Pan-Africanism Reconsidered

This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1962.

• Language: English
• Publisher: University of California Press
• Release date: Apr 28, 2023
• ISBN: 9780520322684

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PAN-AFRICANISM RECONSIDERED

Pan-Africanism

Reconsidered

Edited by the

AMERICAN SOCIETY OF AFRICAN CULTURE

University of California Press

BERKELEY AND LOS ANGELES 1QÔ2

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS

BERKELEY AND LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA

CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS

LONDON, ENGLAND

© 1962 BY AMERICAN SOCIETY OF AFRICAN CULTURE, A DELAWARE CORPORATION

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOG CARD NO.: 62-1I49I

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

DESIGNED BY WARD RITCHIE

Pan-Africanism Reconsidered is composed of the main speeches, papers, and comments given at the Third Annual Conference of the American Society of African Culture, which was held in Philadelphia at the University of Pennsylvania from June 22 to June 26, 1960. The subject of the conference was African Unities and Pan-Africanism. It is our purpose in this book to reflect the nature of this significant conference and to present a record of lasting importance on a subject that is by nature constantly changing. Some attempt has been made to omit the transitory and the ceremonial which cannot be of interest to those who will turn to this volume as a source.

One major apology is made necessary by our decision to publish this volume, and this is to our African participants and guests. When we planned the conference, we had limited funds. Subsequently, we were able to raise additional money from the Cleveland H. Dodge Foundation and the Benjamin Rosenthal Foundation, which made it possible to invite African guests. Unfortunately, by this time it was too late to ask these guests to prepare papers; consequently, our African participants could only be asked to be commentators. In many instances they spoke extemporaneously and had very little time in which to preview the papers on which they were to comment. We have been able to include their contributions in this volume mainly by the use of tape recordings. The transcriptions have been edited and made into more-or-less formal papers. Where our African guests spoke in French, there has been the additional difficulty of the proper rendering of their remarks in translation. In spite of being placed under such handicaps, the contributions of our African friends stand up well in this volume.

The American Society of African Culture (AMSAC), established in 1957, is an organization of about three hunded and fifty American scholars, writers, and artists of African descent. It is an affiliate of the Société Africaine de Culture (SAC), which publishes Présence Africaine from its Paris headquarters. Basically, AMSAC is concerned with the study of African culture in Africa and elsewhere in the world in order to provide a bond of understanding between Africans and all Americans, especially those of African descent. AM SAC’S concern with African culture includes the study of both high culture (the plastic arts, the performing arts, and the humanities) and culture and society in the sense of the social scientist’s use of the term.

The first annual conference of AMSAC was held in New York in June, 1958, and was concerned largely with organizational matters. The second, in June, 1959, also held in New York, considered African literature, history, religion, arts, leadership, economy, society, and education. After long deliberations, the planning committee selected African Unities and Pan-Africanism as an appropriate subject for the third annual conference. It seemed to us that the role of PanAfricanism needed a new emphasis. In the past, with considerable support and nurture from American Negroes, it had served as a rallying force against colonialism, imperialism, and racial persecution. In 1960, African states were emerging at a rapid rate and, in addition to many other problems, were facing two fearful dangers: the development of an unbridled national state system in the pre-World War II sense, and the involvement of African states in the cold war. PanAfricanism, when properly developed, seemed to the planning committee to be a partial answer to both dangers. If the continent of Africa hopes to be neutral, then it needs the defense of Pan-Africanism just as the Western Hemisphere has had the defense of Pan-Americanism. Neutralism requires defensive strength. In the old days, this was provided by oceans, deserts, and mountains. Now that these natural barriers do not suffice, defense for neutralism can be provided for Africa by Pan-Africanism and the United Nations Organization. Pan-Africanism can also provide the motivating force to prevent political, economic, and military rivalries between African nations. There are many unities in African culture to provide a basis for a truly collective Pan-Africanism. We planned our conference in the fall of 1959 and the winter of 1959-60. The events of 1960 showed that our subject was worth considering.

Although the main work of the conference lay in the papers, the panel discussions, the commentary, and the panel reports, African high culture and its continuing creativity and contributions were demonstrated in an art exhibit, an evening of dance and music, and a tour of the University of Pennsylvania’s African Art Collection. The conference opened with addresses by His Excellency Telli Diallo, Ambassador from Guinea to the United States; Dr. Jean Price-Mars, President of the Société Africaine de Culture; and Professor Alioune Diop, Executive Director of the Société. These speeches, which explain the past and present of SAC and AMSAC, along with the keynote speech of the conference are placed in an introductory section of the volume. The book concludes with the final address of the conference by the then Speaker of the Nigerian House of Assembly, the Honorable Jaja A. Wachuku, who on the brink of his country’s independence brought glad tidings to American Negroes of Africa’s future and of theirs.

What the social scientist has to say about Africa is quickly eroded by time. In reading the papers of Marcum, Apter and Coleman, and Fofana, and the comments made upon them, certain events subsequent to their presentation should be kept in mind. Independence for the Congo has been threatened by regional separation. Syria has seceded from the United Arab Republic. The Mali Federation split into Senegal and Mali (the French Soudan), and the latter joined Ghana and Guinea in the Union of Africa States, a loose league involving no transfer of sovereignty. The Casablanca group of nations and the BrazzavilleMonrovia-Lagos group have emerged as representing different aspects of Pan-Africanism and certainly different attitudes toward the former European colonialists and the United States. Both Liberia and Nigeria are active in Pan-African affairs.

One final word is necessary with regard to those who made this book possible. In addition to Samuel W. Allen, the editor, Miss Cynthia Courtney, the AMSAC’s Director of Publications, is mainly responsible for achieving the production of the volume. As we have already indicated, the manuscript presented a host of difficult technical problems. These were mastered by Gilman Park, Jr., who is in large measure responsible not only for copy-editing but also for the preliminary organization and format of the manuscript.

JOHN A. DAVIS

WACHUKU ABENGOWE, born in 1925 in Eastern Nigeria, is a member of the House of Assembly, Eastern Region of Nigeria, and Deputy Chief Whip for the Government. An experienced journalist, Mr. Abengowe worked for the National Council of Nigeria and the Cameroons as well as for several newspapers. He has traveled to Britain to study parliamentary procedures and is now in the United States to observe American government, education, and journalism.

RICHARD MAXIMILIAN AKWEI, born in 1923 in Ghana, is Principal Assistant Secretary, Minister of Foreign Affairs in Accra. He studied at Achimota College in Ghana and at Christ Church College, Oxford. He has served in the Gold Coast Civil Service and was attached to the British High Commission in Ottawa for foreign service training before going to Washington, D.C., where he was Acting Counsellor at the Ghana Embassy.

SAMUEL W. ALLEN, born in 1917 in Columbus, Ohio, is a graduate of Fisk University and Harvard Law School. He served as Assistant District Attorney in New York before deciding to study the humanities in New York and at the Sorbonne. A former professor of law at Southern University, Mr. Allen alternately practices law and publishes poetry. He is presently General Counsel of the United States Information Agency in Washington, D.C.

DAVID E. APTER earned his A.B. in economics at Antioch College and his Ph.D. in politics at Princeton University. He has taught in Africa and has been an associate professor of political science at the University of Chicago. He is Executive Secretary of the Committee on Comparative Study of New Nations. Mr. Apter has done much research in the social sciences and is author of The Political Kingdom in Uganda and The Gold Coast in Transition. He is now an associate professor of political science at the University of California, Berkeley.

KARL W. BIGELOW, of Bangor, Maine, is professor of higher education in the Department of Educational Administration, Teachers College, Columbia University. He received his B.A. from Clark College, Worcester, Mass., in 1920, and his Ph.D. in economics from Harvard University in 1929. Mr. Bigelow has done an appreciable amount of work for UNESCO on education in Europe and Africa. In 1960 he became director of the cooperative Afro-Anglo-American program in teacher education and of the new unit on African education at Teachers College. He has written a number of books on education and the social sciences. He is presently codirector of the Sierra Leone Peace Corps Training Program at Teachers College.

SABURI OLADENI BIOBAKU, born in 1918 in Nigeria, earned his M.A. at Cambridge and his Ph.D. at London University. He has been Master at the Government College, Ibadan, Nigeria; Assistant Liaison Officer for Nigerian students in the United Kingdom; Secretary to the Cabinet, Western Region of Nigeria; and Registrar of University College, Ibadan. He is presently Vice Chancellor of the University of Ife.

GEORGE ERNEST CARTER, JR., born in 1925, is a graduate of Lincoln University and an M.A. of Harvard University. He was formerly Director of the Information Program at AMSAC, producing tapes for broadcast in Africa and overseeing the exchange of cultural material with East and West Africa. Independently, he is preparing a survey of the background of contemporary African social thought. A former consultant to UNESCO on government conferences and social services, he has also been a private consultant to New York agencies planning programs on Africa and Asia. He is presently based in Accra, Ghana, as supervisor of the Peace Corps in the area.

CHRISTIAN ABAYOMI CASSELL, born in 1906 in Monrovia, Liberia, received his A.B. from Liberia College in 1926 and was admitted to the bar in 1927. He has served in many capacities in the Liberian government and participated in several economic and legal conferences and commissions in Liberia and elsewhere. He has twice been a delegate to the United Nations from Liberia and is presently the chief delegate and Liberian member of the All Africa Peoples Conference Steering Committee.

JAMES S. COLEMAN studied at Brigham Young University and at Harvard University, where he received his Ph.D. He has taught political science at Harvard and at the University of California, Los Angeles, where he is the Director of the African Studies Center. In addition to his many articles based on extensive field work in Africa, he has written the book Nigeria: Background to Nationalism.

JOHN A. DAVIS, A.B., Williams College; Ph.D., Columbia University; has taught at Howard, Lincoln, and Ohio State universities and is now professor of government at the City College of New York. He was until 1960 a Commissioner of the New York State Commission against Discrimination. He has been a member of the Executive Council of the American Political Science Association and has written a volume in the field of public administration as well as numerous articles on civil rights. He directed the nonlegal research for the NAACP’s brief in the famous education decisions and was Director of Research and Planning for President Roosevelt’s FEPC. He is Executive Director of the American Society of African Culture.

TELLI DIALLO, of Guinea, was a magistrate and former Secretary General of the Grand Council of French West Africa. Since Guinea gained independence, he has been her Ambassador to the United States and permanent representative to the United Nations.

ALIOUNE DIOP, born in Senegal, now lives in Paris. He is Secretary General of the Société Africaine de Culture (SAC). Mr. Diop was the prime mover in organizing the first world congress of Negro Writers and Artists (held in Paris in 1956), which led to the founding of SAC, and in the formation of the American Society of African Culture. He is director and editor of the journal Présence Africaine.

ANTHONY ERONSELE OGEGHALE ENAHORO, born in 1923 in Nigeria, the son of Chief Enahoro of Uromi, has reported for and edited several African newspapers. In 1954 he became Minister of Home Affairs in the Western Region of Nigeria and Leader of the House. He is now the Action Group member of the Federal House of Representatives from Ishan East in the Western Region, holding ministries for internal affairs, foreign affairs, and legislature in the Action Group’s Shadow Cabinet. He has attended both conferences of the All Africa Peoples Conference.

LATTEE ADEES FAHM, born in 1930 in Lagos, Nigeria, received his A.M. in economics from the University of California and is now a doctoral candidate at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He has served as a teaching assistant and research assistant in economics at the University of California and at M.I.T. His research includes work on economic and political studies of sub-Saharan Africa.

ABDOULAYE FOFANA, born in 1917 in Senegal, has served as a civil servant at Diourbel, Senegal. A former member of the Grand Council of French West Africa, he became Minister of Education and Health for the Mali Federation. He is now Minister of Transport in Senegal.

WILLIAM T. FONTAINE, born in 1907 in Chester, Penn., studied at Lincoln and Harvard universities and the University of Pennsylvania, where he received his Ph.D. in 1936. He has taught at Lincoln, Southern University, and Morgan State College, and is now associate professor of philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania. He has published articles in several scholarly journals, and is Secretary of AMSAC.

KWA O. HAGAN, born in 1913 in Chana, earned his B.A. at Adisadel College. He is National Secretary of the People’s Educational Association of Chana. He has taught at Adisadel and at the University College of Chana (now the University of Accra). He is a member of the UNESCO International Committee for the Advancement of Adult Education and a panel consultant for Africa on the Adult Education Committee, World Confederation of the Organization of Teaching Professions.

J. NEWTON HILL is former Dean of the College, Lincoln University, and has been a member of the Lincoln faculty in the English and art history departments since 1933. He has lectured at Howard and Atlanta universities. Mr. Hill has published numerous articles and lectures on art and has been the director of several little theater groups. He is now director of the Lagos office of the African-American Institute.

VINCENT IKEOTUONYE, born in Nigeria, was educated at Christ the King College, Onitsha, Nigeria, and Lincoln University. He is now Headmaster of Zixton Grammar School, Onitsha. He has been Principal of Africa College and Vice Principal of Priscilla Memorial Grammar School, Oguta, Nigeria. He is a member of the Federal Parliament of Nigeria.

WENDELL P. JONES graduated from Elizabeth City Teachers College, North Carolina, earned his M.A. at Atlanta University and his Ph.D. at the University of Chicago. In 1958 and 1959 he made a field study of education in tropical Africa, and in 1961 he served as program specialist for the UNESCO-sponsored Development of Education in Africa project. He is now a specialist in African education in the field of comparative education at the University of California, Los Angeles, where he is presently program director of the Peace Corps Teachers for Nigeria training project.

JOSEPH KI-ZERBO, a history professor from Upper Volta, is Secretary General of the Mouvement Africain de Libération Nationale. He was educated in France, receiving a diploma from the Institut d’Etudes Politiques of the University of Paris, and is an agrégé in history. He has taught history at the Lycée Vollenhoven in Dakar and at the Lycée in Cona. He was a delegate to the 1958 All Africa Peoples Conference in Accra.

RAYFORD F. LOGAN, a graduate of Williams College, received his Ph.D. in history from Harvard University. He has been for many years the head of the History department at Howard University. After service in World War I, he was secretary and interpreter at three Pan-African Congresses, and Deputy Secretary of the PanAfrican Association in Paris. As a Fulbright Research Fellow, Mr. Logan has studied the administration of the French Overseas Territories and has traveled under the auspices of the U.S. State Department in Africa. He is the author of numerous books and articles in the fields of American history, American Negro history, and the diplomatic history of Negro nations.

JOHN ARTHUR MARCUM studied at Stanford and Columbia universities and at the Institut d’Etudes Politiques, University of Paris. He received his Ph.D. from Stanford after completing a dissertation on French North Africa in the Atlantic Community, based on field work in Paris and North Africa. He has been an assistant professor of political science at Colgate University and has published several articles on North Africa. He is now associate professor of political science at Lincoln University.

ACHKAR MAROF, born in 1930 in Coyah, Guinea, studied at Ecole Breguet in Paris. A former director of Ballets Africains, he is now a Guinean delegate to the United Nations.

SAIDI MASWANYA is Deputy Organizing Secretary General of the Tanganyika National Union (TANU).

EZEKIEL MPHAHLELE of South Africa is an author, critic, and teacher who majored in English, psychology, and native administration at the University of South Africa. While acting as literary editor of Drum, the African weekly, he earned his M.A. in English. He was a resident tutor at University College, Ibadan, Nigeria; the author of Down Second Avenue; and is presently the Director of the Congress of Cultural Freedom in Paris. Mr. Mphahlele lectured at Massachusetts Institute of Technology during the fall of 1961.

DUNCAN NDERITO NDEGWA, born in 1925 in Nyere, Kenya, studied at Makerere College, in Uganda and earned his M.A. in economics at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland. He is now the Assistant Secretary of the Kenya Treasury and participated in the Foreign Specialist Exchange Program of the Office of Cultural Exchange sponsored by the U.S. State Department.

TRALAPUYE O. NA ORUWARIYE, of Nigeria, is a physician and the founder of Oke-Ado Hospital in Ibadan. He studied at Igbodi and Yaba College in Lagos and is an M.B.B.S. of the University of London.

JAMES A. PORTER, B.S., Howard University; A.M., New York University; has studied at New York University, the Institut d’Art et Archéologie in Paris, and the Art Students League in New York. He is the author of Modern Negro Art and of several monographs and articles, and is presently an associate professor of art at Howard University.

JEAN PRICE-MARS, of Haiti, is President of the Société Africaine de Culture. He is a pioneer Haitian anthropologist and ethnologist who received an honorary doctorate at the inauguration of the University of Dakar. He has served as Ambassador from Haiti to the United States, to the United Nations, and to France.

WALT WHITMAN ROSTOW is a professor of economic history at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He studied at Yale (B.A.), Oxford (Rhodes Scholar, M.A.), and Cambridge (M.A.), receiving his Ph.D. in 1940 at Yale. He taught at Columbia College, Oxford, and Cambridge before joining the Massachusetts Institute of Technology faculty in 1950. Mr. Rostow has done extensive research, lecturing, and writing on Soviet Russia, Communist China, Great Britain, and the United States. His many significant contributions in economics include lectures and writing on Non-Communist Manifesto, the book The Stages of Economic Growth, plus several other important publications. He is now on the White House staff in Washington, D.C.

MAIDA SPRINGER, International Representative with the Department of International Affairs, AFL-CIO, has been an officer of the International Ladies Garment-Workers Union. She has represented the AFL-CIO at conferences in Africa and was the AFL-CIO Special Representative for the Trade Union Program in Africa in 1957.

STANLEY SUMLIN graduated from Lincoln University and attended the University of Pittsburgh Law School. He earned his M.A. at New York University and is now a doctoral candidate there. He has been a research assistant at the National Bureau of Economic Affairs and is now in charge of the Near East and Africa desk at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

JAJA ANUCHA WACHUKU, born in 1918 in Aba, Eastern Nigeria, studied at the Higher College in Yaba, Lagos, and at the New Africa Uni versity College in Chana. He received his B.A. and M.A. in Legal Science at Trinity College, Dublin University. He has been chairman of the National Council of Nigeria and Cameroons, and is the founder of the New Africa Party. Mr. Wachuku, previously Speaker of the Nigerian House of Assembly, is now Minister of Foreign Affairs and Commonwealth Relations for Nigeria.

IMMANUAL WALLERSTEIN is an assistant professor of sociology at Columbia University. He studied at Columbia and received his Ph.D. in 1959. He has published several articles on French West Africa.

ARTHUR NUTULTI LUBINDA WINA, born in Northern Rhodesia, received his B.A. from Makerere College and his M.Ed. from the University of California, Los Angeles. He is now engaged in studies in international relations and is the United States representative of the United National Independence Party of Northern Rhodesia.

EMILE ZINSOU, born in 1918 in Dahomey, has served in the French Union Assembly, the French Council of the Republic, and the Territorial Assembly of Dahomey. For a short time he was Minister of General Economy in the Apithy government, but resigned and became leader of the Dahomey section of the Parti de le Fédération Africaine. He is now federal Vice President of the party and Dahomey’s Ambassador to France.

CONTENT

CONTENT

INTRODUCTION

STATEMENT BY DR. JEAN PRICE-MARS

STATEMENT BY PROFESSOR ALIOUNE DIOP

STATEMENT BY HIS EXCELLENCY TELLI DIALLO

KEYNOTE ADDRESS PAN-AFRICANISM: NASCENT AND MATURE JOHN A. DAVIS

THE HISTORICAL ASPECTS OF PAN-AFRICANISM, 1900-1945 RAYFORD W. LOGAN

PAN-AFRICANISM: PRESENT AND FUTURE

COMMENTS

ABOYAMI CASSELL

ARTHUR NUTULTI LUBINDA WINA

ANTHONY ENAHORO

EMILE ZINSOU

VINCENT C. IKEOTUONYE

PAN-AFRICANISM OR NATIONALISM IN AFRICA52

SUPPLEMENTARY REMARKS

COMMENTS

WACHUKU ABENGOWE

RICHARD M. AKWEI

SABURI OLADENI BIOBAKU

SAIDI MASWANYA

MAIDA SPRINGER

IMMANUEL WALLEBSTEIN

ACHKAR MAROF

ANTHONY ENAHORO

RESPONSE

INTRODUCTION

SOME LESSONS OF HISTORY FOR AFRICA

CAPITAL FORMATION, BALANCE OF PAYMENTS, AND ABSORPTIVE CAPACITY IN GHANA AND NIGERIA

COMMENTS

DUNCAN N. NDEGWA

STANLEY SUMLIN

EMILE ZINSOU

VINCENT C. IKEOTUONYE

DISCUSSION

INTRODUCTION

HIGHER EDUCATION IN TROPICAL AFRICA

THE UNIVERSITY OF MALI ABDOULAYE FOFANA

COMMENTS

KWA OWUNA HAGAN

WENDELL P. JONES

DISCUSSION

INTRODUCTION

PHILOSOPHICAL ASPECTS OF CONTEMPORARY AFRICAN SOCIAL THOUGHT

TRADITIONAL AFRICAN SOCIAL THOUGHT

AFRICAN PERSONALITY AND THE NEW AFRICAN SOCIETY

DISCUSSION

THE AMERICAN NEGRO ARTIST LOOKS AT AFRICA

DISCUSSION

INTRODUCTION

NEGRITUDE: AGREEMENT AND DISAGREEMENT

THE IDIOM IN AFRICAN ART WITH SPECIAL EMPHASIS ON AFRICAN SCULPTURE

REMARKS ON AFRICAN PERSONALITY AND NEGRITUDE

COMMENTS

EZEKIEL MPHAHLELE

BEN ENWONWU

T. O. ORUWARIYE

DISCUSSION

THE RELATION OF AMSAC AND THE AMERICAN NEGRO TO AFRICA AND PAN-AFRICANISM

EPILOGUE

INTRODUCTION

IT WAS ON THE EVE of a critical phase of African liberation—the formation of the Republic of the Congo—that the Third Annual Conference of the American Society of African Culture was held in Philadelphia at the University of Pennsylvania in June, 1960. The sessions took place in historic Houston Hall—the same setting where, at the beginning of World War II, Kwame Nkrumah, then a teaching fellow at the university, had shared the platform with Justice William H. Hastie, Congressman Adam Clayton Powell, and AMSAC’s Executive Director, John A. Davis, to consider the subject of African freedom. Alioune Diop, the Senegalese Secretary General and founder of the parent organization, the Société Africaine de Culture, could not remain after the Philadelphia sessions for the tour of American cities with other African visitors because of his scheduled flight to attend what proved to be that crucial event in African resurgence, the inauguration of the Republic of the Congo. In a sense, the Belgian Congo experience—or, more precisely, what at the time of writing still threatens to be the Belgian Congo disaster—reflects in microcosm the clash of forces inherent in the theme of the conference, African Unities and Pan-Africanism. The divisive aspect of nationalism is there, threatening to splinter the Congo hopelessly into its several constituent parts; and the influence of an embattled Pan-Africanism is also manifest even in secessionist Katanga in demonstrations supporting the Republic.

Pan-Africanism is a timely subject. It has been the rallying slogan, the springboard, the ideological vehicle for the common efforts of exiled Africans, West Indians, and American Negroes to advance the cause of Africa and of Africans. But Pan-Africanism, like Joseph’s coat, is described in many colors; at no time have these variegated hues been more significant than now. These are the years—1960 is in a large measure the year—of Africa’s liberation. The drive toward freedom has, or shortly will have, succeeded, with certain reluctant exceptions at the extreme ends of the continent. That very success has, in large degree, automatically eliminated this source of psychological energy, of unity and effort, generated in the struggle against France, England, and Belgium, against political disenfranchisement, against the unnumbered facets of a common colonial oppression. The more difficult question of the ordering of that freedom is imminent. In a new and changing context the delegates to the conference examined the major theme of Pan-Africanism—what it has been, what it is, and, in an awakening continent, what it is most likely to become. Their views, some prepared beforehand, others given extemporarily, are recorded in this volume.

The chapters of the volume correspond to the organization of the conference into panels dealing with the various sub-topics. Owing to the wide range of material covered and the diversity of views presented in these papers, I have found it convenient to present my summary of and comments upon the conference in several parts. The introduction proper concerns mainly the chapters on Pan-Africanism and African politics. Further introductory remarks precede the chapters on economics, education, social thought, and African culture and negritude. In the chapter on African art my remarks are included with a synopsis of the round-table discussion.

• • o

In his keynote speech, John A. Davis, Executive Director of AMSAC, poses the problem that confronts Africa in the initiation of her independence: Is the virus of nationalism to infect a newly freed Africa with the same attendant ills of Balkanization, tariff wars, military alliances, and boundary quarrels which for centuries afflicted Europe so heavily? Or will a mature Pan-Africanism manage to resolve the divisive tensions that threaten not only the continent but the peace of the world? Davis graphically states the urgency of the matter: Yet they and we together dare not fail, for the blast of nuclear fusion blows hot on our necks as we hurry along the path of human reconciliation. Subsequent events have proved his imagery no mere rhetoric, and it is increasingly evident that difficulties facing the newly independent African states have implications far beyond their impact within the limits of the continent.

A complete understanding of the actual and potential range of influence of contemporary Pan-Africanism is afforded only by a knowledge of its origin and the course of its early growth. The first panelist to speak at the Philadelphia sessions was Rayford Logan, one of the handful of pioneers in the development of the Pan-African movement. In this pioneer phase, Logan was one of the principal colleagues of W. E. B. Du Bois, the generally acknowledged father of the PanAfrican movement. In his address Logan traces the origin of PanAfricanism in the early part of the century in the activity of Sylvester Wilhams in the West Indies and of Du Bois in the United States. By coincidence, it was in response to a request from a group of American Negroes from Philadelphia, the site of this years deliberations, that Du Bois issued his first call for a Pan-African conference before World War I. A series of such conferences was held in the first half of the century, meeting, for the most part, in European capitals. Logan takes issue with Du Bois’s belief that the conference held in Paris at the close of World War I through the assistance of Blaise Diagne, the Senegalese member of the French Chamber of Deputies, as the Allies hammered out the clumsy Treaty of Versailles, was responsible for the mandate system. He points to the growing force of Pan-Africanism, however, in the historic culminating sessions held in Manchester in 1945 at the close of World War II, and presided over by the elder statesman Du Bois. Among the participants in this session were the men who were shortly to move to the forefront in the explosive development of African independence: Nkrumah, George Padmore, Kenyatta, Nnamdi Azikiwe, Wachuku, and others.

Logan’s thesis may be termed either an exercise in realism or in cynicism, depending on the vintage of one’s disenchantment. He attributes the success of the Pan-African movement neither to the influence of libertarian ideas nor, in any substantial measure, to the efforts of the early Pan-Africanists, but rather to two debilitating world wars which left Europe prostrate and powerless to maintain her empires. The colonial powers themselves were unwittingly the gravediggers of colonialism, he maintains; and rather than to the egalitarian ideals of pronouncements such as the Magna Carta, the Rights of Man, and the Atlantic Charter, it is to the suicidal struggles of two world wars and the interim stupidities of the great powers that Pan-Africanism owes its growth. Paramount Chief Anthony Enahoro, a member of the Nigerian parhament, rose in opposition to this analysis. Garbed in his traditional tribal robes, speaking in precise, lucid English, he insisted upon the guiding influence of Western ideals and of Western institutions.

Without doubt, the assessment of the relative weight of such intangibles is, at best, an art; yet through the close consideration of the pattern of interaction of forces in the political field, through a selective comparison with other areas, the historian is not helpless. There are elements of truth in both positions. War s destruction of the old is the classic occasion, of course, for the formation of the new. There is little doubt that Europe’s grip upon her colonies could never have been so loosened without the impact of those internecine conflicts which were the two global struggles. An imperialist West’s extremity was, in great measure, the opportunity for every vassal state and territory around the earth. The full historic truth, however, would certainly comprehend not only the shattering impact of these conflicts but also the complementary and directive force of liberal Western ideas. It is Western narcissism that holds that Europe taught an indifferent Africa to want to be free. There is the other side of the coin, however—the possibility of Africa’s freedom. Here, Enahoro does well to point out that there was no inevitability in the successful implementation of that desire, that there was no predestined course of political events following the two world wars, and that the attendant dislocations might conceivably have been superseded by a renewal rather than a relaxation of Europe’s hold upon her African colonies. It is necessary only to consider the close balance of forces in the Weimar Republic, and the almost fortuitous circumstances that determined the monstrous successor finally to emerge from the Weimar ruins, to realize that the course of liberal progress by no means runs in a straight line, and is certainly not inevitable. It is impossible to ignore the circumstances, favorable or unfavorable, attendant on its advance. It is to the English conscience, as shaped by centuries of its poets, essayists, and other writers, that Gandhi, in considerable measure, owed the inspiration for his program of passive resistance. It would be enlightening to contemplate a similar movement under a genocidal Third Reich. Although it required the stunning blows of the two wars to persuade Europe to loosen a rapacious grip upon Africa, the advance of African freedom and of Pan-Africanism, as Enahoro rightly insists, is attributable in great degree to the libertarian ideals of that same Western civilization.

Considerable attention was given at the conference to a definition of Pan-Africanism and to its changing significance over the course of half a century. Again, the conflict in the remarks of Logan and Enahoro graphically points up the transformation in the nature of the movement. In its initiation, its supporters were interested simply in an amelioration of the wretched conditions under which most Africans lived. The influence of Du Bois succeeded in transforming PanAfricanism into a more militant program of nationalism and ultimate African independence. It was a pan movement in the sense that it sought vindication of the rights of all Africans and the establishment ultimately of Africa’s rightful place in the political sun; yet, in a sense paradoxically, its instrumentality was the independent national state. Logan correctly indicates that throughout World War II the immediate objective of the Pan-Africanists was the independence of the several prospective African nations. In the postwar period, however, and with political independence increasingly becoming a fact, Pan-Africanism, while retaining essentially the same motivation, has taken on new tactical objectives. Marcum of Colgate, Coleman of the University of California, Los Angeles, and Apter of the University of Chicago [now at the University of California, Berkeley], in their prepared papers, and Cassell of Liberia, Enahoro and Wachuku of Nigeria, Akwei of Ghana, Zinsou of Dahomey, and others, through panel participation, all contribute to the mosaic of this evolving force in African affairs. Emphases differ, but there is general agreement that modern Pan-Africanism envisages, among other goals, the development of forms of association beyond the present boundaries of independent states in a manner that will strengthen and enrich the fabric of African life. The major discussion concerns the prospect of some kind of political union between or among the various African states.

The discussion seems to reveal two basic attitudes toward political unity. One appears motivated by fear of Balkanization, and advocates immediate measures to achieve political unities larger than those inherited from the chance boundaries of Europe’s original conquests; the other approach would accept the legacy of such colonial boundaries as fait accompli and would endeavor within that framework to achieve economic and cultural cooperation and eventually, perhaps, closer political union. This latter attitude, as Apter points out, is the one urged upon African leaders by the major theorist in the era of English influence in Africa, the late George Padmore. Pan-Africanism is to be achieved, according to the Padmore Dictum, by the realiza- tion first of national states, staked out by present political realities. These states are to be made strong and viable, and the formation of larger regional political entities is not feasible until this preliminary development has been achieved.

Apter and Coleman delineate in considerable detail the factors in colonial Africa—internal and external—which have made for the establishment of separate national states, determined geographically and politically by the boundaries of the old colonial units. Coleman finds the causes for this Balkanizing tendency in three aspects of Africa’s development. The first he calls the legacy of colonialism: It can be stated as a general proposition that during the colonial period the policy and actions of the colonial powers in Africa tended to preserve and to emphasize the separate existence of each artificial administrative entity created during this scramble for Africa. Further: The crux of the matter is that the net effect of European colonialism in Africa has been to create—albeit unwittingly—embryonic nations coterminous with boundaries of the colonial administrative units. He examines the policies of Britain and France in Africa and finds that they fostered separateness and failed to seize the opportunity to create large political unities after World War II, when Africa was on the threshold of liberation. Akwei of Ghana later specifically referred to the carving habits of our friends, the English, who, presiding over the increasingly speedy liquidation of an empire, resorted to what was conceivably the path of least resistance by carving successive pieces of that empire into small nations.

Second, the very mechanics of the struggle for independence tended to perpetuate the existing political entities. Except for certain eruptions of violence in those areas that, in Enahoro’s euphemism of reverse perspective, are burdened with a settler problem, the nationalist movements generally have been committed to constitutional and nonviolent change. Obviously, the goals of these movements could be prosecuted much more efficiently within the framework of an existing political entity of a single language area, unafflicted by customs barriers or other political and economic barriers.

Finally, once independent statehood is achieved, as Coleman points out, the imperatives of nation-building make it impossible to wait upon the liberation of other areas; the state must move immediately to create a stable political community, to inculcate loyalty and respect for the nation and the laws of the government, and to instill in the people a sense of shared purpose and of national identity. Thus, the factors inherent in the struggle for national independence militate sharply against the suprastate of the larger political unity.

The actual history of the present achievement of independence by African states indicates that these and other obstacles to broad political imion are extremely powerful, and suggests the correctness of the Padmore Dictum that the first goal is separate national independence. Of the more than a score of nations gaining independence within the past three or four years, there have been only two examples of the larger political union we are contemplating; namely, the GhanaGuinea Union and the Mali Federation. The first has been described as more a potentially meaningful political union than an actual operative example. The situation in the Mali Federation brings us to a consideration of another approach detected in the discussions on PanAfricanism; that is, the urgency of achieving larger union before the rigidity of national interest sets in.

Marcum describes how Léopold Senghor, as a member of the French delegation to the Consultative Assembly of the Council of Europe in Strasbourg, was impressed with the extreme jealousy of national sovereignty of states whose separate existence had been established. Senghor thus urged, and his sense of urgency is shared by some at the Philadelphia conference, that every effort be made to achieve a broad political union before rather than after independence —the converse of Padmore’s injunction. Senghor s 1959 proposal of federation of all the territories of French West Africa met defeat, and the Upper Volta and Dahomey withdrew from a prospective four- nation Mali Federation. A reduced Mali Federation, however, did eventually emerge—a union of Senegal and Sudan; it was, during its survival, the only example of political union formed prior to independence. It has therefore been signally disappointing to the adherents of Pan-Africanism to observe the recent disintegration of that union and the apparently irreconcilable differences between Senegal and Sudan.

The remarks of Zinsou of Dahomey are in substantial agreement with those of Senghor in his key study, African Socialism. He, like Senghor, strongly insists upon a fairly loose federal type of union, rather than a unitary state with power strongly concentrated in a central government. But federal or unitary, the sentiment was expressed more than once during the conference that Africa, by rare historic fortune, finds herself possessed of a fleeting chance to forge strong meaningful unions between nation states. One of the younger members of the Nigerian Parliament, Ikeotuonye, who indicated he had discussed the matter with his political chief Azildwe before coming to the conference, strongly urged from the floor that the conference go on record as favoring the formation of a federation of most of the states of West Africa. Zinsou of Dahomey deplores the lack of greater awareness on the part of Africans of the dangers of Balkanization. He emphasizes the absolute necessity of African unity, and the unhoped-for historic chance that