Existential Interrogation of Max Webber’s Cultural Determinism and Its Implication on Africa’s Development

Автори:
Страници: 50-57
DOI: https://doi.org/10.54664/OPQW4083

Резюме:

Culture is a critical factor in the development of a people; it is without doubt the foundation upon which a formidable socio-economic structure necessary for development can be built. However, since the time of Weber, culture has taken a deterministic nomenclature, asserting that a given set of cultural factors will give rise to a given pattern of socio-economic life. Thus, in Weber’s and other cultural determinists’ view, certain traditional cultures in most Third World countries are negative and, as such, contribute to economic backwardness and poverty. His work rejects this view and argues for cultural possibilism in the existential tradition. We state that culture, though an intentional tool of development, is not static but rather dynamic through man’s existential powers, who has the ability to recreate or reconstitute the world as he deems fit. Using the existential analysis native to the phenomenological method, we anchor our search for an alternative theory to redress the problem of challenges of development in many African states on the theme of freedom espoused by existentialists. The kernel of this paper is that humans everywhere have the capacity to transform the society and not succumb to any form of cultural “givens”.

Ключови думи:

existentialism, culture, determinism, possibilism, development.

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