Kwasi Wiredu

Kwasi Wiredu (born October 3, 1931 ) is one of the most famous philosophers in Africa. Wiredu was born in Kumasi , the capital of the Ashanti region in Ghana , and attended the Adisadel Secondary School from 1948 to 1952. During this time he developed his interest in philosophy by getting into the literature of Plato and Bertrand Russell . Wiredu is the author of the Akan Culture History of Thought . His work includes the ideas of his teachers from Oxford as well as influences from David Hume , Immanuel Kant and John Dewey . The philosophical perspective of the Akan from Ghana can also be found in his work. With this special reference to Africa, his work is considered particularly relevant and unique.

education

He finished his education at the University of Ghana in Legon , near Accra , where he also graduated in 1958. He moved to England and attended the University of Oxford there to do his bachelor's degree in philosophy . In Oxford he attended the courses of Gilbert Ryle , the supervisor of his master's thesis. He was also supervised by his university tutor Peter Strawson and his personal tutor Stuart Hampshire. During this time he wrote his master's thesis on Knowledge, Truth and Reason .

University employment

After graduating in 1960, he was offered a teaching position at the University College of North Staffordshire (now Keele University ), which he held for a year. At the end of 1961 he returned to his home country to take up a teaching position in philosophy again at the University of Ghana. Wiredu taught at this university for 23 years and over time became head of the faculty and later professor. Since 1987 he has been a teaching professor at the University of South Florida at Tampa .

Visiting professorships

Excerpt from Kwasi Wiredus visiting professorships:

UCLA (1979; 1980)
University of Ibadan, Nigeria (1984)
University of Richmond, Virginia (1985)
Carleton College, Minnesota (1986)
Duke University, North Carolina (1994; 1995; 1999; 2001)

Memberships and associations

Between 1983 and 1998 he was a member of the Commission of Directors of the International Federation of Philosophical Societies . He is also a member of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars (1985) and the National Humanities Center , North Carolina (1986). Since 1987 he has been Vice President of the Inter-African Council for Philosophy (IACP).

Philosophical work

In his philosophy, Kwasi Wiredu tries to achieve a higher degree of intercultural understanding between cultures. In his view he opposes the rapprochement between so-called “ethnophilosophy” and African philosophy on the grounds that every culture has its own “worldview”, which must be taken into account by practical philosophy. In his philosophical thinking Wiredu tries to emphasize the own value of the African tradition and at the same time to open it to a dialogue between cultures. According to his understanding, cultures differ in their way of "understanding" the world - every culture has its own "worldview" inherent. In this context Wiredu speaks of the need for “conceptual decolonization”. According to Wiredu, however, all culturally conditioned “worldviews” are now based on a reason, for example the reality of the world. According to Wiredu, an intercultural dialogue is only possible if it is based on the "most acceptable worldview" for everyone involved, which, according to Wiredu, is composed of aspects of all the "worldviews" involved.

Worldview

Wiredu defines truth as a conception from a certain human point of view that is confirmed by a momentary perception. People learn to understand the world in a social process and are influenced by their culture or by the peculiarities of their own culture, how it recognizes the inner relationships of the world. Wiredu calls this development of the human being from a “mere creature” to a “person”. For this reason, according to Wiredu, people are connected by a worldview that prevails in their own culture.

In this worldview there is something special about a culture, but they all have one goal in common: the realization of human existence. According to Wiredu, the differences are divided into “universals” and “particulars”, whereby the former - empirical, objective knowledge - form the basis of intercultural understanding and are adopted by all cultures, while the latter - subjective, “metaphysical” ideas - the peculiarities of each Form culture.

"Conceptual decolonialization"

The colonization of Africa either forced structures on many Africans or these were adopted into their own culture without criticism. Wiredu illustrates this using the example of language by emphasizing that language transports cultural forms of thought. Translations of thought forms falsify the original meaning or at least obscure the view of one's own structures. Likewise, some terms - Wiredu shows this in “Cultural Universals and Particulars” and several examples - cannot easily be translated into other languages. The oral tradition in African conceptions has also hardly been taken into account by western-influenced philosophers. Wiredu therefore calls for a return to original (original) languages in literature, science and public life. Philosophical conceptions in particular should always be thought through in their own language, since current representatives of African philosophies are mostly strongly influenced by the West. Forms of thought adopted from outside should be recognized, critically questioned and compared with African forms. Wiredu understands “conceptual decolonization” to mean that the languages, values, etc., imposed or uncritically adopted by colonialism are subjected to thorough criticism and it is also checked whether one's own languages or values can also be used to shape the present.

Concept of consensus

According to Wiredu, there is a fundamental community of interests that connects all people. As an example from the Akan culture, he cites the picture of two crocodiles that share a common stomach. The animals fight for food. However, if they could see that it was intended for the same stomach, the reason for their argument would not be justifiable by any rational argument. According to Wiredu, people have the ability to dialogically overcome the seeming contradictions in their interests and thus to create and maintain harmony in a society. The harmony now consists in the reconciliation of opposites in favor of the common good; it is a basic requirement for the good of all and thus of the individual.

Consensus - in Sine Wiredus - is seen as consent. This can mean that individual members of the community do not agree with the proposal, but agree to it in the interests of restoring harmony. The sense and reason for the creation of a consensus is therefore the “reconciliation” of opposing interests in favor of a stable community.

A very recent example of the use of a reconciliation-based approach is the establishment of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) in South Africa in 1995. The reason for the establishment was the consideration that a stabilization of society in the present is only possible through a confrontation with the past. The TRC approach does not focus on the punishment of the perpetrators by amnestying those perpetrators who fully admit the truth about their crimes and whose crimes are politically motivated, as well as through reparation policies towards the victims. Thus the main concern is to create the basis of a common memory and responsibility for the history of South Africa.

Based on his concept of consensus, Wiredu developed consensus democracy and consensus ethics.

A brief outline of Kwasi Wiredu's consensus democracy

In its idea of a consensus democracy, Wiredu opposes multi-party systems introduced by Western states by referring to the African traditions of “consensus”. Wiredu accuses the multi-party system of proceeding according to the “winner takes all” principle. This means that the party that receives the majority of all votes provides the government and makes all the essential decisions. Wiredu is calling for a “non-partisan system” based on the African tradition of “substantial” rather than “formal” representation. This means that individual candidates, rather than parties, are elected.

Brief outline of the idea of the consensus ethics Kwasi Wiredu

Wiredu's ethics of consensus is closely related to the concept of consensus and consensus democracy. Wiredu's ethics of consensus therefore demands reconciliation, i.e. In other words, taking into account all perspectives, to find a compromise that is worthy of approval - but at least one that is reasonable. Wiredu sees the basis of moral action in friendly impartiality (sympathetic impartiality) as well as in the a priori set basic community of interests of all people. For Wiredu, the concept of “reconciliation” is at the center of its ethics concept.

criticism

One point of criticism of Wiredu's philosophy is first of all his theory of consensus democracy. Wiredu's simplified representation of western multi-party democracy and consensus democracy seem to be poorly differentiated, as it transports the principle of “winner takes all” to all “western” states. However, the multi-party systems of the so-called “western” states all know the principle of the separation of powers and are usually supplemented by a sophisticated system of minority representation in parliamentary committees.

A decisive weakness of the consensus ethics is probably that Wiredu neither explains what is meant by the "harmony of the community", nor by the "fundamental common interests of the people". What does harmony mean? Who defines the criteria for this? How are the interests of the individual and those of the community related? Wiredu leaves these questions unanswered. In this context, criticism can also be made of a consensus ethic that dispenses with majority decisions, as this - presumably for lack of time - is ultimately only applicable to communities that are numerically very small.

One of the main critics of Kwasi Wiredus is Emmanuel Chukwudi Eze , a Nigerian philosopher living in the United States.

bibliography

Kwasi Wiredu is the author of numerous articles on logic, epistemology and African philosophy as well as some entries in encyclopedias and anthologies . He is the author or co-editor of the following works:

Works by Kwasi Wiredu

Philosophy and an African Culture . Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1980, ISBN 0-521-22794-1 . (1982, Ghana National Book Award)
as editor: Person and Community: Ghanaian Philosophical Studies. Wiredu & Kwame Gyekye, ISBN 1-56518-004-6 . (1992: New York, Council for Research in Values and Philosophy)
Cultural Universals and Particulars: An African Perspective. Indiana University Press, Bloomington 1996, ISBN 0-253-21080-1 .
A Companion to African Philosophy. Blackwell, Oxford 2003, ISBN 0-631-20751-1 .

Works for Kwasi Wiredu

Olusegun Oladipo: Philosophy and the African Experience: The Contributions of Kwasi Wiredu. Hope Publications, Ibadan, Nigeria 1996, ISBN 978-32037-4-6 .
Olusegun Oladipo (Ed.): The Third Way in African Philosophy: Essays in Honor of Kwasi Wiredu. Hope Publications, Ibandan, Nigeria 2002, ISBN 978-36548-7-X .
Peter J. King: One Hundred Philosophers. Barrons, New York 2004, ISBN 0-7641-2791-8 .
Sanya Osha: Kwasi Wiredu and Beyond: The Text, Writing and Thought in Africa. Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa, Dakar, Senegal 2005, ISBN 2-86978-150-4 .

Web links

personal data
SURNAME	Wiredu, Kwasi
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	Ghanaian philosopher
DATE OF BIRTH	October 3, 1931
PLACE OF BIRTH	Kumasi