Ubuntu: I Am, Because We Are

Image from https://otrazhenie.wordpress.com/tag/togetherness/

This morning, I read this Guardian article about the need to leave self-care in the 2010s in favour of communal care. Brigid Delaney, an Australian columnist, says: 

Wouldn’t it be great if this decade we took the self out of self-care and strived instead for communal care?

Self-care is saying “I need to look after me”, while collective self-care is saying “we need to look after each other” (in the words of Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius: “What is not good for the swarm is not good for the bee.”)

Collective care exists outside the market and can’t be captured by capitalism, turned into a product that we buy back and, by definition of its price, excludes many from participating in it.

The fact that it’s collective, means it’s for everyone.

This made me think of the concept of Ubuntu. The story goes: 

'An anthropologist suggested the following game to a group of children in a tribe in Africa: He placed a basket full of fresh fruits under a tree. He then said that whoever reached the basket first in a race would be the winner of all the fruits.

As he gave the signal to begin the race, the whole group held hands, ran bonded together and then sat and enjoyed the prize together.

When he asked why they had done such thing, when he had offered the possibility to one to be the ultimate winner.

They replied: ” UBUNTU”– how could one of us be happy (feel happiness) while the rest are in despair, unhappy?

UBUNTU in the Xhosa culture means: “I am, because we are.”

Looking around just now, I found this excellent TED blog about Ubuntu.

It includes among other things takes on the concept from Tutu and Mandela, information about the free operating system, and a fascinating article by South African activist Alex Lenferna on 'how thinking about our collective humanity could help form a united front of environmentalism'.

'Many have interpreted uBuntu as a narrow ethic confined to the limits of one’s own tribe, regional community or nation, but for Madiba (Mandela) the scope of Ubuntu expanded to all of humanity, to the community made up of each and every one of us. One could call this Madiba’s Cosmopolitan Ubuntu, and for Madiba it was tied to the recognition that every human being is inherently valuable and has a right to dignity and a decent life.1 Contrary to a strong individualism which permeates the Western world, the ethic of Ubuntu, when combined with Mandela’s cosmopolitan valuing of all humanity, would allow us to see that the enrichment or development of one individual, one community or one nation is not truly enrichment if it is achieved at the expense of other individuals, other communities, other nations or future generations...

'Underlying Ubuntu for Mandela was the belief that each person had a common ‘core of decency’, within which lay the potential to achieve the principles of Ubuntu. However, convincing Shell and BP to live according to the principles of Ubuntu, might be harder than teaching a lion to become vegetarian...

'... like poverty for Mandela, climate change and its detrimental effects are a manmade problem and not a question of charity, rather a matter of justice, especially for the global poor and future generations for whom addressing climate change is about the protection of fundamental human rights, such as the right to dignity and a decent life, and often even the right to life itself. Given the interconnections between climate change and poverty, Mandela’s call to end poverty, his call to justice, rings out just as loudly now as it did then. The challenge of climate change makes his call even sharper, even more urgent, and even more fundamentally a matter of justice. If we are to truly tackle climate change, we must hold ourselves, our nations, institutions, and companies, like Shell and BP, accountable to the demands of justice...

'... overcoming Apartheid often seemed impossible, especially when seen through the perspective of limited social imaginaries that focused on limiting perspectives such as ‘real politik’ and selfishindividualism. However, through visions of greatness inspired by leaders such as Mandela, the seemingly impossible was brought into the realm of the possible. Likewise, in order to rise up to the immensity of the challenge of climate change we need to overcome the narrow and limited social imaginaries that dominate much of our discourse. We need to overcome ideas and policies that limit what is possible and shackle us to a future defined by climate chaos and the damages and destruction associated with it. We need to continue to break down the hegemonic discourse that tells us that we can’t create a better world and replace it with a vision of positive possibilities defined by fairness, equality, and a decent life for all both now and in the future. Of course, this is no easy task and will require great effort on our behalf, but as Mandela pointed out in his call to end poverty: “Sometimes it falls upon a generation to be great. You can be that great generation”. “Let your greatness blossom. Of course the task will not be easy. But not to do this would be a crime against humanity, against which I ask all humanity now to rise up”.'