African Environmental Ethic: A Creation of Distorted Values.

BY

Omam. Pat. AgboroDept of PhilosophyUniversity of Lagos

Nigeria

Man and the Environment. These are two inseparable

entities that cannot be divorced from each other. There

seems to be a constant and almost perpetual interaction of

one with the other. Should we then say that, they are two

sides of a coin?

Various arguments and discussions on environment,

environmental hazards and call to ‘save the environment’

make one wonder: ‘was man made for the environment or

the environment made for man’? The answer depends on

how one chooses to look at it.

The biblical account of the creation story explains that the

environment was first created before man. Man was then

created to control, subdue, dominate and replenish the

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environment. This portion of the bible has been greatly

criticized. It is argued by Lynn White (1967) that it shows a

lack of pro-environmental orientation. This is because the

human is seen as an exalted specie, separate from and

superior to nature. Everything had been put in place for his

benefit and rule for white, this biblical view permeates the

western culture, thereby creating a general disregard for

nonhuman forms of life and natural processes. While some

scholars agree with white that western values and beliefs are

anthropocentric, thereby legitimizing the exploitation of

nature, they maintain that the Judeo-Christian religion is not

the main cause of this anthropocentric view. They argue that

the charge to subdue, dominate etc was quoted out of

context. They point out other portions of the bible which

emphasize stewardship and that man was actually given the

charge to take care of the environment. On the other hand,

some are of the opinion that the human centeredness of the

western culture should be blamed on elements of ancient

Greek philosophy that are in part foundation of modern

scientific thought (Callicott, 1983). Shiva (1989) on his part

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traces this attitude to the scientific revolution which he

argues was responsible for the mechanical view of nature.

Whitney (1993) blames it on western capitalism.

Should we then say that the environment was made for man

or the other way round? This indeed is a mind bugging

question. Whichever way one chooses to look at it, the fact

still remains that man lives in an environment and is

sustained by it. He is faced with the task of understanding

his lot. He needs the environment for shelter, food, clothing,

mobility and what have you. Needless to say, whatever

progress or achievement man seeks is only within and in

relation to his environment. So if the environment was made

for man, why the hullabaloo about taking cares of the

environment? The answer is not farfetched. That which was

made for man must be sustained and taken care of so that

man will continue to benefit from it; not only in his

generation but also for posterity. Gifford Pinchot (1910:3)

talking about the conservation of the U.S. environment

asserts that:

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The most prosperous nation today is the United States. Our unexampled health and well being are directly due to the superb natural resources of our country, and to the use, which has been made of. Then by our citizens, both in the present and in the past. We are prosperous because our forefathers bequeathed to us a land of marvelous resources still unexhausted. Shall we conserve those resources, and in our turn transmit them, still unexhausted to our descendants?

This is the crux of the matter which in itself has been an

issue of debate these past decades. It is not something one

reads about anymore but an issue that is definitely with us

which has in itself become everybody’s problem. The

warning bell ringing in the air suggests that when the natural

resources of any nation become exhausted, disaster and

decay in every facet of national life follow as a matter of

course. And these natural resources seem to be getting

exhausted. It is therefore not surprising that solutions are

desperately being sought for. Usually, the first step in

solving a problem involves knowing its cause(s). Many

thinkers have attempted explanations to the root cause of

environmental pollution. Indeed such explanations reflect

cultural and societal perspectives.

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In this paper, we do argue that the problem of the

environment in Africa is a peculiar one and as such demands

closer attention. The peculiarities are entrenched in

colonialism and a resultant distortion of the psyche of the

African man. This has reduced him to a mere being

struggling for survival. No wonder that his values are

misplaced. Why think of the survival of the environment

when the inhabitant still seeks for survival? And as he seeks

for survival, he consequently destroys that which would have

been of benefit to him.

We shall begin by defining key concepts that are being used

here. This is necessary because often times words are taken

for granted and philosophers are particularly intellectually

cantankerous and could want to clear any form of doubt

regarding concepts that are being used.

The first question to be considered is what is the

environment? We definitely would not want to be

presumptuous by assuming that we all understand what we

mean by that very word.

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Tairu T.T. (1998:8) defined environment as a “combination of

natural objects (living and non living) objects made by

human beings, the inter-relationships between these and

various circumstances which surround people on earth.”

Gordon Marshall (1994:153) a sociologist defines it to mean

the territory in which human action occurs. He explains that

significantly, “the current social and political attention given

to the environment concentrates on the physical world- on

towns, houses, the countryside, and natural resources such

as air and water.

Ebin (1995) defines environment as comprising of land, air,

water and all the physical structures surrounding us. It refers

to the totality of space, time and socio-cultural settings

inherent there in.

Osuntokun (2001:293) a historian environmentalist defines

environment to mean man and his surrounding including the

life support provided by the air, water, land, animals and the

entire ecosystem of which man is but a part.

From the above definitions, it is clear that by environment

we do mean both the physical surrounding of people as well

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as a group of organism. It is the people, plants, trees, water,

air, ozone layer, atmosphere, weather e.t.c. and

relationships that exist between them.

Inyang- Abia (1996:106) succinctly puts it when he says,

that which surrounds is the environment. Every system except the largest has an environment. It is from the environment that life inputs are derived and into it life outputs are sent. Therefore the environment determines, to a great extent, the nature, lifestyle, human culture and activities among other things.

There is also the economic part of the environment. While

some argue that the environment is a subset of the

economy, others suggest that it should be the other way

round. For Lester brown,

Economic theory does not explain why Arctic Sea ice is melting. It does not explain why grasslands are turning into desert in northwestern china…nor does it explain why we are in the early stages of the greatest extinction of plants and animals since the dinosaurs disappeared 65 million years ago. Yet economics is essential to measuring the cost to society of these excesses. (Brown 2001:4)

The next question to be considered is ethics. Ethics is often

defined as the concerns with “what ought to be”. This is

opposed to the scientific concern of what is. In other words,

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while science describes reality as it actually exists, ethics is

concerned with prescribing what ought to be. In effect, a

discourse on environmental ethics will involve a prescription

about the oughtness of environmental situation. Often times,

when the question of “oughtness” comes up, there is the

concern for the prevalent state of affairs that needs to be

changed. The concepts of right and wrong come to bear. And

questions about attitudes and behaviours are critically

examined. Questions like ‘what should I do (or not do), how

should I act and not act’ arise. Everybody at one time or the

other is faced with moral issues day in and out. They come in

all shapes and sizes. Issues of war and peace that national

leaders face are among the “biggest” of moral issues

because they involve the possibility or reality of immense

destruction and slaughter.

For example, in 1961 Abraham Lincoln had to decide whether to use military force to resist the southern states’ attempts to secede from the union and in 1945 president Truman had to decide whether to use atomic weapons on Japanese cities to end the war with Japan.(Barcalow 1994:3).

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Issues of environmental ethics have equally been of great

concern especially in the last decades. It has attracted the

attention of various professionals from all works of life. In

1972, the United Nations sponsored a conference on the

Human Environment in Stockholm. Ever since then both

developed and developing countries concluded that the

environmental question is not a case of crying wolf where

there is none. The problems are real and tangible and they

require urgent attention.

The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Nov: 2000) explains

that environmental ethics is a topic of applied ethics, which

examines the moral basis of environmental responsibility. In

these environmental conscious times, virtually everyone

agrees that we need to be environmentally responsible for

toxic waste, contaminating ground water, oil spills that

destroy shore line, fossil fuels that produce carbon dioxide

thus adding to the green house effect, and use of

fluorocarbon gasses which deplete the earth’s protecting

ozone layer.

Issues of environmental ethics can be summarized thus:

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That the environment was originally made for man’s benefit. Man’s actions are supposed to be beneficial both for him and his environment. The environment has been adversely affected by man’s actions. Therefore, man must redirect his actions to salvage his environment. Infact, the call for preservation and conservation took several dimensions in the west. One perspective was that western societies needed to learn how to be technical innovations, less wasteful of natural resources, more conscious of their dependence on the biosphere.

Another perspective suggests that the ecological approach

can be abandoned in favour of a more mystical, primitive

and humanitarian approach.

Aldo Leopold (1966:238) an ecologist argued that the West

stands in need of a new ethic; an ethic of conservation. He

calls it “an ethic dealing with man’s relation to land and to

the animals and plants which grow upon it”.

On the whole, environmental issues are divided into two

categories. The first category refers to problems like global

warming, ozone layer depletion, acid rain, and deforestation

etc.

The second problem refers to the consequential problems

emanating from the first. Several causes have been

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highlighted. They include population pressure on limited

natural resources, international trade in toxic wastes and

rapid urbanization.

Abuse of the environment could be in two ways. The first is

through nature itself. Floods, earthquake, erosion, volcanic

eruption, tornadoes, e.t.c. can cause environmental

pollution. It can also be caused by the activities of man. As

we have mentioned earlier, there exists a necessary inter-

relatedness between man and his environment. It is this

relationship that gives rise to the ethical issues about his

environment.

In Africa, environmental pollution is quite prevalent.

However, it was never really an issue at least it was not

registered in the consciousness of the African. What has

been and still is of paramount importance to him is the issue

of development and betterment of his lot!

There have been several conferences held on the

environment in Nigeria and various appeals are being made

to the government and the people of Nigeria to salvage what

is left of the environment. Inspite of the fact that Nigeria is

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blessed with natural resources, and is not prone to

earthquakes and volcanic eruptions like her counterparts in

some parts of the world, her environment still suffers from

pollution.

Marinho (1998:145) in his article, “Towards protection of the environmental and ecology” describes the Nigerian environment as:

The easily managed but neglected masses of cellophane bags and other litter at and beyond police checkpoints and toll gates that have turned the sale of pure water into pure pollution. The environment is the soft drink company that puts its logo on up to 80 percent of a school signboard it erects without putting anything educational into the school and thus immorally and perhaps criminally influencing the minds of the children almost for free. The environment also includes the immoral if not actually illegal insistence of government parastatals like NEPA and NITEL on payment of their bills by bankdrafts each of which adds 85 to 280 naira cost to the consumer of more than 1000 naira worth of the commodity.

He laments therefore that a man pursued by a sense of

persecution and injustice will have little time for the

environment. This is the point we are making: that the

environment cannot be treated in isolation of the rest of the

problems weighing down the nation in particular and Africa

in general.

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There is need to interject here that we are not saying that

the call for environmental preservation is a false alarm. The

stark reality stares us in the face and if nothing is done, lives

would be in grave danger. Neither are we brushing aside

with the wave of the hand, the efforts made by individuals,

international bodies, government and non governmental

organizations to address the issues. We do not adher to the

myopic stance of “it is better to be rich and dirty than to be

poor and clean”. If such a situation was the ideal, then the

western world would not be concerned about the

environment as they already are. What we are saying

essentially is that in order to address the African

environmental question, certain peculiar factors have to be

taken into consideration. These peculiarities are entrenched

in the facts of colonialism and neo-colonialism, the

consciousness of the African with the resultant effect

observed even in her present day realities.

By the African, we do mean the masses: the common man

that constitutes the major population of the continent.

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IN THE BEGINNING

The mere mention of the word colonialism brings to the

listeners mixed feelings. To the ex-colonial lords, it brings to

mind sweet memories of rightful domination of a people. To

the African, that very word brings to mind the ravaging of

the Africans by the so called ‘white masters’. To some,

colonialism is synonymous to rape; the ravaging of the

untouched bride, by ‘that’ infidel. Many African countries still

seem to be struggling to recover from the negative effects of

colonialism.

Ideas rule the world and to say the least these ideas reveal

the mindset, culture, belief and orientation of a person or a

group of persons.

Rather than bore ourselves with the details of colonialist

activities, we shall point out issues that are relevant for our

purposes. The features of colonialist missions could be

outlined as follows:

firstly, for the export of raw materials that are

abundant in the land and

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secondly, the struggle for mass control of these

sources of raw materials;

thirdly, the search for exclusive markets for

manufactured goods of the colonial powers;

And making the colonized people non manufacturing

dependents thereby, prohibiting them from trading

with other nations.

It is widely agued that the two religions, Christianity and

Islam were strong instruments of colonization under the

pretext of bringing light to the Dark Continent. For some

historians and political analysts the pretentious reasons

advanced by the colonialists to bring civilization and culture

to the ravaged society are quite unacceptable.(Rodney

1972) Such reasons and actions violate not only their

religious teaching but also the moral principles- the right of

any society in its evolution to evolve a culture and

civilization. More so, this left an indelible mark on the psyche

and history of the continent. Such marks include the

negation of the African characteristics that give him his

dignity.

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As it is to be expected, the coming of the white man into

Africa and the introduction of western education affected his

(African’s) consciousness; for he is suddenly exposed to

things alien to him. He is practically forced to grapple with

strange ideas, ideologies, literature and even language.

Little wonder that at the end of the whole colonization

exercise, the African is purged of his cultural identity. He

thus becomes a person with a confused personality. He is at

the same time Christian, Moslem and the African

traditionalist. He is equally Western, and African

simultaneously. The implication is that the African became a

paradox of names. The same continent is perceived to be

French, English, Portuguese, Spanish, Belgian etc. We can

therefore understand the cultural conflicts experienced by

the African at the social and personal levels. This also

accounts for the developmental problems encountered by

the African leaders in deciding which of these conflicting

values are to be accepted by every member of the society.

After all, one cannot be both a villager and a high class

metropolitan.

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But then was the African a passive observer to the whole

transmission and assimilation processes or an active and

willing participant. Whatever answer one might give, one

fact that cannot be overlooked is that the psyche of the

African was affected. The white is perceived as superior

while the black is perceived otherwise. This attitude has

continued till date. Everything foreign (language, mode of

dressing and ideas) are gullibly accepted as good. Even left-

overs are considered acceptable. And these left overs have

done nothing other than to pollute the environment.

Indiscriminate importation of used frigidaire and air conditioners which still use in spite of part of the Montreal protocol, CFC’s (chlorofluorocarbons) which have been found to destroy the ozone layer in the atmosphere thus permitting ultra violet rays from the sun to hit the earth with devastating effects on human, animal and plant health with consequent rise in the incidence of cancers

and other incurable disease. Osuntokun (1999:5)

It seems that while the Africans were learning how to knot

their ties, they lost sight of the climatic relevance of this

‘fashion”. Indeed, the ogogoro –African alcoholic drink was

rejected and replaced by the gin. The dane gun was

regarded as archaic but the pistol was perceived as

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sophisticated; all well, and good! Yet the issue of

development stares us in the face. It becomes very

important that we need to become as developed as the

west. And with the discovery of so many minerals resources,

it seemed as if we were on our way to economic and

technological development. Alas! Years have come and

gone. We are still grappling with underdevelopment.The

environment is still threatened. The white man has left. Yet

his ghost still remains. From the far shores of his land, he

still exerts a lot of influence on the black man’s land. Now,

the latter suffers from the advancement of the west.

A number of third world countries have been used as dumping ground for toxic wastes from western industrialized countries. The dumping of toxic chemical waste in Koko in 1988 is still fresh in our memory. Steve Okecha (2000:58)

So far, we have established the fact that the African

encounter with the white man, succeeded in making him a

confused being with no mind of his own. Everything foreign

is accepted as superior. He then blindly accepts whatever is

given to him without being able to decipher between what is

harmful or beneficial to him.

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Another vital question we need ask is whether the African

have any sense of the environment at all. This question can

be answered on two levels. At the simple levels, the African

was quite conscious of his environment for he saw that his

survival was dependent on how well he catered for it.

However, at the complicated level, that is the industrialized

level the African is ignorant. He is consumed first and

foremost by the need to survive, becomes industrialized like

his western counterpart before entertaining any thought or

concern for his environment.

In fact, we dare assert that the common African does not

have any understanding whatsoever of environmental

pollution and the need to arrest the situation. He lives,

moves and breathes pollution. It has become a part of his

life. We are not saying that the African is a foolish

ignoramus but that he has come to accept the assaulted

environment as the necessary price to pay for progress.

No wonder developing countries experience urban drift.

People (mostly men) leave the village in search for the

Golden Fleece represented by white collar jobs. This

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migration of men to the cities does not help matters at all.

And because there are too many people looking for few jobs,

the large remnant have no choice than to accept to work in

industries. And here, they are not protected from the

dangers of such occupations. They are exposed to fumes,

noise and what have you. At the end of the day, we are

faced with a population of sick, deaf people with low life

span. A pathetic state of affairs indeed! Consequently, wives

and mothers are left to bear the brunt. The resultant effect is

that labour for subsistent farming reduces. The women

automatically take over the running of the household. Thus

the entire responsibility for feeding, clothing etc. rests on her

shoulders. Dankelman and Davidson observes that

Recent studies of 74 developing countries show that women already have more than a fifth of the household chores in Africa and the Caribbean…for some countries, the figures are much higher. (1988:16)

Statistics show that women constitute a larger percentage of

the world’s population. Oyeshola (1995:20) is of the opinion

that the class position of a woman determines to a large

extent how she relates to her environment. Thus, the way a

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poor woman will relate to the environment will differ from

that of a rich career lady. Since the realities of developing

countries show that the woman is often saddled with the

sole responsibility of catering for the household, we can

imagine the increase in burden if the environment is badly

affected.

As ecological conditions worsen especially because of desertification and deforestation, the burden of the poor woman increases and becomes tiresome. They are to walk further from their homes in search of water, firewood an other forest products for their basic needs. this extra distance adds to their physical burden…in the urban centers, women also do a lot to get water since only about 20 percent of homes have water connected to their houses. (p. 21)

THE PRESENT STATE OF AFFAIRSIn spite of the development they seek, developing countries

in general and Nigeria in particular have the largest

population of poor people. Not only are they poor but they

also live in terribly poor conditions. These poor conditions

generate problems for the environment. They are the

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presence of pathogenic organisms that exists in the human

excreta, crowded and cramped living conditions. This

problem arises out of lack of infrastructures and services.

…Pipe borne water supplies, sewage connections, garbage collections and basic measures to prevent diseases and provide health care. Such deficiencies promote diarrhea, dysenteries, typhoid…when combined with malnutrition, this can also weaken the body’s defense system and measles, pneumonia and other common childhood diseases become major killers. (Oyeshola, 1995:19)

From the fore going analysis, certain points have been

established:

Firstly, the environmental problems facing Nigeria can only

be solved by first looking at the African and indeed the

Nigerian as part and parcel of the environment that is being

polluted. A symbiotic relationship exists between every

organism in the environment and this shows that each

organism has a function to perform. This is the point Aldo

Leopold (1959) seems to be making in his highly influential

essay titled “The Land Ethics”

If we agree that a relationship exists between organisms, it

then implies that an affected organism would definitely have

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an effect on the other organisms. If one organism is

destroyed for example, other organisms that depend on it

one way or the other would suffer. This in turn would affect

the product from that organism. Thus if trees are eradicated,

and concrete buildings are put in place, then the atmosphere

is affected.

When we push this argument to its logical conclusion and

apply it to the personality of the African, we can then say

that a man with a polluted mind will necessarily pollute his

environment whether consciously or otherwise. This is so

because, his values have become distorted. And a distorted

value can only lead to a confused state of affairs where one

ideology or another is experimented with and discarded at

whim.

The history of Nigeria is replete with examples of several

ideologies and policies that reflect the confused mind of the

people. If it is not the “domestic socialism” as preached by

the Action Group of Obafemi Awolowo, it is the “Pragmatic

socialism” under Michael Opara’s N.C.N.C. if we do not hear

the sweet song of yakubu gowons “egalitarianism”, it is the

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fast beat tempo of “jaji declaration” by Olusegun Obasanjo.

Of course there is the ethical revolution in its reggae beat

vocalled by Shehu Shagari. Closely followed by the military

orchestra song titled WAI of the Buhari administration.

Perhaps, due to the very fast beat of the WAI song, the

Babangida administration decided to slow down the tempo

and talk about human rights. Then went away military

regime and then democracy comes on stage. And the

realities on ground seem to emphasize the confusion of the

African. What kind of democracy is being practiced? Is it

government of the people, by the people and for the people

or is it the madness of the many in favour of the few? Life

goes on and on in an endless confused circle. This confusion

is also reflected in the educational sectors and indeed every

sphere of the society!

It is necessary that we capture this bleak picture in order to

show that our values have indeed been distorted and that a

country or continent with a distorted value will definitely

experience chaos in all its sectors.

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We found ourselves in a complete mess, nasty situation whereby most of our activities if not all, seem to have been directed against our own interest towards the negation of our state hood. This is a society in which the activities of many, if not most, people lean towards self discrimination, self humiliation etc. owing to misplaced values and aspirations. (Ogundowole 1992:22)

These misplaced values prevalent in the society have indeed

driven a large number of our youths into a varied anti social

practices which border on various degrees of criminality. In

the bid to survive, oil pipes are busted and everyone within

that community gets his fill until there is a fire outbreak that

destroys the source of “livelihood”.

The distorted value of the African is responsible for the

wrong attitudes that are exhibited towards development

programmes and policies. This has led to the resistance to

change. There is also a general distrust of government and

government’s intentions

Marinho (1998) explains that this distrust is responsible for

the lack of political participation of citizens. This situation is

heightened by the level of poverty, unemployment that is

prevalent in the society.

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All these go to show that the African environment is crying

for help. It is not just the physical state of the environment,

and by this we mean, the plants, soil, water, air, etc that is

crying for solution.

Rather, inclusive in the plea for help is the African. His being

cries for attention!

We do believe that a change is desperately needed. And the

only way to change a people is to change their way of

thinking and their orientation. For these reasons, we do

applaud various governmental and non governmental

organizations’ effort at organizing international conferences

that are geared towards addressing the issue of the

environment.

However, we reiterate that in order to effect a change in a

people’s attitude, there is the need to change their way of

thinking. And what better way to do so than through

education. By education, we do not mean mere schooling.

We also include value education. Until the values of our

society are looked into and reconsidered, for the purpose of

channeling them, through the right routes (educationally)

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destruction awaits us at the end of the tunnel. All efforts to

salvage the environment will fail. During the Buhari’s WAI

(dictatorial) regime in Nigeria, proper behaviour was

displayed out of fear of being caught. Such behaviours did

not emanate from a conscious knowledge of the importance

of doing the right things to ensure a suitable environment to

live in. it is therefore not surprising that the moment that

military government was toppled over, things went back to

normal(?).

Perhaps the importance of education is better understood in

the following words of Akande (1988)

The medical doctor buries his mistake The engineer dies with his mistakes But the whole society perishes at the mistake of the teacher.

No matter how technological and industrialized we desire to

be, development in all spheres of the society cannot be

attained without a proper consideration for the environment.

And a consideration for the environment must necessarily

entail a re-orientation of the people’s way of thinking in

order to ensure that the right attitude is exhibited towards

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nation building. This should be the concern of everybody

within any nation.

We therefore conclude on this note:

The best way to put environmental ethics into practice is to work to instill environmental values in society as the foundation for coercive environmental policies, regulations…

This can only be attained through educational means. And all

the educational sectors play significant roles in carrying out

this assignment. The most effective, seems to be the

primary schools since pupils behavior at this stage can easily

be affected. Once this is achieved, trees would no longer be

cut down for making fire to cook with, but shall be seen not

only as shelter from the sun but as a living thing whose

existence is vital to the existence of other living organisms.

And with a reoriented people shall come a reoriented

government whose policies shall reflect this positive change

in orientation. And only then can we have a people whose

thinking is proevironmentalist like that which is depicted

below:

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Garnder and Stern (2002) refers to a movie recreation by

Ted Perry of the story of chief Seattle , a leader of the

suquamish tribe in the northwestern united states. He was

giving a response to president Franklin Pierce’s offer to buy

a large chunk of Indian-occupied land and to provide a

reservation for the occupants.

(if we sell you this land,)…the white man must treat the beasts of this land as his brothers. I have (heard about)…(a) prairie, left by the white man who shot them from a passing train…(How can) the smoking iron horse be more important than the buffalo that(redmen) kill (only enough of ) to stay alive?...what is man without beasts?... this we know-the earth does not belong to man, man belongs to the earth …All things are connected like the blood which unites one family. Whatever befalls the earth befalls the sons of the earth…Man does not weave the web of life, he is merely a strand in it. Whatever he does to the web, he does to himself. (2002:35)

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