Since I got myself involved in the discourse over the whole issue of disciplinary relevance of the humanities and specifically philosophy, which caused me to advance a case for the rebranding of humanities in terms of pedagogy, curricula and praxis, the response I have been receiving had set me thinking on the fate of political science and the social sciences in the context of the concerns of that debate. This contribution and the next one therefore attempt to share a bit of my thought on this all important subject matter. Political science remains the discipline that gave me the theoretical weapon that had enabled me come to term with thinking about Nigeria from the perspective of the public service and its urgent reform. If the major actors that founded the discipline in Nigeria-Dudley, Essien-Udom, Ezera, Ake, Ekeh, Akinyemi, Gambari, Ogunsanwo, Oyediran, Awa, Nnoli, Ayoade, Adebisi, Ekpebu, Adekanye, Adeniran, Oyovbaire, Jinadu, Olagunju, Elaigwu, Nwosu, Aaron Gana, Gboyega, Otubanjo, Jega, Takaya, Kyari, Bande, Onwudiwe, Onyeoziri, Occuli, Okunade, Amuwo, Agbaje, Ihonvbere, Said Adejumobi, Osagae, Adisa, Dunmoye, Nwolise, Akinterinwa, Joy Ogwu, Egwu, Olukotun, Suberu, etc.-are either dead, semi or fully retired or in the diaspora, where is that discipline headed? How are the current generation of political scientists in Nigeria holding up against the onslaught of discipline-bashing that has afflicted the social sciences and the humanities, especially with the coming of STEM-science, technology, engineering and mathematics?
If, according to Thomas Carlyle, economics is a dismal science, has political science become more dismal? Haven’t political scientists also succumbed to the ‘publish or perish’ principle that ensures promotion on the basis of facile articles that have not illuminated our collective experience as a nation? How do or should political scientists answer to Nigeria? How do functionalism, constructivism, democratic theory, game theory, prebendalism, elite theory, dependency theory, prisoner’s dilemma, iron law of oligarchy, institutionalism, behaviouralism, Marxist-Leninism, Dutch and double Dutch theory, Westphalia concept of world order, and all the others affect the way we perceive our predicament? If Nigeria’s GDP averages 7% annual growth rates, how does that translates relative to mystery index/poverty rate and consequent political behaviour, for instance? What is the state of political science scholarship in Nigeria?
Let us answer that question by starting from the basics: What do political scientists do? They study politics, political processes, political institutions and political behaviour. Or, to put it another way, political scientists are concerned with power and power relations. They are interested in answering the question of who gets what, when and how, from as small a component as the family, down to a somewhat larger component as the Afijio local government council then on to the national level of Nigeria’s political economy and even to a global power relation between the developed and the developing countries of the world. And they are interested in achieving a scientifically objective analysis that eschews bias and sentiment in an attempt to come to methodologically sound conclusions that can aid governance policies and paradigms. Thus, for instance, a political scientist would want to interrogate the political economy dimensions to how income distribution within the Nigerian society, within the last fifteen years, has generated a huge poverty level. Or, s/he may be interested in the question of how the electoral processes constitute a veritable factor in the measurement of democratisation in Nigeria.
Why is political science important? This question seems superfluous given our definition of what political scientists do. Yet its significance derives from the fact that political science has also been boxed into a siege mentality in a modern world given the pre-eminence of science and technology and the other STEM disciplines. Political scientists have been forced everywhere to defend the relevance of their disciplines. And that is in spite of its appellation of being scientific! But this is only one side of the story, especially in Nigeria. The other side is that most political scientists in Nigeria have been forced into exile by the very political processes they are supposed to analyse and understand. One can, as a telling illustration, ask the question: Why would the Centre for Democratic Studies (CDS); National Council for Inter-Governmental Relations (NCIR) – dedicated to research into our peculiar brand of federalism etc, – not have resurrected sixteen years into democratic governance, if indeed they died through suffocation in the heat of militarism? Where is the Nigerian Political Science Association (NPSA) beyond just routine annual conferences? This last question isn’t a request for spatial location but a serious interrogation of the state of political science in Nigeria at both the pedagogical and research levels. In other words, does the discipline of political science in Nigeria lacks an active professional gate-keeping to channel research and pedagogical energies?
Mario Vargas Llosa, the Peruvian writer, captures the cynicism that pervades the study of politics. For him, ‘Real politics…has little to do with ideas, values, and imagination…and everything to do with manoeuvres, intrigues, plots, paranoia, betrayals, a great deal of calculation, no little cynicism, and every kind of con game.’ Have Nigerian political scientists succumbed to the latter and forgotten the former? Or have we retreated to the sanitised and air-conditioned atmosphere of the conference halls where we release communiqués without bites? If not, where are the profusion of ideas, values and imagination? Where is the distinct political science voice on matters of policy intelligence and articulation in Nigeria?
When I made the hard but final decision, in 1980, to pursue political science as a career path, I had a distinctive understanding of what it would enable me to do. I was coming from a particularly strong reading of Plato’s Republic and the connection of philosophy to the political reorientation of society. My parents couldn’t understand my obsession with philosophy. So, I switched my focus: Since it was the manipulation of power that led to the killing of Socrates, the study of power and power relations-the main staple of political science-offers a significant avenue to come to term with the dynamics of the Nigerian society and its own unique predicament. I was not disappointed. And then I eventually met and read political scholars who wrote and taught with passion. They all understood what Noam Chomsky considered the responsibility of the intellectuals everywhere: Speaking the truth and exposing lies. They facilitated the tight connection between political research and policy analysis. This is one of the reasons why the death of Professor Kunle Amuwo was too hard for me to take. He represented a tradition I met in the Department of Political Science, University of Ibadan.
That tradition was a vigorous injection of the Nigerian political scientist into the tragic divide between the state and the society configuration. This, for me, is where the action of political theorising in Nigeria is. It is within the state-society space that power is used and abused. It is that space that spawns corruption, poverty, crime, terrorism, and bad leadership. That space also generates reforms and revolutions. And depending on what we do, it can also either generate abject resignation to autocratic manipulations or invigorate democratic governance and consolidation.
Nigeria and her plural complexities constitute a real theatre for political analysis. It should, by that fact alone, generate serious pedagogical programmes that bring government policies and personalities live into the classrooms for methodological interrogations and interactions. The Boko Haram insurgency is a terrible challenge to the Nigerian Political Science Association and the multiplicities of our methodologies. We have become too academic in the face of serious politics! And the greatest problems of Nigeria will not be solved in sterile conferences and dusty journals; we will begin to solve them when political science pedagogy articulates a new direction for research that interacts with policies and those who make them. We must not only bring Nigeria actively into the average political science classroom, but we also actively apply our methodologies and ideas to Nigeria by a vigorous invasion of her public spheres where we confront policies and policy makers in sincere battles for the soul of our Fatherland. And political science possesses a larger responsibility: It can chart a path for political responsibility that can become a template for other social science disciplines. Isn’t that what the NPSA welcome note intends on its website?
If we can manage all these, then maybe the early avatars of the discipline that had fought a good fight would no longer resent their retirement. And then just maybe, we can all settle down to more enlightening answers to the ancient question of who gets what, when and how.
– Dr. Olaopa is
Permanent Secretary Federal Ministry of Communication Technology Abuja. Nigeria
tunji.olaopa@commtech.gov.ng
tolaopa2003@gmail.com
