Law and the Public Sphere in Africa: La Palabre and Other Writings by Jean Godefroy Bidima (review)

In Law and the Public Sphere in Africa: La Palabre and Other Writings, Jean Godefroy Bidima presents the reader with a question: “[I]f conflict cannot be eliminated, how can we live together with it?” (p.30). Rather than answering with a specific model of political or legal administration, Bidima offers the philosophy behind palabre. Inspired by customary dispute resolution practices, the author defines palabre as “conflict reduction through language” (p.16), “a practice of the in-between” where participants draw from the authority provided through traditional symbolic power, but also “invent and reinvent” practices to meet current needs (p. xxvii). The book combines Bidima’s text La Palabre (originally published in 1997) with several other essays dealing with the topics of law, religion, media, books, and the internet, which together help further define the space known as “the public sphere.”

In the preface, Bidima references perhaps one of the most well-known examples of African palabre, the Gacaca courts in postconflict Rwanda. He then notes that palabre is a paradoxical form of justice “that seems, unlike forms of justice tied to the state, to pursue peace rather than truth” (p. xix). Statements such as this may suggest that Bidima’s is yet another scholarly work entering into the classical transitional justice debate concerning the merits of prioritizing truth, justice, or peace. As the chapters of La Palabre unfold, however, the author expands the discussion far beyond these bounds in a much more novel direction.

In chapter 1, Bidima lays out the dimensions of traditional palabre, including the importance of space, the ways of speaking, and the ways in which concepts such as evidence and punishment are understood. And yet, as soon becomes clear, Bidima is not simply describing an event or form of postconflict justice in his discussions of palabre, but rather a general philosophy for interacting within the public sphere. It is in chapter 2, titled “A Political Paradigm,” where the scope of this model becomes truly visible. The philosophy of palabre is used as a way to understand the importance of disagreement and dialogue within the public sphere for the future of democracy. As a philosophy, palabre values the peaceful practice of “dissensus” rather than idealizing the image of consensus (p. 30). Because the dialogue occurs in public, palabre also contributes to the importance of transparency.

The author also uses the concept of palabre to dispel the notion that the value traditionally placed on communalism in Africa should be equated with consensus. Drawing on his expertise in Africa philosophy, Bidima argues that the exact opposite is true. He argues that palabre is evidence of the fact that African customary dispute resolution has always made space for disagreement and pluralism. The author is also very clear in his criticism of leaders who have attempted to profit by propagating this myth. Chapter 3, “Convergent Suspicions,” explores several of these “repressive forms of consensus,” including the social domination exerted through customary hierarchies, colonialism, single-party states, and pseudo-democracies. In each case, authorities attempt to maintain power by forcing an appearance of solidarity, often justifying the false consensus by invoking notions of “tradition.” Importantly, the author does not employ the concept of the “traditional” unproblematically. Instead, he explores how the invocation of mythic conceptions of tradition can confer legitimacy, but also how it may exert symbolic power to conceal internal disagreement and diversity.

In Chapter 4, “A Difficult Place in Political Thought,” Bidima analyzes the concept of palabre in relation to other African political and philosophical theories, including Pan-Africanism, African Socialism, Négritude, and Evangelization. The example of Nyerere’s Ujamaa is particularly illustrative of Bidima’s nuanced argument. Palabre, as a form of conversation, simply grafted onto current systems of power and domination, will not automatically enable individuals to live together in peace. Bidima illustrates this by discussing how Nyerere...