Globalization and the Marginalization of Indigenous Knowledge Systems of Education and Governance

Globalization which seems to be the imposition of western cultural ideologies on the rest of the world, often generates cultural mutations which militate against the latter’s educational and socio-political philosophies. Liberalism and capitalism, carry in themselves built-in systems of thought that are, for instance, destructive to the very essence of African cultural life. Educational and governance principles which determine the global space drum the merits of euro-centric values, while provincializing the rest, Africa inclusive. This paper is a call for collective responsibility towards the epistemic decolonization of educational and governance philosophies in Africa. It focuses on two axes: Firstly, on globalization and its hidden agendas. Here, I argue that the philosophy which engenders the ideology of globalization, especially the goal on Education trivializes non-western approaches to knowledge construction, and at the same time undermining the essence of indigenous languages of instructions. Secondly, I argue that the identity crisis suffered by the subset; African knowledge systems, within the whole; Western politics of millennium development goals need redress. This is because by its very nature, globalizing western approaches to knowledge and education endangers indigenous knowledge systems with all its virtues. Redressing begins with delinking and relinking of knowledge and proceeds to the restoration of Afro-centric approaches to education and governance founded on African indigenous traditional values such as Ubuntu and Ujama’a. African socio-political philosophy will gain its proper place in the global space when the socio-political actors build their ideologies and political philosophies on knowledge of indigenous cultural constructs of governance which have animated the African space and gained reputation over the ages.