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JBSXXX10.1177/0021934717729503Journal of Black StudiesDensu
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Journal of Black Studies
2018, Vol. 49(1) 29–52
Omenala: Toward © The Author(s) 2017
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DOI: 10.1177/0021934717729503
https://doi.org/10.1177/0021934717729503
Ecophilosophy and journals.sagepub.com/home/jbs
Political Ecology
Kwasi Densu1
Abstract
This article seeks to contribute to the reconstruction of an African-
centered ecophilosophy and political ecology. Employing Cheikh Anta
Diop’s theory of African cultural unity, it considers the Ndi Igbo philosophy
Omenala, its paradigmatic implications for Africana studies, and its capacity
to demonstrate the continuity of indigenous African socioecological praxis
cross culturally. In addition, it explores the relevance of Omenala to the
development of an authentic social history of African people and as a theory
to analyze contemporary problems in the African world. Three key issues
are addressed. First, the article accounts for the absence of ecological theory
within Africana studies. Second, it explicates the cultural and philosophical
basis for an African-centered ecophilosophy and political ecology. Third, it
envisions new approaches and areas of inquiry within Africana studies.
Keywords
African-centered, political ecology, ecophilosophy, environmental justice,
land reform
Corresponding Author:
Kwasi Densu, Assistant Professor, Department of History, Political Science and African
American Studies, Florida A&M University, Tucker Hall Room #320, Tallahassee, FL 32307,
USA.
Email: kwasi.densu@famu.edu
30 Journal of Black Studies 49(1)
Introduction
All philosophies contain preconceived notions of what it means to be a human
being and, by extension, what constitutes human development. They “pos-
sess a set of attributes, an overt or implicit set of empirical and normative
views, which are goal oriented about (1) human nature, (2) the process of
history and (3) the nature of socioeconomic and political arrangements”
(Eatwell & Wright, 1999, p. 14). Historically speaking, philosophies under-
girding the discipline of Africana studies have been, for the most part, anthro-
pocentric in their orientation. Africana studies paradigms have attempted to
engage the problems of African people principally by addressing social con-
ditions, without considering that human life and development cannot be
extricated from the earth’s history and its predetermined ecological processes.
This discussion seeks to demonstrate how an African-centered ecophiloso-
phy and political ecology can help to expand and clarify critical theory within
the discipline of Africana studies. By employing Cheikh Anta Diop’s theo-
retical framework of African cultural unity, we will consider the Ndi Igbo
philosophy Omenala, its paradigmatic implications for Africana studies, and
its ability to contribute to the development of an authentic social history of
African people. In light of contemporary concerns over environmental rac-
ism, global warming, species extinction, food insecurity, global economic
instability, and their impact on the African world, we will analyze the effects
of European cultural hegemony and modernity through an African-centered,
environmental lens. This discussion will unfold in three stages. First, we will
account for the absence of ecological theory within Africana studies. Second,
we will explicate the cultural and philosophical basis for an African-centered
ecophilosophy and political ecology. Third, we will consider new approaches
and areas of inquiry within Africana studies.
Since the Scientific Revolution of the seventeenth century, the West has seen
nature primarily through the spectacles of mechanistic science. Matter is dead
and inert, remaining at rest or moving with uniform velocity in a straight line
unless acted on by external forces. Change comes from outside as in the
operation of a machine. The world is a clock, adjustable by human clock
makers; nature is passive and manipulable. (p. 267)
the ideology (African Centered thought) has been forcefully and clearly
addressed for generations, but overall the ideology has lacked coherency and
adequate theoretical clarity to apply at the grassroots level of organizing, or
apply to the conditions encountered in personal interactions. The conceptions
of culture, history, politics and spirituality have not always been presented in a
coherent fashion. (p. vi)
It reflects the cosmic order which keeps the world going and without which
too, the very existence of nature and the world would be jeopardized including
the welfare of the communities and all the beings who reside in it. There would
be chaos, and the community would lose its normal balance with nature.
(Nwala, 1985, p. 61)
Omenala reflects a cosmic order because it reflects a body of beliefs and mores
without which the community would mean nothing and without which, in fact,
as the Igbo see it and said earlier, the community would cease to exist because
it must have lost its touch with reality and the source of their very existence.
(Nwala, 1985, p. 61)
It is the basis of morality and social justice. It provides a context for negotiat-
ing conflict, making political decisions, managing ecosystem resources, edu-
cating children and adults, and “the actual practice of the customs as they
apply to any aspect of social and ritual life of the various communities in
36 Journal of Black Studies 49(1)
Omenala refers to the Igbo attitude to life and their basic conceptions about
nature, society and life. It embraces the whole system of civilization of the Igbo
in both theory and practice. (Nwala, 1985, p. 8)
It was an ideology, which emerged from their natural and social environment,
especially from their mode of production, the basis on which Igbo society was
organized (Nwala, 1985, p. 8)
like other Africans, engaged and understood nature not as an abstract concept,
but as an experienced reality. Their sense of oneness with it was heightened by
their sense of the sacred which pervades the world and embraces animals,
plants, mountains, river, wind, rock, flood, sun, moon star and other modalities
of being. (Karenga, 2004, p. 389)
Densu 37
Among the Akan of present-day southern Ghana, the earth is called Asase
Yaa, earth Mother born on Thursday. According to Donkor, on Thursday
Akan people may not till the earth because this period of time is devoted to
consecrating the earth. Any acts that desecrate the earth must be avoided. These
may include spilling blood (homicide) on her, sexual indiscretion on the open
field, toxic waste, and indiscriminate use of land. (Donkor, 1997, pp. 28-29)
The defining aspect of land-use in the Gamo highlands is a set of intricate and
well enforced traditional laws called Wagas. These laws stem from the belief
that everything is connected and bound in a delicate balance. Together they
form a natural resource management system that dictates everything from
interpersonal relationships to the conservation and preservation of pasture,
forest, soil, and water. Because all of the Wagas are interconnected, if any one
38 Journal of Black Studies 49(1)
The African conception of the earth as Mother and the universe as an inter-
connected phenomenon gave birth to indigenous political economies that
were, generally speaking, sustainable in socioeconomic and ecological terms.
Bamana people, for instance, distinguish between two forms of economic
activity: ka bolo, production for life, and ka wari nyini, production for wealth
accumulation (Wooten, 2009). Ka bolo is associated with the cosmological
concept badenya, “things born of the mother.” Badenya refers to all things
that create and maintain social cohesion, solidarity, and equity within a given
society. This principle manifests itself as sociopolitical and economic prac-
tices defined by the commons. The commons is rooted in the idea that all
human beings must have access to the most fundamental social and economic
resources that give life. On an economic level, land, including forest and
water resources, is held in common. All adults, provided they are socially and
ecologically informed and responsible, have the right to land for the produc-
tion of goods and services, in particular subsistence needs, that is, food,
clothing, shelter, medicine, art, and so forth. Typically, common lands are
distributed in a decentralized fashion among extended families within a given
community. The elders of each extended family are responsible for the equi-
table distribution of land among their adult descendants. In traditional African
thought, land is not a commodity; it cannot be bought or sold. Land belongs
to the ancestors and the children yet unborn, all of whom make up the
extended family. The values of the commons encompass other areas as well.
Typically labor for the production of homes, staple foods, community
Densu 39
Cibo labor closely resembles the kind of festive labor events described in other
areas of West Africa and beyond. A typical cibo involves hosting a large group
of men (often in excess of 75 individuals) from the home community and
neighboring villages for a day of work in the field. The participants in this kind
of collective labor event do not typically receive monetary compensation, but
the host provides them with some or all of the following: high-quality meals,
tobacco, kola nuts, beer and coffee. These events are usually quite spirited and
fairly social. (Wooten, 2009, pp. 72-73)
Table 1. “Spirit Force” Associated With Trades Among Select African Ethnic
Groups.
Due to the seasonal nature of labor demands in the rain-fed farming cycle, most
people do not devote too much time to such personal activities until the close
of the year’s farming season. However, once their obligations to the food
economy are met, most people—young and old, male and female—at least
devote some time to producing or collecting products that they sell in nearby
markets. (Wooten, 2009, p. 88)
In traditional times, African people lived and dwelled in the midst of the forest.
The forest like mother earth was seen as a source of life. African people respected
and reverenced the plants in the forest. Not far away from African villages and
towns were sacred groves inhabited by sacred trees and abode of ancestral
guardian spirits. These groves were centers of biodiversity. (Ikeke, 2013, p. 347)
42 Journal of Black Studies 49(1)
In African tradition, the social order begins with the occupation of the land
inherited from the ancestor-founder of the lineage. This ancestral heritage is the
actual soil where the Africans are born and raised, grow, and organize their own
descent and immortality. This land is more than a birthplace, it is a living
environment, the total environment which has witnessed rituals sacralizing
birth, childhood, adolescence, adulthood, healing processes, and death. This
land is truly a spiritual universe. (Montilus, 1989, p. 33)
The colonial revolution extracted native species from their ecological contexts
and shipped them overseas as commodities. It placed cultured European humans
above wild nature, other animals, and “beastlike savages.” (Merchant, 1989, p. 2)
The roles that were once fulfilled by families and communities for free have been
“taken apart, function by function, and sold back to people, who missed the
things that these once provided. People have become purchasers of community
and care, rather than participants in it.” (Walker & Goldsmith, 1998, p. 217)
The questions of environmental justice and land reform are not narrowly
confined to U.S. borders. They are, in fact, international issues and have impli-
cations for expanding Africana studies contributions to Pan-Africanism.
Critiques of industrial models of production, that is, conventional agriculture,
fossil fuel–based energy systems, Western-styled urbanization, and so forth,
are in order (Kunnie, 2013). For instance, it provides an opportunity and con-
text for Africana studies’ scholars in the areas of agriculture and development
studies to unearth and explore the ways that traditional agroecological knowl-
edge can be used to rebuild local food economies on both the African conti-
nent and in the African diaspora (Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa,
2016). Beyond agriculture, the fields of conservation biology, restoration ecol-
ogy, and bioremediation are important as well. Low-income, African-
descendant communities in the capitalist metropoles, Caribbean and African
nations in the Global South are most impacted by human-induced climate
change. The conservation and restoration of local ecosystems and biomes is
considered to be an important strategy to slow down and mediate the impact
of climate change. African-centered ecophilosophy, political ecology, and tra-
ditional ecological knowledge can play an important role in restoring forest
systems, water systems, agricultural lands, degraded wetlands, and bioreme-
diation of electronic and industrial waste, nonsensically imported from
Western countries by African elites to gain access to foreign currency. This
also provides an avenue to increase the number of students and scholars in
Africana studies in fields typically associated with the natural sciences. A
commitment to the innovation and production of green technologies, fusing
both African indigenous knowledge systems with Western ecotechnical
knowledge, should drive Africana studies’ curriculum development, applied,
and theoretical knowledge (Pope, Smith, Shacks, & Hargrove, 2011). This has
obvious implications for our survival as a discipline given the overemphasis
on Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) within U.S. higher
education. This approach also has the capacity to advance the development of
indigenous African knowledge systems. No body of knowledge is without its
own potential for dogma. Although this discussion explores the positive
aspects of African-centered ecophilosophy and political ecology, weaknesses
do exist. One example is the notion that indigenous African socioecological
praxis is not always based on environmental consciousness, but fear of the
“unknown” and spiritual sanctions from the ancestors. Taringa argues,
In the light of this we can note three attitudes to nature. These are to maintain,
obey and act on it. The first two are related to sacred aspects of nature. They are
primarily based on fear of reprisal from powerful ancestral spirits. As we
mentioned in the discussions above the attitudes are one of placation appeal
48 Journal of Black Studies 49(1)
and coercion. Sacred aspects are not indifferent. They are morally significant.
They care. They are involved in conduct. So they constitute a system of moral
consequences. This is why respect (for nature) is based on fear rather than on
environmental consciousness. (p. 211)
In this regard, we must consider the wisdom of Cabral. A return to the source
requires both an internal critique and assessment of the positive and negative
aspects of indigenous African culture in addition to a critical assessment of
the lessons learned from African contact with European cultural hegemony
and exploitation (Cabral, 1973).
In the realm of political economy, an African-centered ecophilosophy pro-
vides a theoretical basis for reconsidering economic development in the
African world. It critiques “catch up development” strategies, in both capital-
ist and socialist forms, because of their commitment to the fallacy of perpet-
ual growth rooted in the unlimited extraction and consumption of natural
resources (P. I. Grant, 2009). It calls for a “new anthropology” of economic
systems that abandons the polarized capitalist versus socialist typology. It
prioritizes the maintenance of biodiversity and the sociocultural reproduction
of human communities as the main goals of economic development.
Finally, an African-centered ecophilosophy and political ecology will
position Africana studies to expand its understanding and critique of science,
technology, and society. African culture’s emphasis on biocentrism provides
a piercing analysis of Western modernity, science, and technological prog-
ress. It situates itself within the broader context of the indigenous call to
decolonize science. It moves beyond the tendency, within Africana studies, to
discuss the “African origins” of science and technology while ignoring con-
temporary problems of alienation, inequality, and development. It inspires
Africana studies’ scholars to answer the following questions: How should we
understand and interact with nature? What, on a material level, do we “need”
to develop genuinely as human beings? How should socioecological wealth
be distributed? What role should technology play in society and what values
should govern its development?
In conclusion, the absence of an African-centered ecophilosophy and
political ecology within Africana studies suggests that there is a relative dis-
regard, among Africana studies’ scholars and social movement activists, for
environmental and land-based issues. This is problematic for a number of
reasons. At the same time, however, it is understandable given European
ideological hegemony over environmental justice and sustainable develop-
ment discourse.
This ecohesitation has been conditioned in part by African suspicion of the green
discourses emanating from metropolitan Western centers. Also, African experiences
Densu 49
of nature, it is often argued, are different and other. Indeed, there is good cause to
worry that environmentalism and ecologism are new forms of dominating
discourses issuing from Western or First World centers. And the suspicion that
environmentalism in all its various shades of green (including red greens) is a white
thing is borne out by the explosive growth of research and participation in it by
white scholars in and outside Africa. (Slaymaker, 2001, p. 133)
Author’s Note
The Faculty Research Awards Program in the School of Graduate Studies and
Research at Florida A&M University supported the research for this study.
Acknowledgment
In addition, I thank Tiffany Austin and Marva Hinton for assistance in editing the article.
Funding
The author disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research,
authorship, and/or publication of this article: The Faculty Research Awards Program
(Project No. FRAP 2016-17) in the School of Graduate Studies and Research at
Florida A&M University supported the research for this study.
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Author Biography
Kwasi Densu is an assistant professor of political science and African American stud-
ies at Florida A&M University. He does research in the areas of Africana land-based
social movements, sustainability, indigenous knowledge, environmental justice, and
Africana political thought.