IS ETHIO CENTRISM GOOD?

K. Mohieddine , PhD (Khartoum)

 

I have observed recently an interesting but not focused discussion going on concerning Ethiopia and what is the meaning and worth of Ethiopiawinet.  At the base of this discussion, argument at times is the tenet of Ethio centrism which is actually derived from afro centrism. What is afro centrism? Is it even relevant to Ethiopia?

 

To go to the simple definition, Wikipedia defines afro centrsim as follows:

“Afro centrism or Afrocentricity is a world view that emphasizes the importance of Afrcain people in culture, philosophy, and history. Fundamental to Afro centrism is the assumption that approaching knowledge from a Eurocentrist perspective, as well as certain mainstream assumptions in the application of information in the West, has led to injustices and also to inadequacies in meeting the needs of Black Africans and the peoples of the African Diaspora.

As an ideology and political movement, Afro centrism has its beginnings in activism among Black intellectuals, political figures and historians in the context of the US American civil rights movement. Molefi Kete Asante describes Afrocentricity as a “systematic nationalism.”^[ According to its critics afro centrism is grounded in identity politics and myth rather than scholarship,^[2] but it does not represent a coherent political ideology but rather appears as a set of tactics in the “culture wars“.

 

Afro centrism emerges from a defensive position to face up to the denial of the West that Africa had contributed anything to the world civilization.

“Therefore, Afro centrism is a paradigm shift from a European-centered history to an African-centered history……

In the United States, writers and editors of publications such as The Crisis and The Journal of Negro History sought to counter the prevailing view that Sub-Saharan Africa had contributed nothing of value to human history that was not the result of incursions by Europeans and Arabs.^[13] Authors in these journals theorized that Ancient Egyptian civilization was the culmination of events arising from the origin of the human race in Africa. They investigated the history of Africa from that perspective.

Afro centrists claimed The Mis-Education of the Negro (1933) by Carter G. Woodson, an African- American historian, as one of their foundational texts. Woodson critiqued education of African Americans as “mis-education” because he held that it denigrated the black while glorifying the white. For these early Afro centrists, the goal was to break what they saw as a vicious cycle of the reproduction of black self-abnegation. In the words of The Crisis editor W.E.B. Du Bois, the world left African Americans with a “double consciousness,” and a sense of “always looking at one’s self through the eyes of others, of measuring one’s soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity.”

It is not very clear what all this has got to do with Ethiopia as this country has its own history and trajectory. Africa in general and Ethiopia in particular have had their won civilizations whether the debate on Egypt being part of Africa/black/ or not is settled this way or that. Axum, Songhai, Ashanti, Nubia, Cush, Zimbabwe, etc… Africans can claim their own in the world civilization list. Afro centrism has had its positive role but the defensive nature of its main proponents have also led to the glorification of myths, to the denial of the inter relationship of peoples and civilizations. Chiekh A. Diop and others labor hard to prove Cleopatra was black while some writers have even argued the “Caucasoid” nature of some tribes of the Sudan. We can confidently state though that Egypt had little to do with the cultures and heritage of the Africans taken as slaves to America. In other words, Afro centrism when pushed to its extremism reflects an unjustified inferiority complex that is forced to resort to myths and fallacies to justify its claims. While Ethiopia has had its civilization it is for example not true that it was the centre of scientific discoveries.

 

Hence, the Ethio-centrist arguments that are being propagated  by some Ethiopians these days can be understood as a defensive measure in face of the anti Ethiopian stand of the ruling EPRDF but is no way justifiable as it has appeared as a revival of feudal notions of grandeur.  The attempt to attack the benefits of modern education as a curse and anti Ethiopian, the desire to isolate Ethiopia from the world, the paranoid anti white position, the defense as ” ours and Ethiopian” those harmful customs that have to be changed, the negative position as regards the progressive Ethiopian student and revolutionary movement and, as one scholar put it, the unhealthy hankering for the idealized past is all unhealthy Ethio centrism. Excessive idolization of the past reveals an unsatisfied present as one saying puts it.  Ethiopia of the past was no idyllic place. We have customs that should be preserved and developed and others that ought to be stamped out. At the same time, Ethiopia is no island isolated from the world. It has interacted and will certainly interact with the vast wide world just as it did in the ancient times. Ethiopian Emperors that are reputed to have guarded or fought for Ethiopian independence sought at the same time modern ideas and technology. The total rejection of what is foreign is a big mistake. The world has benefited from Ethiopian and African civilizations just as Ethiopia has and should continue to do so. Hence, there is no need for Ethiopians to feel ashamed of their present condition of poverty and to seek a false sense of pride in isolation or to hide in a mythical conception of their past or history.

 

The definition of Ethiopiawinet, a minefield for any scholar or politician at his time, cannot therefore base itself on a defensive Ethio-centrism which, if shove comes to push, may end up by presenting Ethiopia as a Christian island of one and only ethnic group. It is neither possible nor advisable to hanker for a past that has not been fair to most of the citizens. It is not also proper to defend indefensible customs under the cover of preserving one’s identity. The search for Ethiopian identity and “ethos”, whatever this may be, has to be “modern”, has to be an improvement on what was. Times have changed and we cannot be caught standing still while it is necessary to wed modernization with our own multi ethnic stamp, with the imprint of multi cultural Ethiopia.  To equate modernization with and exclusively with the “West” or westernization is wrong just as being Ethiopian cannot and should be stuck in some undefined Sahel desert isolated from the progress of humankind. Ethiopia benefitted from its interaction with the best of the West and, like other peoples, has been affected adversely by other facets of this same contact. To blame the past Emperors, including Atse Haile Sellasie, for introducing modern education is to shout at the wind. Educated Ethiopians, or intellectuals, contributed much to the progress of Ethiopia. It is no accident that the Italian invaders wiped our intellectuals who spearheaded the resistance. Since then, intellectuals, with few exceptions, have been doing well for Ethiopia.  Ethiopiansim defined as anti modern education is a fallacy that will bring obscurantism.

 

Know yourself is vital advice. But knowing oneself is not static. Culture is not static. We are not wearing ije tebab, debelo and tenfanef to work. Our habits (food, dress,), language and attitudes change along with the development in our own country and in the world. Nothing is frozen forever. Hence, we know ourselves in the changed context, in light of the present and the world we live in. Our world outlook inevitably changes too. The advocates of Ethio- centrism have themselves changed much as those preaching afro centrism. And this makes their stand contradictory as they do not live what they preach or express it in their everyday life and behavior. Most, if not all of us, after all wear our western education tags with pride. And thus the Ethio-centrists appear hypocritical much as they may not want to.  From the point of the struggle for Ethiopia and the desire to maintain her unity, Ethio-centrism as expressed by some of its recent advocates is harmful. Harmful in that it divides the people, damaging in that it yearns for a past that has changed and had to be changed. Ethiopia is a multi ethnic and multi cultural country. Ethiopia is part of the world. Ethiopia needs to change and not to stay frozen in a mythical state that never was and will never be. The unbalanced tendency to present Ethiopia as unique and consequently better and “konjo” than most will eventually slide into the pit of racism. Thus, it is time to put an end to this confused and confusing notion of an Ethio-centrist path that will lead nowhere but to division and doom. We want a new Ethiopia that does not deny her past but strives for the future, a New Ethiopia as Dr John Garang de Mabior used to say of the New Sudan. The struggle for democracy must be healthy, all inclusive, and free from the cobwebs of feudalism and ignorance parading as science.