Redefining Law in African Jurisprudence from the Spectacle of Hegelian Dialectics

Reappraisal of Moral and Religious Value Factors

Abstract

Obviously, perception of law by conventional jurisprudence as endorsed by the global West is different from the value-laden model of law as endorsed by African jurisprudence. In African traditional religion, one cannot talk of law without morality and religion because, it is generally believed that Africans being so incurably religious, every sphere of African existence is influenced by morality and religion, so that what is forbidden by the moral and religious life of the community is, most of the times forbidden by their laws thus showing African jurisprudence as an altogether different class of philosophy, a value-model class. However, Hegel in his dialectics presented Africans as a people still in the state of nature, lacking in knowledge of any Being, outside themselves; devoid of moral and religious values; that African jurisprudence had little or no system of laws, without respect for individual rights; only positive without negative attributes for correcting breaches and lacking in literary philosophical significance to general jurisprudence. By doctrinal approach, this paper examined these basis of attacks on African jurisprudence and found that as a valued-centered philosophy, it presents a model of law that is peculiar to African values.The paper thus recommended that in an era where the world is facing all forms of socio-political challenges, African perception of law, endorsed by natural law values must be given a pride of place in International Community and allowed to survive the fallout of solely positivist philosophy characteristic of the 21^st century.