THE CONSTITUTION AND LIMITATION OF THE LIBERAL STATE Once upon a time, the most important, and indeed controversial question in moral philosophy and its subsequent offsprings like political science and theory was Platonic: "Who should rule?" To the extent that the above is true is itself the legend and stuff of the history of ideas, moral and political philosophy since time immemorial. Wherever and anywhere that decent attempts were made by men to launch enquiries into the general welfare and progress of their fellow men, it becomes an article of faith to pose questions on a social, political and economic order by contesting the legitimacy of such orders and its lack thereof and almost always, such legitimacy questions revolve and to a greater degree resolve around the Platonic question: "Who should rule?" Arguably, there were subtexts to this new found fount of moral and political philosophy pace Plato. One immediately thinks of Machiavelli, Hobbes, De Tocqueville, Montesquieu et al. But none acted radically to reformulate this new found fount. It was Karl Popper, who through his penetrating, profound and precise study of the various strands of the totalitarianisms of Fascism and Marxism - benign and murderous - radically forwarded the thesis that the said Platonic consensus on democracy was inherently flawed and does in quirk turn of historical fates tend to prop up and blossom dictatorships of all shapes and colours. This unconventional critique of Popper's on the sacrosanct consensus of Plato's moral and political philosophy was one of the most important contributions - in my view - to political and social theory since Plato. The key question of what democracy really means and its philosophical rationale, which Popper addressed very persuasively, ferociously and adequately in his seminal work, "Open Society and its Enemies", was a very radical departure from and very courageous reformulation of the Platonic question: "Who should rule?". For Popper, the question "Who should rule?" is not only antiquated but derives from a sloppily misconstrued perception of why democracy, its etymology and philosophical rationale. Because Plato was largely concerned/obsessed with a political order arrived from the synthesis or osmosis of appointing an ideal sage as the great source of moral, social and political authority and a monist value system which accepts only one version of the Good, Popper felt that for a society that cannot lay claims to all the fundamental moral truths that should govern its affairs, placing too much emphasis on or even posing the question "Who should rule?" and stating such criterion as rulers be of the calibre of philosopher kings misses the point totally for no such criteria exists by which we can fully ascertain that we have landed the "ideal" ruler. As Popper himself puts it: "Always we find ourselves facing the Platonic question: 'Who should rule?' This still has great importance in political theory: in the theory of legitimacy, and especially in the theory of democracy. It is said that a government has the right to rule when it is legitimate - that is, when it has been elected under the rules of the constitution by a majority of the people or its representatives. But we should not forget that Hitler came to power legitimately, and that the Enabling Law which made him dictator was passed by a parliamentary majority. The principle of legitimacy is not sufficient. It is an answer to the Platonic question:'Who should rule?' We must change the question itself." "................i propose[d] replacing the Platonic question 'Who should rule?' with a radically different one: 'How can we draw up the constitution in such a way that we are able to get rid of the government without bloodshed?' This question places the stress not upon the mode of **electing** a government but upon the possibility of **removing** it" [Karl Popper, Freedom and Intellectual Responsibility in Lesson of this Century, pp. 82-83, Routledge, 2000.] Here we see Popper attacking the Platonic suggestion that a system can be created which will put the "ideal" person in charge of our state of affairs and radically coming up with a reformulated basis on which democracy can blossom and become a credible bulwark against the perpetuation of tyranny. Suffice for me to say that in the Popperian interpretation of the word, democracy is above all to prevent the perpetuation of tyranny by placing emphasis not on who ends up ruling us but on the free institutions created that makes the perpetuation of a tyranny virtually impossible. For Popper, democracy shouldn't be about trying to set up some chimeric modus operandi as a selection process in which future would-be tyrants would be detected and purged out but the creation or setting up free institutions and a liberal leaning constitution that will rigorously scrutinise the flow of power and guide against its misappropriation in a polity - notwithstanding who ends being in power. To the extent that this radical interpretation by Popper of democracy is crucial for the future of liberal democracy, is it self the bane of the crisis of liberal democracies the world over - especially on the African Continent where the monstrosity of tyranny still holds the peoples of this great Continent in awesome contempt and still hijacked by its irrational outbursts of uncertainty and protracted political violence. In short, since no system of government can come up with a fool proof criteria that will detect potential dictators/tyrants and choose the "ideal" leader in the Platonic sense of being flawless, wise and impeccable, the best and indeed worthiest weaponry we have in protecting our liberties and the liberal order is to create and or set up free institutions bolstered by a liberal leaning constitution that acts as a preventer of tyranny and or ridding the body politic of such tyranny - without resorting to violence. As proposed or alluded to earlier, the extent to which this radical rejuvenation of the philosophical rationale of democracy by Popper is crucial to a renewed Africa of hope, decency and tolerance should be what occupies the new young African thinker who has not only witnessed the plunder of the Continent by misfits and miscreants but despaired also in the reckless and grotesque misinterpretation of the whole concept of Africa, African-ness, the post-colonial dispensation, despair and modernity by the enormity of the excesses of ideologues of all shades. We shan't attempt to discourse these distortions of the African reality by ideologues and their tyrant client. What we shall aim to modestly embark upon here is a philosophical delineation of how, when, why and where democracy is needed and what strengthens it in the body politic the extent to which it shall bring forth and nurture free insitutions that will command the awe reverence of all Africans. Surely, this can only be fruitfully discoursed juxtaposed to a delineated conceptual framework of the liberal state, its consitution and limitation. In order to break loose from the narrow constraints of moralising and gain enough turf to be able state my political position clearly, i shall commit the enormity of the excesses of the ideologues i derided earlier and for a brief second wear the garb of the determinist. Because of the diversity and the different strands that amount to what makes up Africa and the African peoples, no polity other than a secular liberal democracy can fairly cope with and or accomodate the conflicting pluralistic values, norms and ways of life the African continent has since time immemorial exhibited. This, resolutely calls for a State that exhibits liberal institutions and unflinchingly secular in its mode of discourse and dispensation. We shall first of all clear three clutters. By Liberal State and or regime, we shall refer to it mean as John Gray prescribed for it: " Liberal regimes enable people whose views of the good are at odds to live together on terms they can all accept as fair. They can agree on these principles and how they are to be applied in particular cases despite disagreeing in their conceptions of the good...........Liberal States are regimes in which the claims of rival freedoms are negotiated openly." Intrinsically, the Liberal order's chief mode of dispensation would be the Hobbesian strand of thought of liberalism that seeks through tolerance not to impose a monist view of the good life on the rest of a polity or a rational consensus on the good life. Rather, it would be tolerance that primarily exists as strategy for peaceful coexistence between peoples, values and norms that in many cases and ways are not congruent or do not converge. The second clutter that needs clearing away is the oft ambiguity inherent in the secular Liberal State's relationship with the fringe polity of religious and sectarian adherences, norms and ambitious. It is true that secularism and religion are not blood brothers; they can wittingly and unwittingly seek to undermine each other in their various vibrancies. The experience has been that of a secular polity recklessly pursued, can - wittingly and unwittingly - be susceptible to exchanges with religious fringes that be incordial and some cases very hostile indeed. The reverse can be said of religious fringes of a polity Yet, this need not be the case. The relationship between the Liberal secular State, again, would be primordially Hobbesian: a blind indifference and not hostility to the appurtenances of the different religious and sectarian affiliations that inhabit the said secular polity. In such a case, the relationship would be based on mutual accomodation, tolerance for the differences between adherents of the different faiths and championing what has come to be their shared values: tolerance, fair play, equality before the secualr laws of the polity, accomodation, justice, freedom to choose ways of life that are not intrinsically hostile to others choices and individual liberty. Since it is the argument of theists that secularism drives underground the spiritual instincts of a nation or a society, these shared values shall be marshalled in the form of a secular religion, i.e. patriotism, and used as a rallying point for all irrespective of leaning and or affiliation - socially, politically and economically. The third clutter to clear is one of misconception. It has become a rallying point of critics of secularism, liberalism - especially liberalism with the capital L - and capitalism are alien concepts and or ways life. This, needless to point out is a gross ignorance of human development and its history. Here i shall - because of the hostility Africans generally tend to show towards liberalism - endeavour to make it a duty to clear that clutter and all good things shall follow. If by liberalism, we mean it to refer to a Hobbesian call for tolerance as a strategy towards peaceful existence between peoples, ways of life and values. To the extent that this is true of the core of liberal thought is itself a largely ignored antecedent development in non-Western history and or world and its coping since time immemorial of the different values, norms and ways of life it has always exhibited. As John Gray points out, "Toleration didn't begin with liberalism. In ancient Alexandria and Buddhist India, amongst the Romans, the Moors and the Ottomans, different faiths coexisted in peace for long periods." Tentatively, one can forward the thesis that liberal toleration as understood as a strategy earmarked for peaceful co-existence has its roots in non-Western cultures. Western thought might have made it reach it apotheosis through centuries od intellectual deliberations but liberal tolerance in practice was a wholly non-Western tradition. To forward arguments that posit that liberalism - at least as understood in the Hobbesian sense, as a strategy for peaceful co-existence - is an alien concept to the African and way of doing things in Africa, is to ignore the history of this great Continent. So we sum up that liberal thought through its mode of dispensation of tolerance is not alien to the Africa existence and or experience and will not seek to undermine the society. Rather, one can boldly claim that only such a strategy of tolerance towards peaceful co-existence for the different ways of life, values and peoples and only in it does future hope lie in freeing the Continent from the throes of anarchy, despodency and hopelessness. The clearing of these clutters shall help in the delineation of what constitutes and limits the liberal State. As implicitly demonstrated in the foregoing arguments, the consitution of the secular liberal State is its very limitation. What do we mean by this? The limitation of the liberal State's reaches in prescribing what shall be perceived of as the Good life for different peoples, values and norms shall be its constitution. Here we take note and indeed make emphasis on this inviolable liberal principle that: the philosophical rationale of the secular Liberal State is not to herd everyone towards a consensus of what the good ought to be and its prescription but that of a mode of liberal toleration, primarily as a strategy for peaceful co-existence between peoples, values and norms that are both incongruent and do not converge on the essence of the good. The parametres of such limitations and constitution shan't necessarily be determined by rational consensus but by the long haul of pluralist liberal democratic politics - pluralist liberaldemocratic politics in tandem with the radical Popperian interpretation of democracy and the propping up of free institutions wedded to the Hobbesian notion of liberal toleration and nurtured to the point where they command the awe reverence of all peoples. The Capitalist case for Africa and the African peoples then primarily resides on such moral premises. To be continued.......... Hamjatta Kanteh ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html You may also send subscription requests to [log in to unmask] if you have problems accessing the web interface and remember to write your full name and e-mail address. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------