KWASI WIREDU’S CONSENSUAL DEMOCRACY: TOWARDS A PATH OF REALIZATION IN THE MAJORITARIAN HEMISPHERE

Abstract

Wiredu’s work titled Democracy and consensus in African traditional politics: A plea for a non-party polity (1996) has generated so many reactions so much, that scholars on African politics have argued in support of and against on justificatory and logical grounds. Basically, a summary of the arguments of Wiredu in this work are as follows: (1) He offered a consensus-based non-party ideology as a fundamental tenet of political theory and democratic practice in Africa. (2) He avers that the majoritarian democracy in practice has failed to put the interest of the minorities into consideration in the decision making process. (3) He views consensual democracy as a workable and suitable substitute for majoritarian democracy. He feels that the rights and the interests of the minorities which are not taken care of in majoritarian democracy can only be done under a consensual process. In this paper, I submit that there is a need to muddle consensual democracy principle which are positively inclined and significant as replacements to parts of the places in which majoritarian democracy has fallen short. The paper employs the science of muddling through theory by Charles Lindblom to reiterate to justify this notion. The aim of this work is to demonstrate that there are aspects of consensual democracy that are inherent in majoritarian democracy but which are not really taken cognizance of. Also, consensual democracy can still come to realization in practice and applicability if and only if the positive and useful features of it can be employed in majoritarian democracy. The paper employs both the analytic and expository methods respectively in showing the logical and practical possibility of reconciling majoritarian and consensual democracy.