Globalization and Autonomy

Knowledge of Globalization and Globalization of Knowledge: Issues and Perceptions at Stake in Africa and from Africa

Armstrong Matiu Adejo, Benue State University, Makurdi, Nigeria

Introduction

When issues of globalization are raised in Nigeria, and Africa at large, they evoke instant emotion and bring memories of the historical processes which saw Africa and its states arrive in their unenviable status and location in global power and economic relations. Globalization requires Africa to open up and place the "New World Order" development agenda in its top drawer. This agenda is touted as an elixir for progress by ardent globalists who glorify the form of cooperation and linkages it affords in creating mutual interdependence in the global system. In every sense, globalization has become the defining process of the present age.

For us in Nigeria, getting to the root of this process in the context of world history will broaden our knowledge and probably our horizon, to remove the veil of ignorance which shrouds the universalistic approach to international development. Within this context, too, Arjun Appadurai's essay on "Grassroots Globalization and Research Imagination" (2000) makes interesting and, admittedly, very cogent reasoning in line with perceptions on globalization in Nigeria, and Africa in general. We share anxiety, but up to a point, as we reflect on the roots of imperialism, globalization, and the visible and comparatively underdeveloped stages of our institutions and facilities.

Critical Issues and Perceptions from Africa

In this paper, I will attempt to address the questions posed to us by Professor William Coleman.¹ But first, I would like to emphasize that while I am from Nigeria, the critical issues within globalization discourse are common to Africa since many of the countries share historical, cultural, economic, and political similarities and our attempts at addressing these issues are erected largely on a common emotion and epistemological question. This is, however, not to say that everything is the same; definitely not. There are specific country experiences but these are marginal when juxtaposed against larger and broader questions of the continent's development in the global setting.

How My Research has Focused on Globalization

From a historical standpoint, I have, like the majority of scholars from Nigeria and Africa, addressed globalization by analyzing its roots. In one of my critical essays, "The Roots of Globalization: A Historical Review" (Adejo 2003a), I review the progressive growth of expansionary global capital. This is basic to our understanding of the concept of imperialism and its twin object, globalization. My focus is on the challenge of current global developments for the South and this is invariably characterized by a disapproval of the character and modus operandi of globalization.

In some of my other essays, I have also questioned vehemently the new hegemonic forces that have emerged especially since the Cold War and, like Appadurai, I also note the different worries about globalization, including the new forms of structural adjustment, "Americanization disguised as human rights," and the unremitting neo-colonial instruments visibly in play in Africa.

This is why my essay on "NEPAD and African Development: A Diplomacy of Self Reliance or Un-abetting Dependency Mentality?" (Adejo 2003b), outlined the need for the reversal of the abnormal situation with which Africa is confronted, using the new regionalist impulses of the African Union and the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD). I also believe that the state-centeredness in prevailing development models, against the workings of a predatory global setting, will not make Africa's initiative work unless there is a partnership engagement with civil society for sustainable development.

It is against this backdrop of the African condition and the necessity for an aggressive South-South cooperation, that my current research looks at subregional communities in a predatory global system and compares the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and the Asian experiences as examples. My interest in this research was also fired by the preliminary discussions held with colleagues at the Institute of Malaysian and International Studies (IKMAS) after the 3rd Globalization Studies Network Conference in Malaysia.

My thinking is rooted in the many questions surrounding the contradictory transformation processes that have characterized the world order since the nineteenth century. The ramifications of these processes have been antithetical to the interests of the poor and weak, especially in Africa and Asia. However, I believe that the lure of regionalism or the widespread enthusiasm for regionalism derives from complex motives and sentiments. As sovereign states of Africa and Asia struggle to retain their sovereignty, the vagaries of the international system demand some measure of surrendering that sovereignty. Comparing experiences from Africa and Asia, the key issues to be addressed include:

The nature of human diversity and regional ownership of development
The ideological underpinnings of collective self-reliance and the compelling practical needs of the regions
Global governance and regional inputs for political, economic, and social recovery, especially in addressing poverty
A rethinking of new development architecture for the regions, especially that of sharing of regional experiences to enhance greater South-South cooperation.

What Scholars and Activists in Africa Mean by "Globalization"

Works by African writers, including my own works (Adejo 2003a, 2003b, 2004, 2006; Ojione 2002; Elaigwu 1998; Oduntan 2001) yield the following understandings of globalization:

It is no more than a transition of the geo-finance system.
It is a global capitalist system and its character is still a much-thriving mercantilism.
It is a means of tying down the masses and compounding the poverty level through its three main neo-liberal policy measures of privatization, deregulation, and trade and financial liberalization.
It is the rapid integration of economies worldwide through trade, financial flows, technological spillovers, information networks, and cross-cultural currents dominated by hegemonic forces which have flattened national boundaries and invaded nation-state sovereignty and held most states hostage in terms of development.
That imperialism, capitalism and globalization are the realities of a single phenomenon in perpetual motion.

Globalization has equally come to mean other more significant issues among African scholars and activists. These include:

Globalization is a perspective that sees the world from the so-called "Eurocentric" or "economic North's" position — that is, it portrays the world from the perspective of the dominant political and economic interests prevalent in Europe, North America, and Japan (Aina, Chachage, and Ananan-Yao 2004).
It is also the point of contact in which globalization, beyond the realm of ideas, touches lives, livelihood, and life changes of many ordinary peoples in Africa but is riddled with contradictions and ambiguities.

This is why the following nagging questions keep recurring:

How can those who are most seriously affected by poverty become active in local governance?
Against the background of international activities, what can be done to provide meaningful assistance to the poor in the process of constructing local governance in a globalized world?
Has the recent wave of democratization in Africa improved the chances of the poor in these respects?

Most Pressing Research Questions Related to Globalization in Africa

The issue of development dominates Africa's research matters. There is a steady dissatisfaction with conceptualizing development in largely economic terms (Adejo 2006; Obadina in Africa Today, April 2006 and New African January 2006; Ake 2001; Kiawi and Mfoulon 2002; Macamo 2005; Toyo 2000). A consensus exists that there is a close correlation between the mode of integrating Africa and other developing regions into the world system and the state of underdevelopment they experience. The dependency school which arose from this connection stressed the centrality of external outcomes over domestic ones (Yapi-Dialou 2005).

Spirited discourse, some exhibiting frustration with the concept of development, has taken place. Claude Ake (2001) notes that the assumption so readily made that there has been a failure of development is misleading. The problem is not so much that development has failed as that it was never really on the agenda in the first place. In the same vein, Macamo, speaking on "Against 'Development'" (2005), notes that the commitment of generations of African politicians, scholars, and well-wishers to develop the continent over the past half a century has been a gross misunderstanding. He reiterates the two major ideas that have been central to the notion of development: one is the belief that development describes the political, economic, and social condition of Western countries and the second, and even more significant idea, is the assumption that any country which follows a set of policy recommendations that are thought to have led to the present condition will grow.

Macamo rightly mimics that, "African countries must commit themselves to human rights and to a free market economy, they must uphold the rule of law, be fair in their political processes, train their workforce, give education to the young, bring succour to the suffering poor, observe gender equality, the rights of minorities etc. In so doing they will be discharging precisely the tasks that lead to development. In other words, the very things which African countries are unable to do because their present condition prevents them from doing so are turned into pre-conditions for Africa's development. Alas, these pre-conditions are precisely the properties of non-development. In other words, they describe Africa's condition" (2005, 5-7).

One can then appreciate why he says that "development does not exist" or better still "development is an argument, a fallacious one at that" (Macamo 2005, 5-7). In essence, what should be understood in the globalization and development question is that those from the economically privileged groups tend to be better educated and to enjoy higher status and to move successfully, professionally, and politically. Economic inequality is extremely important as it tends to reproduce itself endlessly in a series of other inequalities. Thus, those who are economically privileged tend to be interested in preserving the existing social order and those who are disadvantaged by the order, particularly its distribution of wealth, have a strong interest in changing the social order.

Herein lies the crux of the African development question. Thus, before Africa is crushed under "dual apartheid" (with includes Appadurai's concept and extends beyond it), and before the world makes "African poverty" and "lack of development" history we need to get the history of poverty and underdevelopment right. We in Nigeria and Africa are questioning why, if finance, trade, and cultural flows are elixirs for progress, as ardent globalists glorify, African internal and external trade is at such dismally low levels? Is the market the problem or what Africa has taken and now takes to the market, or is it not the rigging of trade rules in favour of more advanced economies? Can credible competition be guaranteed in conditions of perverse inequality?

The obvious thing is that international wealth transfer in the past five decades has consistently gone from the poor to the rich and makes the achievement or construction of peace difficult. Thus, gleaning from work published in Nigeria and Africa, such as in the Journal of Globalization and International Studies (Benue State University), Fulbright Readings on Globalization and National Development in Nigeria (2003), and CODESRIA Bulletin (for example Yapi-Diahou 2005; Zegeye 2005), and against the credible argument that development is something that people do by themselves and for themselves, there needs to be a reconsideration of the international development architecture. It is from this posture that civil society and some scholars argue that the struggle for alternatives to the type of globalization system under which Africa in particular prevails, is a struggle for the survival of human civilization (African Agenda, 2000).

Questions vigorously contested and forcefully held in Africa, and which reflect on the state of research on globalization, include (Aina, Chachage, and Ananan-Yao 2004):

Whether globalization can bring Africa significant social and economic benefits?
Can it, in any positive manner, transform the lives and livelihoods of African peoples?
Can globalization provide a solution to the poverty and underdevelopment which overwhelm the continent?
Or, does it aggravate these problems?

Questions related to Africa's economic and political developments have resonated strongly among the intellectual community on the continent and those that engage in South-South intellectual exercises. For instance, the Asian Political and International Studies Association (APISA), the Latin American Council of Social Sciences (CLACSO), and the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA), organize joint research, training, publishing, and dissemination activities such as those on "Development and Social Movement in the Countries of the South," "Global and Regional Hegemonic Dilemmas in the South," "Rethinking Development for the South: Proposal for Africa, Asia and Latin America," and "Regionalism in the South and the New Global Hegemony," all of which took place in 2007.

More recent works demonstrate concern about social policy in Africa. For instance, Aina and colleagues (2004) focused on Globalization and Social Policy in Africa. The issues raised are reflected in their subtitles:

Economic Globalization, Market Reform and Social Welfare in West Africa
Globalization and the South African Transformation
Global and Local Factors and the Welfare of the Poor in Ethiopia
Economic and Regional Trends (West Africa, Southern Africa and Maghreb)
Poverty and Social Services Provision
Globalization, Women's Work and Citizenship
Higher Education and Globalization

From various other studies, it is clear that:

Globalization has not necessarily been benign as far as Africa and Africans are concerned.
Globalization has not only generated much anxiety, insecurity, and resistance but has generated an almost unanimous perception of polarization, pain, and greater inequality along with a feeling of almost insurmountable threat to the human condition, especially the ordinary peoples' livelihoods and cultures.
Globalization is seen as been imposed through adjustment programs, offered in different guises, regardless of all systems and institutions.
Lip service is paid to political liberation and advanced in many countries of Africa but with lack of genuine participatory democracy and the social integration of the marginalized and the poor.
Economic "liberalization" is accompanied by increased repression and oppression.

The broad theme of African development and globalization, and encompassing the questions outlined above, will benefit immensely from more systematic collaboration with colleagues outside Africa. Appadurai's analysis (2000) helps raise the following questions which collaborative work could help to elucidate:

What are the great global agencies of aid and development up to?
Is the World Bank really committed to incorporating social and cultural values into its development agenda?
Does Northern aid really allow local communities to set their own agenda?
Can the media ever be turned to the interests of the poor?

Fundamentally, the double apartheid thesis Appadurai describes could be addressed through consistent collaborative research among South-North scholars to remove the veil of prejudices unobtrusively thriving at both ends. There definitely exists a "growing disjuncture between the globalization of knowledge (which is more critical to us in Africa and the South) and knowledge of globalization." Through wider collaborative projects, we can advance knowledge to wonderful heights while criticisms that are most vital for the formation of democratic research communities that could produce a global view of globalization may systematically emerge.

From such synergy, Africa's critical research questions might be engaged for a clear research framework for collaboration with Northern colleagues to emerge and remove prejudices that exist in the North. Although, Appadurai raises and attempts to explain the matter away, his statement that "theory and method were seen as naturally metropolitan, modern and western" still pervades. He continues that "the rest of the world was seen in the idiom of cases, events, examples, and test sites in relation to this stable location for the production or revision of theory" (2000, 4).

Through collaborative research we may be able to do away with the hub-and-spoke model of South-North intellectual collaboration which invariably is a consequence of political thinking in the North.

In summary, items for concerted collaboration could include, but are not limited to:

Cultural dimensions (encompassing globalization and cultural pluralism, international information flows)
Social dimensions (encompassing globalization and education, health, and social welfare)
Economic dimensions (encompassing the IMF, World Bank position on development, trade, labour, environmental degradation especially in the extractive industries, foreign aid and its politics, and poverty and its consequences).
Political dimensions (encompassing democratization and democracy, conflicts and insecurity, and so on).

We must note that quality of life is a social construction which is influenced by local factors and to a large extent by global factors, so it invariably beholds that the intellectual community across divides must work together for its proper conceptualization and analysis.

Principal Obstacles faced by Globalization Studies Researchers in my Location

Research is fundamental to knowledge production and it requires a conducive atmosphere for its conduct. Some of the basic problems which confront researchers in Nigeria, at more practical level, include:

Apparent lack of government interest in research enterprises. This is seen in the poor funding of education in general and research activities in particular.
Few opportunities for intellectual mobility. Knowledge is about interaction and exchange of ideas. Few scholars have the opportunity for major outings which are intellectually refreshing.
Most governments and research institutions have little or no ICT facilities.
Computer use is extremely low, even among academics.
Where facilities are available basic infrastructures are at a rudimentary stage.
Few research institutions exist for specialized research in globalization. Some universities have centres for development studies but they are hamstrung by lack of proper funding and poor infrastructure.
Poor or underdeveloped library facilities.
Limited outlets for professional publication of peer-reviewed works.

Some of these obstacles could be addressed by greater cross-national research collaboration in that: opportunities offered scholars from Nigeria and Africa will break down the immobility status of some of them; opportunities for publication of local research might become available; sabbatical leaves designed around specific research collaborations could empower researchers and activists; ICT and computer availability would enhance research; conference and seminars across the regions and university exchange programs are basic areas for removing some of the glaring obstacles to extending the frontier of knowledge across global divides. We may also be able to overcome what Abebe Zegeye (2005) called "the slippery relationship between knowledge production and publishing in Africa."

Through wider collaborative work, we will be able to scale some of the re-echoing prejudices. Although Appadurai attempts to be nice in conveying this, couching the idea in less angry language, this is seen in his question, "Can we find ways to legitimately engage scholarship by public intellectuals here and overseas whose work is not primarily conditioned by professional criteria of criticism and dissemination?" (2000, 14). This underscores the perception problem in the North (and which academics from the South find uninviting and an extension of the globalization question). There is no doubt, as earlier shown, that there are legitimate worries expressed by scholars from the South as to "where the intellectual or scientific communities really situate themselves" especially when it comes to the identification and improvement of new "paradigms'" that seem to be the most suitable for influencing the evolution of societies, and to development that talks of governance, poverty, sustainable development, and globalization. These worries are embedded in the often-asked question "how many scientific works carried out by researchers in African universities have been indexed or referenced by scientific communities in the North?" (Yapi-Diahou 2005).

A worrisome trend, however, and which is a product of donor influence from the North is the issue of what Yapi-Diahou (2005, 17) describes, as "expertise as challenge for research." Expertise differs from the scientific activity which "by nature as well as by vocation, needs time to determine its aims, develop its subjects and polish up these issues." Expertise observes phenomena and specific objects, according to Yapi-Diahou, within limited timeframes with the sole objective of enlightening decision-makers with regard to actions to be taken in the short term. What leads to this threat of "expertise vogue" is the "cupidity and misery of intellectuals" which invariably limit the vision and relegation of research responsibilities of the intellectuals.

Conclusion

What Appadurai says about research is fundamental to intellectual tradition and culture in any civilized community. He states that "research ethic is obviously not about just any kind of new knowledge. It is about new knowledge that meets certain criteria" (2000, 4). Each discipline may set a framework for research activities but what I really know is that each research seeks some basic truth devoid of emotion.

Acknowledgement

I want to take this opportunity to express my profound gratitude to Professor William D. Coleman, organizer and Canada Research Chair on Global Governance and Public Policy, and to the Centre for International Governance Innovation, for providing this wonderful opportunity to interact with colleagues from across the globe. For those of us who come from Africa this kind of opportunity is most often referred to as "golden and God-given." I do hope that its scope and the level of interactions will be expanded and sustained.

Works Cited

Adejo, Armstrong Matiu. 2003a. The roots of globalization. Journal of Globalization and International Studies 1 (1): 1-11.

Adejo, Armstrong Matiu. 2003b. NEPAD and African development: A diplomacy for self-reliance or un-abetting dependency mentality. Makurdi Journal of Arts and Culture 5: 58-69.

Adejo, Armstrong Matiu. 2004. The hegemonic offensive of the United States and the New World Order: A reinvigoration of the diplomacy of imperial domination. Journal of Law and Diplomacy 1 (1): 25-30.

Adejo, Armstrong Matiu. 2006. Globalization and ownership of the development agenda: The Africa dilemma. Paper presented the 3rd Globalization Studies Network Meeting, University of Malaysia, Kabangsaan, Malaysia, 23-26 August.

Aina, Tade Akin, Chachage, Chachage Seithy L., Ananan-Yao, Elizabeth, ed. 2004. Globalization and social policy in Africa. Dakar: CODESRIA.

Ake, Claude. 2001. Democracy and development in Africa. Ibadan: Spectrum Books Ltd.

Appadurai, Arjun. 2006. The right to research. Globalisation, Societies and Education 4 (2): 167-77.

Elaigwu, J. Isawa. 1998. African crises and challenges: Towards a casual analysis. Governance: Journal of the Institute of Governance and Social Research 2 (1): 31-47.

Kiawi, E.C. and Mfoulon, Jean. 2002. Rethinking African development: Social science perspectives. CODESRIA Bulletin 1-2: 12-17.

Macamo, Elisio. 2005. Against "development". CODESRIA Bulletin 3-4: 5-7.

Obuntan, O.B. 2001. The impacts of globalization on African development. African Journal of International Affairs and Development 6 (2): 11-22.

Ojione, O.C. 2002. Globalization and the integration of West Africa states. African Journal of Economy and Society 4 (1-2): 5-7.

Toyo, Eskor. 2000. Background to globalization. Ibadan: Academic Staff Union of Universities, Nigeria.

Yapi-Diahou, Alphonse. 2005. Research and the challenge of expertise in Africa. CODESRIA Bulletin 3-4: 5-17.

Zegeye, Abebe. 2005. Knowledge production and publishing in Africa. CODESRIA Bulletin 3-4: 31-34.

Notes

1. These questions are: "How has my own research addressed or focused upon globalization?; In thinking about my own research and that of other colleagues that I know in my country, what are the most pressing research questions related to globalization?; Which of these questions would benefit the most from more systematic collaboration with colleagues outside my country in perhaps larger projects?; When scholars and activists speak of globalization in my country, what do they usually mean by the term?; What are the principal obstacles faced by globalization studies researchers in my country when it comes to carrying out their research and making it available to other scholars and to interested persons of the general public?; Might any of these obstacles be addressed by greater cross-national research collaboration?; When it comes to my country, is Appadurai's analysis of differences in research approaches and research ethics across the world relevant and helpful, or not?"

Knowledge of Globalization and Globalization of Knowledge: Issues and Perceptions at Stake in Africa and from Africa

Contents

Glossary Terms