Excerpt from a paper by John Murungi author of An Introduction to African Legal Philosophy:
What is the province of African jurisprudence? In this question, the word “African” qualifies jurisprudence. The qualification implies that there are other provinces of jurisprudence. The further implication of this implication is that the province of African jurisprudence is what it is, in part, by its intersection with other provinces of jurisprudence. Adequately understood, African jurisprudence, like any other jurisprudence adequately understood, ought to lead us to such an intersection. It is tempting to think of this intersection as what constitutes the proper province of jurisprudence, and to think of the qualifications of jurisprudence as merely marginal. This is likely to seduce some universalists into thinking that jurisprudence should concern itself only with what is universal. Succumbing to this seduction may lead to another seduction, namely, that of being led to think of jurisprudential inquiry as an inquiry that exclusively investigates what the provinces of jurisprudence have in common. In this view, the inquiry into African jurisprudence would marginalize what is African about jurisprudence and concentrate on what is universal in it. To the extent that such an inquiry is philosophical, what is African about philosophy would be essentially inconsequential to the inquiry. To meet the task at hand adequately, philosophical method would be directed to what is universal,
