Deconstructing Ujamaa

The death of Julius Nyerere in 1999 has renewed interest in the history of the socialist experiment in Tanzania and its relevance for the future of the developmetalist project in Africa. Positions on the issue have been polarized, with some commentaries based on reasoned, empirical research and analysis and others, essentially speculative, assuming a pattern that has been described as "African bashing". This article explores Nyerere's philosophy of Ujamaa as an attempt to integrate traditional African values with the demands of the post-colonial setting. As a philosophy, the central objective of Ujamaa was the attainment of a self-reliant socialist nation. The fact that its achievements were rather qualified was no doubt partly due to its inadequate appreciation of the Tanzanian reality, and the fact that it was more Utopian than practical. But this is not to deny the legitimate intentions and aspirations that informed Ujamaa as a development strategy. Implementation was a major challenge. However, in assessing how well it fared as policy, Ujamaa has to be placed side by side with comparative schemes, or alternative developments models, including the IMF/World Bank sponsored structural adjustment programmes. Given the current developmental challenges in Africa, there is need to go beyond "Africa bashing" to constructively interrogate previous developmental experiments like Nyerere's Ujamaa and ask what lessons they hold for the quest for socio-economic development in the continent.