PERSONALIZED, AUTHORITARIAN RULE is a worldwide, not
just an African, phenomenon. Regardless of formal restraints of a
constitutional nature, power tends more and more to be centralized under single
party control and to flow from the top downward. Consequently, legislatures are
losing power to executives on most continents; and individual rights have lost
some of the sanctity of former times. Labour unions, universities, political
groups, youth wings, and other independent centres of power are increasingly
coming under governmental supervision and control in many countries, if not
becoming instruments of the state itself. Other institutional restraints, in
particular a federal-type solution, are regarded with suspicion. Thus President
Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana, in opposing U Thant's three-phase plan to end the
secession of Katanga, called on Premier Adoula and his government "to setyour
face resolutely against any imposition on your country of a federal solution
which would act as a permanent bar to the unity of the Congo . . . "Many a
nationalist the world over would give similar advice. What these leaders share
in common, for many and varied reasons, is a dislike and fear of
institutionalized political diversity in their countries.
Although authoritarianism is an
international phenomenon, it differs markedly from country to country. One must
distinguish the totalitarian variety of the Communist states from the
plebiscitary, but far less all-embracing authoritarianism of de Gaulle. The
referenda of the French Fifth Republic give the general public a choice, but
referenda are not usually a meaningful choice between two equally plausible
alternatives. In the case of Hungary, however, even a students' and workers' revolution
was not sufficient to unseat the regime. One must also distinguish between the
authoritarianism of such non-ideological states as Portugal and Spain on the one
hand and such ideologically-oriented countries as Guinea and Tanganyika on the
other. These countries may not differ very much from one another in the extent of
government centralization or control, but they differ considerably in their
determination to transform their societies.
This essay intends to raise some
questions with regard to the significance of this trend in Africa. However, before
it can undertake this task, it is necessary to point out the major explanations
for the increase in one-party states in much of the world at this time. An
understanding of the causes of their rise and an evaluation of their
significance should help to throw some light on their role in the Africa of
tomorrow. How can one account for the trend toward one-party states ? In a
larger sense, perhaps man is not the rational, responsible individual John
Locke contended he was. Westerners such as President Woodrow Wilson of the United
States assumed that people wanted the world made safe for representative
democracy. In fact, the spokesmen of many societies, particularly in Africa, prefer
collective to individual initiative. They see individual initiative,
particularly in the economic sphere, as emphasizing false values. Naturally
this suspicion of individualism has very real consequences in respect to
political responsibility. The rights of the individual are never considered
apart from or in opposition
to the state; rights become meaningful through participation
in the state's activities. In the Rousseauist sense, forcing men to be free
means compelling
them to live ethically through identification with
and submission to the general will. In our more immediate time-place situation,
a number of other factors clearly play their part in shaping this movement
toward the administrative state. Because modern weaponry is enormously
destructive and ideological differences are extensive, international tensions continue
to increase. The very scale of these tensions and dangers abet the rise of a
strong executive, regardless of system. Rocket wars require instant action, not
prolonged debate on the means of response. A confrontation involving the major
powers, arising out of a crisis occurring anywhere in the world, could lead to nuclear
disaster. As leaders mobilize their strength to deal with these recurrent
crises, they become impatient with any signs of dissension at home. Pluralism
is seen as weakness, unity as strength. Moreover, as the stakes of diplomacy
increase, the leaders tend to become more and more impatient with limitations
upon their freedom to act. They 'know' the dimensions of the
crisis and the need for swift, decisive action. They
doubt the public's capacity to determine such complex questions as war and
peace, tariff reform, and recognition of states or governments. As the states
rise, the executive seems likely to insist upon being trusted with an
everwidening measure of discretion; the consequence of this trend could well be
a corresponding decline in legislative restraints wherever these are still
operative. Just as the citizen is becoming more and more removed from the
decision-making process in the international sphere, he finds it increasingly
difficult to make.......