The Bourgeois State And Peripheral Underdevelopment In Nigeria: A Critical View

Abstract

This article on “The bourgeois state and peripheral underdevelopment: A critical view “, is an effort at synthesizing the role of the bourgeois state in the crises of development being witnessed among most, if not all peripheral societies. This effort is informed by the decades of crises and conflict most third world societies have experienced from their colonial days till the contemporary post colonial era. Using Nigeria, a major Actor in the process of exploitation and expropriation of wealth, south of the Sahara as a unit of analyses, this researcher is focusing on a content analyses of the journey so far by the Nigerian people, as they strive to develop themselves. Based on the use of the historical and dialectical materialistic interpretation of the socio-economic process of-wealth creation and distribution among Nigerians, under the hegemony of the prebendalist state, data gathered were interpreted. The findings show that the bourgeois state in Nigeria is both an alien and rogue state. It is a state under the control of a cabal in both military and civilian uniforms who sit in “council” on behalf of their metropolitan bourgeois masters to facilitate the endless and rapacious “rape” of the Nigerian masses. Thus this state as it operates under the capitalist order controlled by the international order of liberal democracy and globalization cannot facilitate the even development of Nigeria, To address the ills identified in this paper, the researcher recommended among other things, a return to the Nigerian people’s indigenous ways of life under which political leadership and ruler ship were people oriented. Based on an ideological re-orientation, a new order of African socialism should be advocated, under which welfarism   and brotherhood will   be pursued to   usher   in egalitarianism.