Last week I attempted to explain two contending perspectives on human nature.
The first one sees human beings as inherently good. The second looks at individuals in its entirety as predisposed to evil especially and particularly when left to their own devices.
There is one very important and specific aspect of universal human behavior that cuts across these two stylized views, favoritism, to which I return in a moment.
The point I sought to underline last week is that for good or bad, human beings have to be subjected to standard rules and norms. We more generally refer to rules and norms as institutions. They both constrain and shape our actions or inactions.
Rules and norms of managing public affairs and governing society must necessarily be impartial and impersonal. Impartial by not being discriminatory and impersonal by not being dependent on any one individual to be enforced or respected.
The political scientist Francis Fukuyama has pointed out that human sociability is characterized by two related phenomena: kin selection and reciprocal altruism. The former is genetic; the latter is socially produced. Kin selection means that animals tend to be close to and trust fellow animals with whom they share genes.
This has been scientifically observed in primates and obtains among human beings who, at their core, are social animals.
Human beings tend to favor other beings in a manner that is proportional to the number of genes that they share. More shared genes mean closer affection. This nepotistic tendency is a universal behavior observed in all societies across time and space.
Reciprocal altruism, on the other hand, occurs from repeated interaction and exchange of favors between individuals who are not related. Repeated exchange of favors builds up friendship and in due course individuals engage in crony relations of mutual exchange and benefit.
Both kin selection and reciprocal altruism are not learnt behavior. Rather, they occur somewhat spontaneously in the course of human interaction. The average human being behaves favorably towards family members who are genetic relatives and friends who are known to him or her through repeated exchange of favors.
Until the early modern period, with the exception of China and to some extent Prussia, monarchies and ruling groups around the world used to run public affairs through kin selection and reciprocal altruism.
Both the Quin state, the precursor to modern China and Prussia, the precursor to modern Germany, were forged out of hostile conditions of warfare that necessitated building meritocratic systems to prosecute war.
In the face of incessant external military threats, rulers did not have the luxury of managing public affairs on the basis of kin ties and crony relations. This is how China evolved the foremost and enduring merit-based civil service and a strong state bureaucracy.
It is, therefore, perfectly in order and fully normal that individuals relate favorably to their blood relatives and co-ethnics or that someone discriminates in favor of close friends and confidants. This is a natural inclination.
The real issue is how society designs methods of a level-playing field and a fair system that is impersonal and impartial. Because individuals are for the most part rational enough to respond to signals, a system that grants everyone equal chance will be embraced and respected when all actors expect that they will not be shortchanged by those in charge of either writing the rules or enforcing them.
Short of a merit system or in the event of a rigged one, individuals will revert to social institutions and practices that assure them access to certain opportunities and resources. This is why tribalism, nepotism, and cronyism is so prevalent and pervasive in a society like Uganda.
Easily the biggest failure of the NRM regime and its chief ruler, Mr Yoweri Museveni, has been the failure to overcome the allure of nepotism and cronyism, and to work ruggedly for writing and enforcing rules that guard against the natural inclinations of human beings.
The behavior of appointing the wife as a cabinet minister, the young brother as commander of the military, and the son as the commander of forces directly guarding the ruler is reminiscent of the predominant practices in the medieval times of monarchical rule. It is representative of personal rule and absolutism.
In a poor and socially underdeveloped society, the actions of rulers at the top very much shape behavior and conduct at lower levels.
Appointing relatives and friends, both overtly but especially in disguised covert methods, instead of rewarding merit and excellence, become the default modus operandi in governmental bodies and public agencies at all levels. The upshot is dysfunctional system.
Historically, state-builders leveraged coercive power to institute institutional forms that constitute the foundation for socioeconomic transformation.
A key aspect of this foundation is to discard the natural human inclination towards a system of favoritism and build a merit-based society. It’s possible this can happen out of goodwill and idealism, but the more plausible route is one of being compelled by dire circumstances.
In the case of the NRA and Mr Museveni, it appears that they neither had the idealism nor faced the compelling conditions that would necessitate a rigorous adherence to meritocracy.
The author is an assistant professor of political science at North Carolina State University.
