An African Epistemological Framework for Environmental Philosophy through Complementarity Epistemic Reflection (CER)

Akinpelu Oyekunle

doi:10.21697/seb.5896

Opublikowane: 2026-06-23

Afrykańskie ramy epistemologiczne dla filozofii środowiskowej w perspektywie komplementarnej refleksji epistemicznej (CER)

Akinpelu Oyekunle

Studia Ecologiae et Bioethicae

Dział: Artykuły naukowe

https://doi.org/10.21697/seb.5896

Abstrakt

Artykuł przedstawia argumentację na rzecz filozofii środowiskowej zakorzenionej w afrykańskiej epistemologii oraz holistycznej ontologii integrującej środowisko ludzkie i naturalne. Autor krytycznie odnosi się do tendencji w filozofii środowiskowej polegającej na opieraniu się przede wszystkim na ramach etycznych i proponuje, jako niezbędne uzupełnienie, podejście epistemiczne. Wykorzystując metodę jakościową i analizę konceptualną, artykuł bada myśl Jorubów i Igbo w celu rekonstrukcji form holizmu ontologicznego i relacyjnego obecnych w rdzennych społeczeństwach afrykańskich. Szczególną uwagę poświęcono koncepcji komplementarnej refleksji epistemicznej (Complementarity Epistemic Reflection, CER), rozwiniętej na podstawie filozofii Sophie Oluwole i Innocenta Asouzu i służącej zrozumieniu współzależności między człowiekiem, naturą i wiedzą. Analiza pokazuje, w jaki sposób rdzenne afrykańskie systemy wiedzy mogą stanowić epistemologiczną podstawę interpretacji relacji człowiek–natura bez odwoływania się do ścisłego dualizmu podmiot–przedmiot. W artykule argumentuje się, że afrykańska epistemologia oferuje istotne zasoby do ponownego przemyślenia filozofii środowiskowej w antropocenie poprzez wzmacnianie relacyjności człowieka i natury oraz wspieranie bardziej całościowego, relacyjnego i pragmatycznego podejścia do współczesnych kryzysów środowiskowych.

Słowa kluczowe:

Afrykańska epistemologia, filozofia środowiska, komplementarna refleksja epistemiczna, Joruba, antropocen, holizm, rdzenne afrykańskie systemy wiedzy, relacje człowiek–natura

Pobierz pliki

PDF (English)

Zasady cytowania

Oyekunle, A. (2026). Afrykańskie ramy epistemologiczne dla filozofii środowiskowej w perspektywie komplementarnej refleksji epistemicznej (CER). Studia Ecologiae Et Bioethicae, 21–35. https://doi.org/10.21697/seb.5896

Cited by / Share

Licencja

Utwór dostępny jest na licencji Creative Commons Uznanie autorstwa – Bez utworów zależnych 4.0 Międzynarodowe.

Bibliografia

Asouzu, Innocent Izuchukwu. 2004. The Method and Principles of Complementary Reflection in and beyond African Philosophy. University of Calabar Press.
Google Scholar

Asouzu, Innocent Izuchukwu. 2007. Ibuanyidanda: New Complementary Ontology: Beyond World-Immanentism, Ethnocentric Reduction and Impositions. LIT Verlag.
Google Scholar

Asouzu, Innocent Izuchukwu. 2011. “Ibuanyidanda” and the Philosophy of Essence: Philosophy, the Science of Missing Links of Reality. University of Calabar Press.
Google Scholar

Badru, Ronald Olufemi. 2018. “Environmental Deficit and Contemporary Nigeria: Evolving an African Political Philosophy for a Sustainable Eco-Democracy.” Environmental Philosophy 15 (2): 195–211. https://doi.org/10.5840/envirophil201892879.
Google Scholar

Behrens, Kevin Gary. 2010. “Exploring African Holism with Respect to the Environment.” Environmental Values 19 (4): 465–484. https://doi.org/10.3197/096327110X531561.
Google Scholar

Behrens, Kevin Gary. 2012. “African Philosophy, Thought and Practice, and Their Contribution to Environmental Ethics.” DLitt et Phil diss., University of Johannesburg. https://hdl.handle.net/10210/5330.
Google Scholar

Behrens, Kevin Gary. 2014. “An African Relational Environmentalism and Moral Considerability.” Environmental Ethics 36 (1): 63–82. https://doi.org/10.5840/enviroethics20143615.
Google Scholar

Bryant, Bunyan, ed. 2011. Environmental Crisis or Crisis of Epistemology? Working for Sustainable Knowledge and Environmental Justice. Morgan James Publishing.
Google Scholar

Callicott, J. Baird. 1984. “Non-Anthropocentric Value Theory and Environmental Ethics.” American Philosophical Quarterly 21 (4): 299–309. https://www.jstor.org/stable/20014060.
Google Scholar

Chemhuru, Munamato. 2016a. “The Import of African Ontology for Environmental Ethics.” PhD diss., University of Johannesburg. https://ujcontent.uj.ac.za/esploro/outputs/doctoral/The-import-of-African-ontology-for/999990407691.
Google Scholar

Chemhuru, Munamato. 2016b. “Using the African Teleological View of Existence to Interpret Environmental Ethics.” Philosophia Africana 18 (1): 41–51. https://doi.org/10.5840/philafricana20161814.
Google Scholar

Chemhuru, Munamato. 2017. “Gleaning the Social Contract Theory from African Communitarian Philosophy.” South African Journal of Philosophy 36 (4): 505–515. https://doi.org/10.1080/02580136.2017.1359470.
Google Scholar

Chemhuru, Munamato. 2019a. “An African Communitarian View of Epistemic Responsibility.” Politikon 46 (1): 71–81. https://doi.org/10.1080/02589346.2019.1571290.
Google Scholar

Chemhuru, Munamato, ed. 2019b. African Environmental Ethics: A Critical Reader. Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-18807-8.
Google Scholar

Cheney, Jim, and Anthony Weston. 1999. “Environmental Ethics as Environmental Etiquette: Toward an Ethics-Based Epistemology.” Environmental Ethics 21 (2): 115–134. https://doi.org/10.5840/enviroethics199921226.
Google Scholar

Chimakonam, Jonathan O. 2018. “Should African Philosophers Care about the Sub-Saharan Environment?” In African Philosophy and Environmental Conservation, edited by Jonathan O. Chimakonam. Routledge.
Google Scholar

Chimakonam, Jonathan O. 2019. Ezumezu: A System of Logic for African Philosophy and Studies. Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-11075-8.
Google Scholar

Colyvan, Mark. 2006. “Environmental Philosophy: Beyond Environmental Ethics.” Arts: The Journal of the Sydney University Arts Association 29: 95–104. https://www.colyvan.com/papers/envphil.pdf.
Google Scholar

Copi, Irving M., Carl Cohen, and Kenneth McMahon. 2014. Introduction to Logic. 14th ed. Pearson Education.
Google Scholar

Ekwealo, Chigbo Joseph. 2011. “Environmental Ethics and Values in the 21st Century: An Africanist Philosophical Analysis.” Journal of African Environmental Ethics and Values 1: 1–14.
Google Scholar

Fox, Warwick. 1989. “The Deep Ecology–Ecofeminism Debate and Its Parallels.” Environmental Ethics 11 (1): 5–25. https://doi.org/10.5840/enviroethics198911120.
Google Scholar

Fox, Warwick. 1990. Toward a Transpersonal Ecology: Developing New Foundations for Environmentalism. Shambhala.
Google Scholar

Fox, Warwick. 2006. A Theory of General Ethics: Human Relationships, Nature, and the Built Environment. MIT Press.
Google Scholar

Gordon, David M., and Shepard Krech III, eds. 2012. Indigenous Knowledge and the Environment in Africa and North America. Ohio University Press. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctt1j7x56v.
Google Scholar

Ifeakor, Chinedu Stephen. 2019. “An Investigation of Obligatory Anthropoholism as Plausible African Environmental Ethics.” International Journal of Environmental Pollution & Environmental Modelling 2 (3): 169–176. https://dergipark.org.tr/en/pub/ijepem/issue/54368/789166.
Google Scholar

Jackson, Tim, and Peter A. Victor. 2013. Green Economy at Community Scale. Metcalf Foundation. https://metcalffoundation.com/publication/green-economy-at-community-scale/.
Google Scholar

Jimoh, Anselm Kole. 2018. “Reconstructing a Fractured Indigenous Knowledge System.” Synthesis Philosophica 33 (1): 5–22. https://doi.org/10.21464/sp33101.
Google Scholar

Jimoh, Anselm Kole, and John Thomas. 2015. “An African Epistemological Approach to Epistemic Certitude and Scepticism.” In Exploration in African Philosophy: Essays in Honour of Anthony O. Echekwube, edited by Monday L. Igbafen and Blessing O. Agidigbi. BWright Integrated Publishers.
Google Scholar

Kaphagawani, Didier N., and Jeanette G. Malherbe. 2003. “Epistemology and the Tradition in Africa.” In The African Philosophy Reader, 2nd ed., edited by P. H. Coetzee and A. P. J. Roux. Routledge.
Google Scholar

Kawall, Jason. 2010. “The Epistemic Demands of Environmental Virtue.” Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics 23 (1–2): 109–128. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10806-009-9183-4.
Google Scholar

Kelbessa, Workineh. 2005. “The Rehabilitation of Indigenous Environmental Ethics in Africa.” Diogenes 52 (3): 17–34. https://doi.org/10.1177/0392192105055167.
Google Scholar

Kelbessa, Workineh. 2014. “Can African Environmental Ethics Contribute to Environmental Policy in Africa?” Environmental Ethics 36 (1): 31–61. https://doi.org/10.5840/enviroethics20143614.
Google Scholar

Kelbessa, Workineh. 2018. “Environmental Philosophy in African Traditions of Thought.” Environmental Ethics 40 (4): 309–323. https://doi.org/10.5840/enviroethics201840431.
Google Scholar

Mathews, Freya. 2005. Reinhabiting Reality: Towards a Recovery of Culture. State University of New York Press.
Google Scholar

Mathews, Freya. 2014. “Environmental Philosophy.” In A Companion to Philosophy in Australia and New Zealand, 2nd ed., edited by Graham Oppy and N. N. Trakakis. Monash University Publishing.
Google Scholar

Mawere, Munyaradzi. 2014. Environmental Conservation through Ubuntu and Other Emerging Perspectives. Langaa Research & Publishing CIG.
Google Scholar

Metz, Thaddeus. 2007. “Ubuntu as a Moral Theory: Reply to Four Critics.” South African Journal of Philosophy 26 (4): 369–387. https://doi.org/10.4314/sajpem.v26i4.31495.
Google Scholar

Metz, Thaddeus. 2010. “African and Western Moral Theories in a Bioethical Context.” Developing World Bioethics 10 (1): 49–58. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1471-8847.2009.00273.x.
Google Scholar

Metz, Thaddeus. 2012. “An African Theory of Moral Status: A Relational Alternative to Individualism and Holism.” Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 15 (3): 387–402. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10677-011-9302-y.
Google Scholar

Metz, Thaddeus. 2013. “The Western Ethic of Care or an Afro-Communitarian Ethic? Specifying the Right Relational Morality.” Journal of Global Ethics 9 (1): 77–92. https://doi.org/10.1080/17449626.2012.756421.
Google Scholar

Metz, Thaddeus. 2015. “How the West Was One: The Western as Individualist, the African as Communitarian.” Educational Philosophy and Theory 47 (11): 1175–1184. https://doi.org/10.1080/00131857.2014.991502.
Google Scholar

Metz, Thaddeus. 2017a. “Ancillary Care Obligations in Light of an African Bioethic: From Entrustment to Communion.” Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics 38 (2): 111–126. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11017-017-9404-1.
Google Scholar

Metz, Thaddeus. 2017b. “How to Ground Animal Rights on African Values: Reply to Horsthemke.” Journal of Animal Ethics 7 (2): 163–174. https://doi.org/10.5406/janimalethics.7.2.0163.
Google Scholar

Mumford, Lewis. 2009. “Technics and Civilization.” In Encyclopedia of Environmental Ethics and Philosophy, edited by J. Baird Callicott and Robert Frodeman, vol. 2. Macmillan Reference USA.
Google Scholar

Murove, Munyaradzi Felix. 2004. “An African Commitment to Ecological Conservation: The Shona Concepts of Ukama and Ubuntu.” Mankind Quarterly 45 (2): 195–215. https://doi.org/10.46469/mq.2004.45.2.3.
Google Scholar

Naess, Arne. 1973. “The Shallow and the Deep, Long-Range Ecology Movement: A Summary.” Inquiry 16 (1–4): 95–100. https://doi.org/10.1080/00201747308601682.
Google Scholar

Nkulu-N’Sengha, Mutombo. 2005. “African Epistemology.” In Encyclopedia of Black Studies, edited by Molefi Kete Asante and Ama Mazama. SAGE.
Google Scholar

Ogungbemi, Segun. 2001. “An African Perspective on the Environmental Crisis.” In Environmental Ethics: Readings in Theory and Application, 3rd ed., edited by Louis P. Pojman. Wadsworth.
Google Scholar

Ojomo, Philomena A. 2010. “An African Understanding of Environmental Ethics.” Thought and Practice: A Journal of the Philosophical Association of Kenya 2 (2): 49–63. https://doi.org/10.5840/tap2010223.
Google Scholar

Ojomo, Philomena A. 2011. “Environmental Ethics: An African Understanding.” Journal of Pan African Studies 4 (3): 101–113.
Google Scholar

Oluwole, Sophie B. 2015. Socrates and Orunmila: Two Patron Saints of Classical Philosophy. Ark Publishers.
Google Scholar

Oruka, H. Odera, and Calestous Juma. 1994. “Ecophilosophy and the Parental Earth Ethics: On the Complex Web of Being.” In Philosophy, Humanity and Ecology: Philosophy of Nature and Environmental Ethics, edited by H. Odera Oruka. ACTS Press and African Academy of Sciences.
Google Scholar

Oyekunle, Akinpelu Ayokunnu. 2011. “Environmental Epistemology and the Critique of Anthropocentric Environmentalism.” MA thesis, University of Ibadan.
Google Scholar

Oyekunle, Akinpelu Ayokunnu. 2021. “An Exploration of an Indigenous African Epistemic Order: In Search of a Contemporary African Environmental Philosophy.” PhD diss., University of South Africa. https://hdl.handle.net/10500/27624.
Google Scholar

Oyekunle, Akinpelu Ayokunnu. 2023. “Good Environmental Governance in Africa: Epistemic Reflection and Complementarity Principle.” In African Democracy: Impediments, Promises, and Prospects, edited by Jonathan O. Chimakonam and Isaiah A. Negedu. Bloomsbury Academic.
Google Scholar

Preston, Christopher J. 2003. Grounding Knowledge: Environmental Philosophy, Epistemology, and Place. University of Georgia Press.
Google Scholar

Ramose, Mogobe B. 2002. African Philosophy through Ubuntu. 2nd ed. Mond Books.
Google Scholar

Samuel, Olusegun Steven, and Ademola Kazeem Fayemi. 2019. “Afro-Communal Virtue Ethic as a Foundation for Environmental Sustainability in Africa and Beyond.” South African Journal of Philosophy 38 (1): 79–95. https://doi.org/10.1080/02580136.2019.1581393.
Google Scholar

Samuel, Olusegun Steven, and Ademola Kazeem Fayemi. 2020. “A Critique of Thaddeus Metz’s Modal Relational Account of Moral Status.” Theoria 67 (162): 28–44. https://doi.org/10.3167/th.2020.6716202.
Google Scholar

Santos, Boaventura de Sousa. 2014. Epistemologies of the South: Justice against Epistemicide. Paradigm Publishers.
Google Scholar

Scarfe, Adam C. 2006. “On Determinations of Causal Connection with Respect to Environmental Problems: Hume, Whitehead, and Hegel.” Process Studies Supplement 9: 1–55. https://ctr4process.org/resources/publications/process-studies-supplement/.
Google Scholar

Tangwa, Godfrey B. 2004. “Some African Reflections on Biomedical and Environmental Ethics.” In A Companion to African Philosophy, edited by Kwasi Wiredu. Blackwell.
Google Scholar

Tempels, Placide. 1969. Bantu Philosophy. Translated by Colin King. Présence Africaine.
Google Scholar

Wiredu, Kwasi. 1994. “Philosophy, Humankind and the Environment.” In Philosophy, Humanity and Ecology: Philosophy of Nature and Environmental Ethics, edited by H. Odera Oruka. ACTS Press and African Academy of Sciences.
Google Scholar

Zimmerman, Michael E., J. Baird Callicott, George Sessions, Karen J. Warren, and John Clark, eds. 1998. Environmental Philosophy: From Animal Rights to Radical Ecology. 2nd ed. Prentice Hall.
Google Scholar