Community – Being Human 77Metaphorically, community is on the riverbank of culture, while in-
dividualism hovers like hawks in the sky, ready to swoop and catch
whatever chicks are left unattended. Thus “community” in Western cul-
ture means individuals each pursuing individual interests, while in Afri-
can culture it means closely knit social entities, made up of individuals
each of whom matters to the rest. The Savings and Credit Cooperative
Societies in Kenya are based on this community model, and have be-
come the backbone for the low-income sector of the population- for
whom conventional bank loans would be unaffordable and unservicea-
ble.
5.4 Ethics without Morals
The European Enlightenment (circa 1650 – 1800 CE) is replete
with treatises about ethics and moral ideals. The most celebrated Euro-
pean authors of the Enlightenment were those who articulated the
norms, principles and values they considered worthy of praise in cele-
bration of European culture- such as Emmanuel Rene Descartes (1596-
1650), Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679), John Locke (1632-1704), Montes-
quieu (1689-1755), Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778), David Hume
(1711-1776), Kant Emmanuel Kant (1724-1804), Friedrich Hegel (1770-
1831), Ludwig Feuerbach (1804-1872). Yet it is during the Enlighten-
ment that Europe conquered and occupied foreign lands in Africa, Asia,
Americas, Australia, New Zealand and the Caribbean. It is during the
Enlightenment that the Atlantic Slave Trade was at its peak. It is during
the Enlightenment that Christian missionaries accompanied their coun-
terparts to preach to the “natives” and the “slaves.” The celebrated
thinkers of the Enlightenment were normatively prejudiced against other
peoples, considering Europe as the norm against which to evaluate the
moral worth of other societies. The celebration and evidence of Europe-
an “Progress” was manifested in the conquest and the denigration of
peoples other than European. The American Declaration of Independ-