Kenya needs Chinese-style social credit system to stem graft

We live in the shadow of corruption. The spectre of siphoning of public resources to fraudulently and corruptly benefit individuals marked President Uhuru Kenyatta’s State of the Nation address on Wednesday. Corruption remains a blotch in our conscience and a real risk to the “Big Four” Agenda – universal healthcare, food security, manufacturing and affordable housing – Kenya Vision 2030 and Kenyatta’s post-2022 legacy.

In a deep sense, Kenyatta’s censure of corruption carried the familiar echoes of the immortal sermon by the Anglican priest Frederick Lewis Donaldson, delivered in Westminster Abbey on March 20, 1925, which gave a list of “Seven Social Sins”: Wealth without work; pleasure without conscience; knowledge without character; commerce without morality; science without humanity; worship without sacrifice; and politics without principle. These irredeemably corrupt society.

Corruption – not poverty or lack of wealth – is rightly viewed as Africa’s greatest problem. It has been likened to a cancer that steals from the poor, eats away at governance and moral fibre, and destroys trust. A nation of corrupt people has no honour. Indeed, corruption is a form of tyranny.

SOCIAL VICES

Down the centuries, response to the scourge of corruption and other social vices that undermine the moral fabric of civilisations has taken a “whole-of-society” approach that ensures that future generations grow up incorruptible. 

Three forms of “social credit” frameworks have defined responses to corruption and other threats to socio-economic progress.

One of the oldest and sturdiest is the “spiritual credit system” at the core of almost all religions, which stresses that actions in life effect what happens to you in the afterlife.

The spiritual credit system gave rise to the iconic scale of justice, which has its roots in ancient Egypt, based on the idea of judgement by a deity after life. The corrupt are punished and the righteous rewarded.

Order and piety in ancient Egypt were governed by the belief that upon death, one entered the underworld, where the god of the afterlife weighed the person’s heart on a scale against a feather (symbolising order, truth, and righteousness).

CONSEQUENCES

A person whose heart weighed more than the feather was judged as wicked, and the corrupted heart would be devoured by a demon, leading to complete annihilation of the corrupt from existence.

This belief that corrupt behaviour in life has consequences for what happens to people upon death is a central theme of Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity and Islam) as well as African traditional religions.

In ancient Greece, upon death, legendary heroes and those who lived an uncorrupt and righteous life were sent to “Elysium”, a special space in the realm of Hades or underworld, to relax and enjoy a life of everlasting joy in a beautiful and comfortable field with trees and sun; those judged as neutral (neither corrupt nor righteous or good and bad deeds are about equal) were sent to a featureless, dull and boring place (Asphodel Fields); and the most corrupt were dispatched to Tartarus, the deepest realm of Hades where they were punished for eternity.

Similarly, in the Dharmic religions (Hinduism, Budhism and Chinese religion) practised in China, Korea, Japan and other parts of Asia, reward or punishment in the next life (after reincarnation) largely depended on whether or not one adhered to their duties in life, had good deeds and lived an honest life.

This ‘‘spiritual credit system” has influenced the interpretation of corruption as an “ethical issue” rather than a crime. It also explains why religious figures are preferred to lead bodies such as the  Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC).

CAPITALISM

The rise of capitalism influenced the development of the “financial credit score system” as a feature of Western civilisation. American capitalism, the world’s most successful, developed an almost flawless financial credit score system, which has reached a high level of sophistication and efficiency during the consumer age from the late 20th century. 

The third is the Oriental social credit system in socialist countries, itself still work in progress. China has recently moved the social credit system to a whole new level to produce an all-round citizen as a consumer and a responsible person.

When fully in place by 2020, the social credit system in China will constitute a new way of controlling both the behaviour of individuals and of businesses, perfecting China’s socialist market economy, eliminating problems such as food safety issues, cheating, corruption and counterfeit goods, strengthening and innovating the governance of society and steering the positive behaviour of citizens.

However, because it depends on mass surveillance and big data analysis technology to monitor and rate over 1.4 billion Chinese citizens as well as businesses operating in China, liberal proponents of an “open society” have lampooned this system as “black mirror”.

SOCIAL CREDIT SYSTEM

So far, based on China’s embryonic social credit system, nine million people with “low scores” have been blocked from purchasing domestic flights.

Errant people or low scorers cannot get their children to certain schools, rent hotels, use credit cards, and are black-listed from procuring employment.

The system is also used to rein in rogue social media activists and those misusing the cyberspace while rewarding quality users such as online shoppers.

Africa’s response to corruption is a weak and eclectic mix of the spiritual credit thinking, a budding financial credit system and rudiments of the social credit system.

Taking over an endemically corrupt state, Thomas Sankara, President of Burkina Faso (1983-1987), pioneered Africa’s social credit system. He renamed his country Burkina Faso (meaning “the land of upright people”), the equivalent of changing Kenya’s name to The Ungwana Republic – as a conscious repudiation of the Ushenzi (corrupt) republic.

INTEGRITY

The onset of multipartyism spurred the adoption of new constitutions as social contracts with ingrained “social credit systems” to address the social behaviour of citizens.

Kenya’s new liberal constitution introduced Chapter Six that requires leaders to maintain the highest degree of integrity. The chapter is also a safeguard against the capture of the State by criminals and corrupt individuals or cabals.

In the memorable words of Leo Tolstoy, the famous author of War and Peace,  “Wrong does not cease to be wrong because the majority share in it.” Wrong ceases when the majority cease to share in it. A well thought-out social credit system can foster a new environment where future generations grow up incorruptible. 

Prof Kagwanja is a former Government Adviser and Chief Executive of the Africa Policy Institute.