Page 69 - CONSCIENCISM By Kwame Nkrumah_Neat

62 CONSCIENCISM SOCIETY AND IDEOLOGY 63

ofcolleagues; the sneer, the snub and countless other devices, these and we had to be encumbered with tutelage. And this tutelage, it
are all non-statutory instruments by means of which societies was thought, could only be implemented if we were fmt sub­
exert coercion, by means ofwhich they achieve and preserve unity. jugated politically.
'Coercion' could unfortunately be rather painful, but it is signally history of a nation is, unfortunately, too easily written as
effective in ensuring that individual behaviour does not become history ofits dominant class. But if the history ofa nation, or a
dangerously irresponsible. The individual is not an anarchic unit. people, cannot be found in the history of a class, how much less
He lives in orderly surroundings, and can the history of a continent be found in what is not even a part
surroundings calls for methods ofit - Europe. Africa cannot be validly treated merely as the space
One of these subtle methods is to be found in the account of in which Europe swelled up. If African history is interpreted in
history. The history ofAfrica, as presented by European scholars, terms of the interests of European merchandise and capital, mis­
been encumbered with malicious myths. It was even denied sionaries and administrators, it is no wonder that African national­
we were a historical people. It was said that whereas other ism is in the forms it takes regarded as a perversion and neo­
shaped history, and determined its course, Africa colonialism as a virtue.
had stood still, held down by inertia; that Africa was only propelled In the new African renaissance, we place great emphasis on
history by the European contact. African history was therefore presentation of history. Our history needs to be written as
presented as an extension of European history. Hegel's authority history of our society, not as the story of European adventures.
was lent to this a-historical hypothesis concerning Africa, which he African society must be treated as enjoying its own integrity;
himself unhappily helped to promote. And apologists ofcolonial­ history must be a mirror ofthat society, and the European contact
ism lost little time in seizing upon it and writing wildly thereon. must fmd its place in this history only as an African eXlDerlell.ce.
In presenting the history ofAfrica as the history of the collapse of even ifas a crucial one. That is to say, the European contact needs
our traditional societies in the presence of the European advent, to be assessed and judged from the point ofview ofthe principles
colonialism and imperialism employed their account of African animating African society, and from the point of view of the
history and anthropology as an instrument oppressive harmony and progress of this society.
ideology. When history is presented in this way, it can become not an
Earlier on, such disparaging accounts had ofAfrican account of how those African students referred to in the intro­
<"""'A.nand culture as to appear to justify slavery, slavery, posed duction became more europeanized than others; it can become a
accounts, seemed a positive deliverance of our map ofthe growing tragedy and the fmal triumph of our society.
ancestors. When the slave trade and slavery became illegal, the In this way, African history can come to guide and direct African
pVlnpr1-< on Africa yielded to the new wind of change, and now action. African history can thus become a pointer at the ideology
to present African culture and society as being so rudi­ which should guide and direct African reconstruction.
mentary and primitive that colonialism was a duty ofChristianity This connection between an ideological standpoint and the
and civilization. Even ifwe were no longer, on the evidence ofthe writing of history is a perennial one. A check on the work
shape ofour skulls, regarded as the missing link, unblessed with the great historians, including Herodotus and
arts ofgood government, material and spiritual progress, we were exposes their passionate concern with ideology.
still regarded as representing the infancy of mankind. Our highly moral, political and sociological comments are particular mani­
sophisticated cnlture was said to be simple and paralysed by inertia, festations of more e:eneral ideological standpoints. Classically. the