Metodo

International Studies in Phenomenology and Philosophy

Series | Book | Chapter

226891

Precolonial imaginaries and colonial legacies in Mobutu's "authentic" Zaïre

Daviel Lazure Vieira

pp. 165-190

Abstract

Lazure Vieira examines the doctrine of authenticité, Mobutu's self-described "African philosophy" whose aim was to reconcile ideas of the past informed by precolonial times with the exigencies of modernity. According to Mobutu, authenticité represented a departure from the ferocity of the colonial experience and provided a comprehensive value system (cultural, political, legal, and economic) to harmonize the past with the present. Lazure Vieira challenges both claims, arguing that the degree of authenticity of authenticité's rhetoric is debatable, and that its archetypes often reproduced the colonial violence it insisted on refuting. The author concludes by suggesting some features of Congolese society, practices like kindoki, toro, iloki, or evu may reveal possible strategies of insubordination and resistance despite their attempted discontinuation under the "modern" terms of authenticité.

Publication details

Published in:

Kalu Kenneth, Falola Toyin (2019) Exploitation and misrule in colonial and postcolonial Africa. Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan.

Pages: 165-190

DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-96496-6_8

Full citation:

Lazure Vieira Daviel (2019) „Precolonial imaginaries and colonial legacies in Mobutu's "authentic" Zaïre“, In: K. Kalu & T. Falola (eds.), Exploitation and misrule in colonial and postcolonial Africa, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 165–190.