“With this book, M. Molefe continues his important analytical enquiry into African ethics, now critically discussing how strong our obligations are to strangers compared to associates. Whereas some working in the African tradition deny that morality prescribes any kind of favouritism towards intimates and others accept that it does when it comes to right action, Molefe’s novel view is that partiality is best understood as an instance of morally good character (personhood). His virtue-centric approach and his defense of it as both more African and more philosophically plausible than the alternatives, deserve attention from the field.”

Thaddeus Metz, University of Pretoria, Professor of Philosophy (Research Focus)

M. Molefe has done a lucid analysis of how African communalism (Ubuntu) and its normative conception of personhood illuminate the nature and role of, debates on, and efforts to reconcile the apparent divergence between partiality and impartiality in ethics. With this nuanced and focused examination, this book highlights a relevant point of interface and dialogue between Western and African philosophy and makes a significant contribution to moral philosophy.

Polycarp A. Ikuenobe, Kent State University

Questions about partiality and personhood are some of the most vexed and controversial issues in African philosophy. Molefe manages to tackle both topics, paying careful analytical attention to their roots and intersections in African thought. In so doing, he also succeeds in giving a sense of the distinctive contribution that African theorizing makes to debates that tend to be saturated with thinking from Western ethical traditions. Molefe’s contribution is important, as an addition both to African literature on partiality and personhood and to global philosophical debates on these topics.

Christopher S. Wareham, Steve Biko Centre for Bioethics, University of the Witwatersrand