Social structures - contd

Kenyans need to see themselves as individuals not in respect to others i.e tribe etc. 

In the intervening years; society has changed, people are less loyal to clans especially the urban areas but as a replacement there is an increased loyalty to churches, economic groupings (a variation of micro-finance) and socioeconomic class. 

Responsibility as a virtue in Kenya involves attention to the group like tithing to churches and regular contributions to self-help group, and religious or group meetings. Kenya being a poor country with low incomes it makes economic sense for people to pool resources but the prevailing mechanism eschews formal system and accountability - there have been numerous cases of pyramid schemes that defrauded Kenyans, often they are sanctioned by a micro-finance bank or a church. 

The government has stepped in to harness the pooling effect, for example, there are funds disbursed through commercial banks for women and the youth that can be accessed only through self help groups. One of the drawbacks to this, is that government picks favored banks creating an opportunity for rent-seeking and excluding women and youth from commercial competition fails to entrench the intended free enterprise ethos. 

With time the traditional authority (clan) set-up was replaced by a form of charismatic authority because legal authority didn’t take root. The 'prophets', religious ministers, group leaders, and even politicians are an example of the charismatic authority, a variation of tribal kinship - in contrast to legal authority i.e constitutional

 Kenya hasn’t afforded people opportunities to see themselves as individuals and the different forms of  kinship applied to a modern society have marginalized poor Kenyans by robbing them of private incentives, individual rewards and personal freedom which would help them compete or assess their leaders. 

With the new constitution, Kenyans felt a sense of ownership of the document but like many constitutions it fails to express the idea of a right as unintelligible without taking into account the responsibility one owes for the right. It would have been immensely helpful if the civil-society went around highlighting what it takes to have a right. Kenya’s sense of values would be better aligned with what it seeks to be; for example it would clearly delineate certain acts like corruption and abuses as criminal. Sadly for Kenya, it has conveniently failed to define or label particular offenses affecting how they are conceived or stigmatized and therefore punished. Furthermore, the penalties provided by the law are usually vague such that massive fraud is no more grave than simple stealing thereby providing no deterrence.