the intricate connection between science and ideology, which he
noticed have always been rejected, unfortunately even by socialist
philosophers. To this end, Mafeje posited that behind every science, there is
an ideology, and science will have no meaning if it cannot be applied for
practical benefits of man. Drawing from this, he sketched an overview and
background to what informed the writings of these theses. These essays, as may
have been earlier stated, were an outcome of a combination of the author’s
first hand experiences and a response to studies already carried out in East
Africa to depict the nature of underdevelopment, albeit on conclusions drawn
from basically what appears to be apparent than real. To begin with, Tanzania
served as his first laboratory in order for him to ascertain and clarify the
true nature of underdevelopment and dependency in East Africa. This
particularly applies to his first paper, which although appears at the end of
the book and written in 1973, due largely to the fact that socialist ideology
was rife in Tanzania, yet the necessary organisation and class unity needed to
utilise same for revolution and development was absent. As had already been
stated, what prompted these writings were the fact that Mafeje questioned the
rationality behind the approaches adopted by both bourgeois and Marxist in the
study of dependency with, perhaps exception of Samir Amin and Gunder Frank. In
the same token, his paper “Ideology and Development” sought to give direction
to ideologies embedded in theories and their application to reality,
particularly development in third world countries. Questions have been put
forward by his detractors in the form “where cometh ideology?” To this, Mafeje
had offered a precise and appropriate responce, hence the paper sought o
address (i) the essence of theory, that is (noumenon) and Practice, which is
phenomenon; (ii) science and ideology; and (iii) subject and object, that is,
subjectivity and objectivity.
Be
that as it may, the second paper “Beyond dual theories of economic growth”
written in 1975 was a rejoinder to Ann Siedman’s “Dual economies in East
Africa”. Mafeji observed that Siedman merely studied those east African
countries on the basis of their appearances- a rural hinterland far removed
from modern industrial cities, which in turn restrain rapid economic growth
necessary for development. He held a contrary view, which he buttressed in his
paper on the said subject. He submitted that colonial experiences led to the
underdevelopment of these rural areas by creating an artificial distinction
between traditional technology and modern imported technology. To him,
advancement of the traditional technology would have sped up the pace of
development in East Africa had that dichotomy not been created. The details
shall be discussed under one of the chapters towards the middle of this
presentation.
The
third and final paper making up this book, “the role of State capitalism in
predominantly Agrarian economies” written in 1977 was an opportunity for Mafeje
to scrutinise further, the so called anti- imperialist struggle and their
strategies. The main focus of the essay was to answer the following question
“was the anti- imperialist struggle the essential explanation for the
postulated historical structure of ‘development- underdevelopment’, could it
make socialist revolution in a backward country encircled by triumphant world
capitalism anything but an instance in the process of capitalist accumulation?”
(p10). To this and other questions, the presented answers become mechanical,
derivatives or idealist, thereby making them unscientific, while there remained
way in which they could be made scientific without vitiating their
innovativeness and subtlety. An instance is that while maintaining tensions
between essence and appearance and authentic potentiality and immediate
existence, dialectical theory makes it possible to deal with phenomena at both
their apparent and real instances, to use Mafeje’s exact words. Mafeje equally
postulated that it is only when possibility overcomes itself that it becomes
reality. Likewise, reality is overcome by being a potential possibility for
another reality. To this end, if anti- imperial struggles are viewed from an
apparent level, then their essence can never be understood.
In chapter
two, Mafeje had alluded to the fact that the state plays a role, be that
negative or positive, which are attributable to state capitalism as a specific
socio- economic form. Historical experiences from third world countries of Eastern
Europe and Latin- America have attested to that fact, hence the need to study
the historical role of state capitalism became inevitable. Nevertheless, there
appears a problem ascertaining the objectivity of the role played by history in
the establishment of state capitalism. Marxists assertions that state
capitalism was a universal repository of collective property, or that it was a
prelude to socialism has not been proven by events. This is because it has not
been ascertained that state capitalism, bureaucratic entrenchment and economic
stagnation as it does, then becomes a contradiction in terms since state
capitalism is to serve as a transition to socialism, where socialism itself is
a transitory phase to communism. In fact, this is the main reason Mafeje
undertook the study on this subject in the first instance.
In a
sub head in the same chapter, Mafeje posited that the underlying circumstances
that led to the emergence of third world countries after colonialism were (i)
political subordination; (ii) economic stagnation; and (iii) dependence on a
world market system. On account of this, the emergence of state capitalism was
a response to economic domination and monopoly of metropolitan capital, and
cannot be said to be based on any socialist ideology. Of course a few
exceptions could be made, and these include China, Cuba, North Korea, North
Vietnam, Burma; and to some extent, Egypt, Somalia and a few other countries.
The situation in Asia, Africa and Latin America contrasted with those in
Eastern Europe, where there was ideology behind their nationalisation policies.
At birth therefore, political identity in the third world derived from negative
conditions- ex- colonial status and underdevelopment. Consequently, these
states were encumbered by unfavourable international division of labour, and
their socio- economic status remains inconsistent within the capitalist scheme
of production.
Initially
though, nationalisation yielded positive results in some parts of the third
world, but overtime it turned out that most, or almost all of these
nationalisation strategy became a route to capitalism as surplus value became
increasingly concentrated in the hands of bureaucratic state officials. This
opened up room for restiveness in most states, with the exception of Iraq and
Egypt, where state resources were sufficient enough to veil primitive
accumulation. Owing to this, the nature of these developing countries became
quite difficult to classify in terms of their historical antecedents and
political or socio- economic status. The question being asked frequently is-
are they socialists or another grade in the rung of global capitalist system?
In a bid to establish the connection between state
capitalism and underdevelopment, Mafeje postulated that states in post
independent Africa were saddled with the responsibilities of protecting their
national economies and compensating for the weakness of nascent bourgeoisie.
But this had already given rise to the antithetical characterisation which
obscures the real nature of the process involved. In the same token, they are
faced with the following specific tasks (i) anti- colonialism; (ii) anti-
imperialism; (iii) united front led by petit bourgeois elements and (iv)
commitment to rebuilding the economy. To use Mafeje’s exact words, “these
nature of post independence are often loss site of in the face of widespread disillusionment,
and the state, as a matter of necessity filled in the void by nationalising
most enterprises in order to, firstly, curb the menace of international capital
and secondly, to restrain domestic petit bourgeoisie. Consequently, the state
found itself filling in the political void in the historical epoch of
underdeveloped states. By so doing, this became antithetical to Marxian
postulation, and politics assumed more preference than economy. It is therefore
in this regard that the state becomes the main agent of underdevelopment. To
answer the question on neo- colonialist or socialist strategies to development,
Mafeje explained that aside political liberation, independence also implies
emancipation from economic exploitation and backwardness. There are countries
whose leadership decided to identify with foreign capitalist interests to bring
about the necessary economic advancement through negotiations for better terms
of interaction and distribution of surplus value. Mafeje pointed out that this
is neo- colonialist strategy for development. This was what obtained in Latin-
America with a possible exception of Cuba and the regimes of Allende in Chile
and Valesco in Peru. But for these regimes, both Middle East and most African
regimes were guilty of this act. To him, this is one of the reasons for
disagreements between even the local elites, which led to frustration for
radicals among them.
As
regards the socialist strategy of development, he pointed to the fact that it
is quite easy to confuse anti capitalist feelings with socialism, and this is what
most post independent governments did by announcing to their publics, so called
socialist slogans through identifying themselves with various names which he
believed were inconsistent because the names vary. They range from “socialist”,
“non capitalists”, “revolutionary democracies” or “bureaucratic capitalism”,
and all these characterisations are a product of the same phenomenon- they are
regarded as socialists without accompanying socialist ideologies, rather, these
characterisations have been adopted merely to thwart internal pressures which
could lead to revolution.
African historical experiences showed that Africa was
incorporated into world capitalist system in the last quarter of the 19th
century. Compared to other parts of the world, this is rather late. The various
modes of production in Africa at the point of contact with Europeans make it
very difficult to talk of “African mode of production”. At this period, West
Africa, the most advanced part of Sub Saharan Africa, struggled with primitive
communalism and pastoralist aristocracy. According to him, the only region in
Africa that came close to the West Africans was parts of Central Africa and
South West Africa. Thus, Africa cannot be said to have taken the same natural
historical path leading from one mode of production to the other. Having been
faced with agitations for independence, European powers created another class
to serve as a buffer class against what he called “hot headed” nationalists.
This they did by empowering some aspects of the farming population. As may have
been stated earlier, newly independent states were handed over to people whom
were little educated to clerical and secretarial level.
To
buttress his argument, Mafeje referred to two interesting examples, which are
Tanzania and Somalia. There is a lot that these two share in common, and some
of these characteristics are that these two are poor countries even by African
standard, and they constitute pastoralist classes in the majority, while they
have very little resources if any at all. In Tanzania, Nyerere initiated what
he referred to as “African Socilaism”, “Ujama” owing to the Arusha accord, and
it so happened that he sincerely wanted to bring about social change, but the
challenge he had was that most of his cabinet member see him as a stumbling
block denying them the fruits of political independence, hence they conspired
to bring an end to the Ujama programme. Admittedly, Nyerere invited the World Bank
to discuss modifications to the Ujama and negotiated loan with the
International Monetary Fund (IMF), a clear sign to the failure of Nyerere to
bring about a true socialist state in Africa. As had been pointed out by
Mafeje, the only asset Tanzania has are her people who have been conscientised
on the need for social revolution, but even at that, initially, Tanzanian
peasants lack the capacity for organisation, thus lacking in the necessary
skill to carry on social revolution.
Somalia
on the other hand has a chequered colonial history. Prior to colonialism that
country was pastoralist. During colonial period, it was tossed from one
colonial power to another- Germany, France and Britain. Its educational system
is unstable, and it is a country so dearth of natural resources. After
independence, most would believe that Somalia would be free of capitalist
grips, but her leaders had no choice rather than to rely on foreign capital for
survival. But the major difference between Somali and Tanzanian peasants is
that the Somalis have an ability for militia organisation and the ability to
craft local technology for that purpose and agricultural production. What they
lacked therefore, are the necessary consciousness of the situation and the
ability to direct it towards social revolution, which still keeps them in their
ever backward state. Having mentioned this, Mafeje concluded that the necessary
unity and organisation needed for social revolution in Africa and other parts
of the third world are the greatest assets that people lack. To this, he
offered solutions as to how these backwardness and lack of revolution could be
brought to an end.
He stated that there must be an elimination of the
contradiction between resource use and domestic demand- the redirection of the
means of production to satisfy local needs rather than export oriented
production; in an age of technological revolution, he suggested development
centred on improving local technology compatible to the environment; thirdly,
there must be development of the skill to carry out operations and utilise the
technology appropriately by indigenous workers to be achieved through education
given to them for ideological and developmental purpose.
On the peasant- workers alliance question, Mafeje
stated that it will be delightful if workers and the peasants realise their
common destiny and work towards ameliorating their woes through social
revolution, but he is up bit on such happening as the workers, most especially
skilled and bureaucratic, see themselves as a class different from the peasants.
This is the main reason they would not be a united front between these two
groups. None the less, he believed that the Tanzanian worker is largely
conscious of the fact- thanks to Nyerere’s social programme- Ujama. But the
Somali worker is not conscious of this fact even though their peasants can
fashion out technology which is firstly, necessary for social revolution; and
secondly, compatible to local needs.
Beyond
dual theories of economic growth was a response to Ann Seidman’s thesis.
Usually, countries in transition offer blur and ambiguous reference for any
scientific theorising due largely to the dialectical dynamics inherent in them.
On account of this, Mafeje pointed out that bourgeois and Marxist scientists
have erroneously developed hypothesis on the contradictions of dualist natures
of these economies. The dual economic theory, he stated stems from the works of
Arthur Lewis, John Fei, and Gustav Ranis. The Lewis hypothesis states that
there is an existence of dual economies within third world countries- one
traditional and subsistence, while the other, modern and capitalist. The
traditional is characterised by surplus labour, unchanging production
techniques and zero net savings, where the capitalist is seen to have efficient
labour utilisation and high savings and a creator of employment. Within this
basic schema, growth is perceived as the gradual shift from traditional to
modern modes of production, which implies development. To this end, Mafeje had
towed the line of Gunder Frank, Samir Amin, Laclau, Dos Santos, Anibal, Quijano
and Clive Thomas to mention but a few. With these dependency writers, Mafeje
criticised the Lewis Hypothesis by studying the historical experiences of East,
Central and Southern African states to theoretically support his claim.
In
South Africa, the most industrialised country in Africa labour studies and
government reports show that economic integration is an accomplished fact, and
has been so far, in the greater part of the 20th century. The South
African government has artificially maintained what it called “tribal
homelands”, “Bantu areas” or “Bantustan”. Be this as it may, during colonial
periods, native South Africans were required to pay pole tax or hut tax, which
forced most rural dwellers to migrate from their villages in search of jobs in
the industrial complexes to enable then keep up with the responsibility of tax
payment. This itinerant labour engaged in stems from 1894 to 1936, where mining
companies alone have employed over 100,000 black South Africans with
agriculture employing even more. With Wilson, Mafeje has been able to prove the
modern industrial sector in South Africa came to rely heavily on native migrant
labour, which the anomaly in Lewis’ hypothesis- it is the traditional sector
that sustains the modern one. The situation in South West Africa (Namibia),
Lesotho, Malawi and Mozambique is no different, except some of these migrant
labours were used outside the shores of their countries.
The
Central African experience pointed to a similar pattern to South Africa’s, but
it’s mainly agriculture and railway that have served to support Mafeje’s
argument. In Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) there arose a demand for agricultural land,
and the government enacted the land apportionment act (1931), where
reservations were created in favour of white farmers who came to rely heavily
on native labour for the sustenance of plantation agriculture. With Arrighi and
Yudelmann, Mafeje conclude that this is what destabilised the traditional
sector for the advancement of the modern sector just as it did in South Africa.
In Northern Rhodesia (Zambia), the depletion of the traditional sector had been
in the railways and expansion of the tertiary sector, which was carried out in
favour of settled white population.
East
African experience that in Kenya, the most favourite British colony in East
Africa, string of laws were enacted to restrict native population from
agricultural production since the economy relied on plantation like agriculture
with white farmers being major participants having a larger share of the
cultivable land. Furthermore, native population were restricted from trading in
commercial agricultural produce in order to maintain the economic divide and
perpetually keep native to proletarian cadre within the relations of
production. In Tanzania on the other hand, what obtains initially was akin to
Kenya’s, but with the defeat of Germany in the Second World War, Britain
maintained the German policy while only transferring ownership of plantations
from German to British, Greek and Asian owners. Nevertheless, since most of the
lands were around Kilimanjaro, Bukoba, and Rongwe, most of the farmers were
confined to that area, and native farmers were encouraged to grow cotton in
places other than those mentioned. It will seem from this situation what
obtains in Tanganyika is better than that of Kenya. Far from it- Migrant
population till the coffee farms and over 100,000 Tanzanians work abroad. This
helps to sustain the extraction and exploitation of the traditional sector in
favour of the modern sector.
In
Uganda, the situation was a little different. Most of the lands in Buganda were
left in the hands of their powerful chiefs who could hold their own against the
British colonial officials. The rest of the more marginal lands were left to
the British government on the basis of an accord to that effect. In combination,
both the British and the Bugandan chiefs hired labour for the cultivation of
tea, cotton and coffee. In addition, Bugandan peasants were allowed to
cultivate cotton, an activity that posed serious threat to the British and
Bugandan semi-estate holdings. Consequently, the British colonial officials
stipulated that all unemployed male over the age of 15 must engage in a two
months compulsory labour at the plantations annually. This policy led to a
stiff opposition by the peasant with support of the local chiefs. Some of these
strict policies led to the Maji- Maji rebellion. Be that as it may, events in
Northern Uganda took a dramatic turn in favour of the British land holdings.
Belgian colonial powers had increased taxes in their colonies, and that led to migration
of many natives from that region into Buganda in search of jobs. This supplied
Buganda the necessary cheap labour needed to boost both production and revenue.
Upon reflection of this scenario, one may be compelled to think that the
Ugandan situation is better, but the opposite is what obtains. Buganda has
grown into a centre of commerce and agriculture, and an important centre of
capital accumulation and onward transmission of same to metropolitan centre,
while draining the developmental potential of all lands around it- these
include Northern Uganda, Ruanda- Burundi and parts of Tanganyika.
Judging
by the nature of production in East Africa- semi plantation agriculture, one
may think that the nature of agricultural activities may not support capitalist
exploitation- far from it. By the semi plantation agriculture there, cash crops
that supported high industrialisation aided the entrenchment of foreign
capitalist interests in the region. Mention can be made of Brookebond Leibeg,
Rally brothers, Baumann, Mitchel Cotts and British American tobacco to mention
but a few. In fact some of them have common cause with domestic settler
capital, which led to the establishment of light industries such as East
African breweries. Mafeje, as a matter of reflection alluded to the fact that
he had seen these native people in his life time, and from what he can make of
their plight is that they are far removed from the so called city life being
talked of, while the cities continuously rely on their labour to sustain the
same capitalist accumulation that exploits them. “From the point of view of
underdevelopment, the primary contradiction is not between ‘traditional’
society or sector and ‘modern’ or capitalist sector but between capitalism as a
mode of production and its social formations in peripheral countries”, to use Mafeje’s
exact words. Mafeje poses a theory of underdeveloped capitalism owing to the
fact that dialectical unity between development and underdevelopment has not
led to a general theory of underdevelopment among Marxist scholars. Further,
underdeveloped countries serve as complex phenomenon too difficult to
understand by both bourgeois and Marxist scholars alike. As such,
underdevelopment is not a product of capitalism, rather colonialism is borne
out of the need for capitalist expansion, hence, Mafeje utilizes the polemic
between Bettelheim and Emmanuel to further submit that there is a problem of
characterisation, and the appropriate one for third world economies is “Underdeveloped
Capitalism”.
In
the last part of the book, titled “ideology and development”, Mafeje pointed to
the fact that many have asked the question, “where cometh ideology?” When it
comes to issues of development, many are impatient mainly at no fault of theirs
due to the urgency of the problem of underdevelopment. Owing to this, African
nationalists see lack of scientific knowledge and adherence to outdated
traditional values as the major impediment to development, whereas
revolutionaries see lack of ideology (socialist) as the major reason delaying
African revolution, hence development. However, Mafeje believes that both
parties are guilty of the same thing, and treating issues mainly based on
appearances and upholding rhetorical slogans devoid of action or practice. He
chastised the bourgeois liberal view of development as the rejection of
traditional, superstitious beliefs and adoption of modern science. He states
that this view fails to explain contrasting examples such as China and India,
where science and technology are not the determining factors for development. Although
Mafeje’s intentions were not to provide technical definitions nor were they a
discourse on the relationship between concepts, then ideology and development
were used in a broad general way. Consequent upon this, he sees ideology as : a
set of beliefs about man’s nature and the world in which he lives; it’s about
the proper conduct of life; that organisation of human society and the ultimate
destination of human history. He did not look at development as mere growth in
per capita income or structures put in place by a society. Rather, he sees
development as: the expanding and adaptive capacity of society to satisfy the
changing and increasing needs of its members, be material or cultural.
To
this end, he questioned the rationale of pursuing development goals without corresponding
and guiding ideology. Ideology itself cannot be conceived of without consciousness
and knowledge to bring about the necessary change needed in society. Knowledge
is the main variable that guides consciousness, and ultimately, all are
determined by knowledge. In this regard, Mafeje faulted bourgeois liberalist
conception of knowledge, with this, he begins with philosophers such as
Socrates, Plato and Aristotle, who believed that knowledge can be sought for
knowledge’s sake. It follows then too that the Romans and the French towed the
same line. It was Karl Marx who questioned the belief of having knowledge that
cannot be applied for the benefit of humanity. Even at that, Marx himself had
overlooked the fact that for the implementation of knowledge, there must be a
commitment to the actualisation of societal goals. Against this backdrop, ideological
commitment, scientific knowledge and organisational ability are the three
critical variables in the process of development (p 83).
To
him, these are the critical things lacking in Africa’s pursuit of development.
Bourgeois social sciences, in their quest to be objective have sought to
separate science from ideology. It is for this reason that many believe it is
impossible to combine science and ideology on the same and equal pedestal. Many
believe that science propels technology, and ideology does not have a place as
far as science and technology are concerned, hence development must be devoid
of ideology. Further, Mafeje accused bourgeois social science of deceiving the
rest of the world by shrouding their ideology under the veil of scientific objectivity.
Behind every science lies an idea; an idea cannot be devoid of perception;
perception here, is the underlying ideology of the scientist. To him, even
natural science is guilty of this characterisation.
Finally, this is where the ignorance of Africa lies.
Firstly, development is pursued without an underlying ideology, which leads to
the exclusion of the traditional sector in development. Africans are also
unconscious of their status, which is why there is no ideology in their
developmental pursuit, and even at that, they lack the organisational skills to
bring about the needed consciousness through knowledge and the application of
same in the advancement of their society.
REFERENCE
Mafeje, A.
(1978) Science, Ideology and Development:
three essays on development theory, Upsala, Scandinavian Institute of
African Studies
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