Q0604

“It was a democracy because government was by the consent, and subject…” — Kwasi Wiredu ("Democracy and Consensus in African Traditional…)

Verified English quotation. Primary source: "Democracy and Consensus in African Traditional Politics" (in Cultural Universals and Particulars, 1996). Theme: politics.

English

It was a democracy because government was by the consent, and subject to the control, of the people as expressed through their representatives. It was consensual because, at least as a rule, that consent was negotiated on the principle of consensus.
Thinker Kwasi Wiredu
School Africana Philosophy
Source "Democracy and Consensus in African Traditional Politics" (in Cultural Universals and Particulars, 1996)
Theme Politics
Another quotation More from this thinker

Source and attribution

The archive attributes this English wording to "Democracy and Consensus in African Traditional Politics" (in Cultural Universals and Particulars, 1996) and files it under Africana Philosophy. That locator distinguishes the passage from loose internet attributions: readers can return to the named work or section to check translation, surrounding argument, and edition-specific wording.

About Kwasi Wiredu

Kwasi Wiredu (1931–2022) was a Ghanaian philosopher trained in Accra and at Oxford under P. F.

How to read this passage

Across 4 recurring voices here (notably Plato and Kwasi Wiredu), politics is framed through Africana Philosophy and Platonism. Some passages define politics; others warn how it fails; still others relocate it inside habit, community, or language. This passage enters that discussion through politics, community, freedom.

Concepts in this quote

Politics
Politics appears in this archive as a live philosophical concern—not a slogan. These verified English passages show how thinkers treat politics as a problem of judgment, practice, or explanation.
Community
Community appears in this archive as a live philosophical concern—not a slogan. These verified English passages show how thinkers treat community as a problem of judgment, practice, or explanation.
Freedom
Freedom is among the most searched and most contested themes in philosophy: what it is to choose, to be responsible, and to live without illegitimate constraint.

How to cite this quotation

APA: Kwasi Wiredu. (n.d.). It was a democracy because government was by the consent, and subject to the control, of the people as expressed through their representatives. It was consensual because, at least as a rule, that consent was negotiated on the principle of consensus. In Philosophy Blind Box. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0604

MLA: Kwasi Wiredu. “It was a democracy because government was by….” Philosophy Blind Box, https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0604.

Chicago: Kwasi Wiredu. “It was a democracy because government was by….” Philosophy Blind Box. Accessed 2026. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0604.

Frequently asked questions

What is the source of the quotation “It was a democracy because government was by…”?

The passage is attributed to Kwasi Wiredu, "Democracy and Consensus in African Traditional Politics" (in Cultural Universals and Particulars, 1996). The archive attributes this English wording to "Democracy and Consensus in African Traditional Politics" (in Cultural Universals and Particulars, 1996) and files it under Africana Philosophy. That locator distinguishes the passage from loose internet attributions: readers can return to the named work or section to check translation, surrounding argument, and edition-specific wording.

What does Kwasi Wiredu mean by politics?

Across 4 recurring voices here (notably Plato and Kwasi Wiredu), politics is framed through Africana Philosophy and Platonism. Some passages define politics; others warn how it fails; still others relocate it inside habit, community, or language. This passage enters that discussion through politics, community, freedom.

Same thinker

More from Kwasi Wiredu

  1. By decolonization, I mean divesting African philosophical thinking of all undue influences emanating from our colonial past. The crucial word in this formulation is "undue".
  2. A language, most assuredly, is not conceptually neutral; syntax and vocabulary are apt to suggest definite modes of conceptualization.
  3. On the negative side, avoiding or reversing through a critical conceptual self-awareness the unexamined assimilation in our thought of the conceptual frameworks embedded in the foreign philosophical traditions that have had an impact on African life and thought. And, on the positive side, exploiting as much as is judicious the resources of our own indigenous conceptual schemes in our philosophical meditations.
  4. By contrast, the majoritarian system might be said to be, in principle, based on consent without consensus.
  5. A theory of truth is not of any real universal significance unless it offers some account of the notion of being so.

All quotations by Kwasi Wiredu

Same theme

More on politics

  1. Extreme freedom seems to change into nothing but extreme slavery.
  2. Man is by nature a political animal.
  3. The true end of the state is in reality freedom.
  4. Unless…either philosophers rule in the cities or those now called kings…philosophize genuinely and adequately…
  5. The heaviest penalty is to be ruled by someone worse than oneself.

Browse the politics theme