Penser la crise de la légitimité du pouvoir politique en Afrique. une lecture contextualisée du Léviathan de Thomas Hobbes

Abstract

Title: thinking about the crisis of the legitimacy of political power in Africa. A contextualized reading of Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes, this dissertation is an essay on the foundation of the legitimacy of political power, with regard to the ethical and political excesses experienced by our States in Africa. These drifts create and develop a policy of dependence vis-à-vis the West considered as the “model” of good governance or the fabricator of universal political systems. By drawing inspiration from Westerners to conduct their political affairs, Africans run the risk of forgetting their cultural specificities, and this error can lead to the failures that this continent is experiencing, for example the multiple conflicts that persist on its soil. This situation weakens and gives rise to various popular and military uprisings, thus threatening African political life in general to the point of creating a gap between the rulers and the ruled. Clearly, in the accomplishment of its sovereign mission, the state sabotages normative values and creates a distance between consenting parties, the main founders of political power. This attitude leads to a crisis of social ties that we call a crisis of legitimacy. Indeed, the consent that legitimizes this power is violated; individuals are wronged and abandoned to their sad fate. Justice, security and equality, pillars of power, are in permanent disagreement within the said Republic which is supposed to guarantee them. However, Hobbes warns us of the danger that the State incurs, if the security, justice and equality of the people are not guaranteed. This leads anyone to suddenly take back their natural right, that is to say the power to protect themselves and preserve their life as much as they can. Since it is human nature to seek the means of its conservation and protection. With Hobbes, the consent of individuals entitles them to security and protection. Our study seeks to show that, if legitimacy embodies the normative, legal and conventional dimension, it should not be transmitted as a model to be imported or exported, but it must be a construction of the people in connection with their political universe and social. Despite the absoluteness of this political power that the latter advocates, its purpose is based on republican and humanist values; these values lead to authenticity and build legitimacy. The power of the state is an asset for the sovereignty of Africa, which is plagued by multiple ills. The philosophy of peace, security, justice and legality for all can only be possible through the conservation of African cultural values that attachment to Western democracies tends to erase. The citizen must no longer return to the state of nature where “man is a wolf for man”. Our States must guarantee a healthy relationship between citizens, so that everyone is a “god for man”, an expression dear to Hobbes. This is the interest of this research work.