The Socialist-Populist Ideology II

Abstract

This chapter continues the survey—started in Chapter 5—of the political, economic, social, and cultural dimensions of the socialist-populist ideology from a distinctly socialist perspective. It shall focus on the statesmen (and regimes) who, in spite of their socialist rhetoric, have used the socialist-populist ideology as an instrument of control and coercion and sometimes—as in the case of Guinea’s Sékou Touré—even as an instrument of terror. These political systems are characterized by relatively authoritarian (sometimes totalitarian) regimes, a top-down system of administration, as well as state control over the economy. Gamal Abdel Nasser (Egypt), Kwame Nkrumah (Ghana), Ahmed Sékou Touré (Guinea), Modibo Kéïta (Mali), and Julius Nyerere (Tanzania) all fall in this category. It is important to note in this regard that there is a significant difference of degree between these leaders in terms of the authoritarian vs. democratic nature of their regimes. Thus the most autocratic and authoritarian (even totalitarian) tendencies were exhibited by Sékou Touré and Kwame Nkrumah (more pronounced in the former than in the latter), while Modibo Kéïta and Julius K. Nyerere were somewhat more liberal, open, and democratic in their exercise of power (Nyerere more so than Kéïta).

The basis of colonial territorial dependence is economic, but the basis of the solution of the problem is political. Hence political independence is an indispensable step towards securing economic emancipation.

—Kwame Nkrumah, Towards Colonial Freedom, xv