African Environmental Ethics and Sustainable Development

Abstract

In this paper, I argue that African environmental ethics can contribute to sustainable development as well as mitigate the devastating effects of global warming and climate change in Africa. Although Africa bears the least onus of responsibility for global warming and climate change, she suffers the greatest burden of the adverse effects of global climate change and environmental crisis. While industrialized countries, nations which are largely responsible for the greatest amount of greenhouse emissions are laggard and reticent in implementing international agreements aimed at palliating the untoward effects of climate change, there is an urgent need to seek indigenous solutions to environmental crisis in Africa without compromising the much needed development in the continent. African environmental ethics extends the moral community beyond anthropocentric concerns by including non-human animals, plants, the unborn, and the supernatural into the moral universe. I use Kom environmental ethics to show how indigenous African societies employed different values and customs to make their environment physically and spiritually sustainable. There were taboos, values, and norms which prescribed correct behavior towards nature. But as a result of the colonial encounter, Africans were forced to abandon some of these indigenous environmental values and sustainable practices for an anthropocentric approach. With this outlook where humans have moral responsibility only towards humans, development meant the complete disregard for traditional African holistic values and customs. This disregard, in conjunction with weak or absence of institutional framework regarding environmental protection and corruption in the management of natural resources, has led to unsustainable exploitation of the natural environment in Africa.

Personalism in African Cultures and Ethics: The Examples of the Bantus in Central, Southern Africa and of the Mossi in West Africa

“…The works of Tempels (1948), Nkafu (2010), Kouam (2017) and Igwebuike (2001) will allow us to gather cultural and anthrological elements for the reconstruction of the phenomenology of the human being (the bukomo) among the Bantu. Through the published article by Tosam (2019) entitled "African Environmental Ethics and Sustainable Development" we will reflect on the relational trilogy of attunement between man, the environment, and ancestors living in the afterlife. While the publications of Simpore (2002Simpore ( , 2004Simpore ( , 2012 and the manuscripts of Maurier (1959), Ouedraogo (1973), Wedraogo (1973) and Simporé (1986) will enable us to present, through the habits and customs, the social anthropology and phenomenology of the person (the nisaala) among the Mossi.…”

“…Among many African peoples, there is a kind of relational trilogy with an ethical dimension between man, nature (environment, biodiversity and ecology) and the ancestors. Tosam, has moreover developed this reality well, through the concept of "Kom environmentalism is holistic and includes humans, the ecosystem, spirits, the living dead, as well as the unborn in the moral community" (Tosam, 2019).…”

The Role of Africa’s Moral Education in Environmental Care for Socio-economic Development in Contemporary Society

“…The social and economic development flourishing of any society depends on a people's responsiveness to the demands of nature such as environmental care and responsibility. Another essentialelement for consideration is sustainability which means continued change and improvement that lasts long enough to benefit future generations.The United Nations document on Sustainability, Our Common Future, defines sustainable development as "development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs" At the core of sustainability is the concept of moral responsibility towards the environment (Tosam, 2019).However, given the environmental challenges that result from human activities such as pollution, animal poaching, destruction of forests, and carbon emissions, there is need to rethink our approach to sustainable development. Since environmental concerns cannot be divorced from the social, economic and political dimensions of development,a strong sense of ecological responsibility should be inculcated inthe African people by revisiting the pre-colonial mode and content of moral education to inform the efforts of local as well as international bodies committed to the salvation of Mother Earth.For us, the gist ofsustainability lies in an ardent ability to consciously maintain or change the status quo as far as environmental stewardship is concerned.…”

The African human rights system as 'norm leader': Three case studies

“…142 Yet, this idea is not particularly novel as environmental consciousness has been both a time-honoured customary value and communal obligation across Africa. 143 Therefore, it is not surprising that this normative synthesis manifests in both the African Charter and the African Commission's jurisprudence which has rightly rejected siloed human rights imagination by denouncing the artificial division between civil and political rights and social, cultural and economic rights. 144 Thus far, the African Court has yet to decide a case on article 24.…”