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Arthur Schopenhauer | Early work | Early work
Schopenhauer left Berlin in a rush in 1813, fearing that the city could be attacked and that he could be pressed into military service as Prussia had just joined the war against France. He returned to Weimar but left after less than a month, disgusted by the fact that his mother was now living with her supposed lover, , a civil servant twelve years younger than she; he considered the relationship an act of infidelity to his father's memory. He settled for a while in Rudolstadt, hoping that no army would pass through the small town. He spent his time in solitude, hiking in the mountains and the Thuringian Forest and writing his dissertation, On the Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason.
Schopenhauer completed his dissertation at about the same time as the French army was defeated at the Battle of Leipzig. He became irritated by the arrival of soldiers in the town and accepted his mother's invitation to visit her in Weimar. She tried to convince him that her relationship with Gerstenbergk was platonic and that she had no intention of remarrying. But Schopenhauer remained suspicious and often came in conflict with Gerstenbergk because he considered him untalented, pretentious, and nationalistic. His mother had just published her second book, Reminiscences of a Journey in the Years 1803, 1804, and 1805, a description of their family tour of Europe, which quickly became a hit. She found his dissertation incomprehensible and said it was unlikely that anyone would ever buy a copy. In a fit of temper Arthur told her that people would read his work long after the "rubbish" she wrote was totally forgotten. In fact, although they considered her novels of dubious quality, the Brockhaus publishing firm held her in high esteem because they consistently sold well. Hans Brockhaus later claimed that his predecessors "saw nothing in this manuscript, but wanted to please one of our best-selling authors by publishing her son's work. We published more and more of her son Arthur's work and today nobody remembers Johanna, but her son's works are in steady demand and contribute to Brockhaus' reputation." He kept large portraits of the pair in his office in Leipzig for the edification of his new editors.
Also contrary to his mother's prediction, Schopenhauer's dissertation made an impression on Goethe, to whom he sent it as a gift. Although it is doubtful that Goethe agreed with Schopenhauer's philosophical positions, he was impressed by his intellect and extensive scientific education. Their subsequent meetings and correspondence were a great honor to a young philosopher, who was finally acknowledged by his intellectual hero. They mostly discussed Goethe's newly published (and somewhat lukewarmly received) work on color theory. Schopenhauer soon started writing his own treatise on the subject, On Vision and Colors, which in many points differed from his teacher's. Although they remained polite towards each other, their growing theoretical disagreements—and especially Schopenhauer's extreme self-confidence and tactless criticisms—soon made Goethe become distant again and after 1816 their correspondence became less frequent. Schopenhauer later admitted that he was greatly hurt by this rejection, but he continued to praise Goethe, and considered his color theory a great introduction to his own.
Another important experience during his stay in Weimar was his acquaintance with Friedrich Majer—a historian of religion, orientalist and disciple of Herder—who introduced him to Eastern philosophy (see also Indology). Schopenhauer was immediately impressed by the Upanishads (he called them "the production of the highest human wisdom", and believed that they contained superhuman concepts) and the Buddha, and put them on a par with Plato and Kant. He continued his studies by reading the Bhagavad Gita, an amateurish German journal Asiatisches Magazin, and Asiatick Researches by the Asiatic Society. Schopenhauer held a profound respect for Indian philosophy; and loved Hindu texts. Although he never revered a Buddhist text he regarded Buddhism as the most distinguished religion. His studies on Hindu and Buddhist texts were constrained by the lack of adequate literature, and the latter were mostly restricted to Theravada Buddhism. He also claimed that he formulated most of his ideas independently, and only later realized the similarities with Buddhism.
Schopenhauer read the Latin translation and praised the Upanishads in his main work, The World as Will and Representation (1819), as well as in his Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), and commented
In the whole world there is no study so beneficial and so elevating as that of the Upanishads. It has been the solace of my life, it will be the solace of my death.
thumb|Schopenhauer in 1815. Portrait by Ludwig Sigismund Ruhl.
As the relationship with his mother fell to a new low, in May 1814 he left Weimar and moved to Dresden. He continued his philosophical studies, enjoyed the cultural life, socialized with intellectuals and engaged in sexual affairs. His friends in Dresden were Johann Gottlob von Quandt, Friedrich Laun, Karl Christian Friedrich Krause and Ludwig Sigismund Ruhl, a young painter who made a romanticized portrait of him in which he improved some of Schopenhauer's unattractive physical features. His criticisms of local artists occasionally caused public quarrels when he ran into them in public. Schopenhauer's main occupation during his stay in Dresden was his seminal philosophical work, The World as Will and Representation, which he started writing in 1814 and finished in 1818.Although the first volume was published by December 1818, it was printed with a title page erroneously giving the year as 1819 (see ). He was recommended to the publisher Friedrich Arnold Brockhaus by Baron Ferdinand von Biedenfeld, an acquaintance of his mother. Although Brockhaus accepted his manuscript, Schopenhauer made a poor impression because of his quarrelsome and fussy attitude, as well as very poor sales of the book after it was published in December 1818.
In September 1818, while waiting for his book to be published and conveniently escaping an affair with a maid that caused an unwanted pregnancy, Schopenhauer left Dresden for a year-long vacation in Italy. He visited Venice, Bologna, Florence, Naples and Milan, travelling alone or accompanied by mostly English tourists he met. He spent the winter months in Rome, where he accidentally met his acquaintance Karl Witte and engaged in numerous quarrels with German tourists in the Caffè Greco, among them Johann Friedrich Böhmer, who also mentioned his insulting remarks and unpleasant character. He enjoyed art, architecture, and ancient ruins, attended plays and operas, and continued his philosophical contemplation and love affairs. One of his affairs supposedly became serious, and for a while he contemplated marriage to a rich Italian noblewoman—but, despite his mentioning this several times, no details are known and it may have been Schopenhauer exaggerating.Safranski, Rüdiger (1991) Schopenhauer and the Wild Years of Philosophy. Harvard University Press. p. 244 He corresponded regularly with his sister Adele and became close to her as her relationship with Johanna and Gerstenbergk also deteriorated. She informed him about their financial troubles as the banking house of A. L. Muhl in Danzig—in which her mother invested their whole savings and Arthur a third of his—was near bankruptcy. Arthur offered to share his assets, but his mother refused and became further enraged by his insulting comments. The women managed to receive only thirty percent of their savings while Arthur, using his business knowledge, took a suspicious and aggressive stance towards the banker and eventually received his part in full. The affair additionally worsened the relationships among all three members of the Schopenhauer family.
He shortened his stay in Italy because of the trouble with Muhl and returned to Dresden. Disturbed by the financial risk and the lack of responses to his book he decided to take an academic position since it provided him with both income and an opportunity to promote his views. He contacted his friends at universities in Heidelberg, Göttingen and Berlin and found Berlin most attractive. He scheduled his lectures to coincide with those of the famous philosopher G. W. F. Hegel, whom Schopenhauer described as a "clumsy charlatan".Schopenhauer, Arthur. Author's preface to "On the Fourfold Root of the Principle of sufficient reason", p. 1 (On the Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason on Wikisource.) He was especially appalled by Hegel's supposedly poor knowledge of natural sciences and tried to engage him in a quarrel about it already at his test lecture in March 1820. Hegel was also facing political suspicions at the time, when many progressive professors were fired, while Schopenhauer carefully mentioned in his application that he had no interest in politics. Despite their differences and the arrogant request to schedule lectures at the same time as his own, Hegel still voted to accept Schopenhauer to the university. Only five students turned up to Schopenhauer's lectures, and he dropped out of academia. A late essay, "On University Philosophy", expressed his resentment towards the work conducted in academies. |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Later life | Later life
thumb|upright|Sculpture of Arthur Schopenhauer by Giennadij Jerszow
After his trying in academia, he continued to travel extensively, visiting Leipzig, Nuremberg, Stuttgart, Schaffhausen, Vevey, Milan and spending eight months in Florence. Before he left for his three-year travel, Schopenhauer had an incident with his Berlin neighbor, 47-year-old seamstress Caroline Louise Marquet. The details of the August 1821 incident are unknown. He claimed that he had just pushed her from his entrance after she had rudely refused to leave, and that she had purposely fallen to the ground so that she could sue him. She claimed that he had attacked her so violently that she had become paralyzed on her right side and unable to work. She immediately sued him, and the process lasted until May 1827, when a court found Schopenhauer guilty and forced him to pay her an annual pension until her death in 1842.
Schopenhauer enjoyed Italy, where he studied art and socialized with Italian and English nobles. It was his last visit to the country. He left for Munich and stayed there for a year, mostly recuperating from various health issues, some of them possibly caused by venereal diseases (the treatment his doctor used suggests syphilis). He contacted publishers, offering to translate Hume into German and Kant into English, but his proposals were declined. Returning to Berlin, he began to study Spanish so he could read some of his favorite authors in their original language. He liked Pedro Calderón de la Barca, Lope de Vega, Miguel de Cervantes, and especially Baltasar Gracián. He also made failed attempts to publish his translations of their works. A few attempts to revive his lectures—again scheduled at the same time as Hegel's—also failed, as did his inquiries about relocating to other universities.
During his Berlin years, Schopenhauer occasionally mentioned his desire to marry and have a family. For a while he was unsuccessfully courting 17-year-old Flora Weiss, who was 22 years younger than himself. His unpublished writings from that time show that he was already very critical of monogamy but still not advocating polygyny—instead musing about a polyamorous relationship that he called "tetragamy". He had an on-and-off relationship with a young dancer, Caroline Richter (she also used the surname Medon after one of her ex-lovers). They met when he was 33 and she was 19 and working at the Berlin Opera. She had already had numerous lovers and a son out of wedlock, and later gave birth to another son, this time to an unnamed foreign diplomat (she soon had another pregnancy but the child was stillborn). As Schopenhauer was preparing to escape from Berlin in 1831, due to a cholera epidemic, he offered to take her with him on the condition that she left her young son behind. She refused and he went alone; in his will he left her a significant sum of money, but insisted that it should not be spent in any way on her second son.
Schopenhauer claimed that, in his last year in Berlin, he had a prophetic dream that urged him to escape from the city. As he arrived in his new home in Frankfurt, he supposedly had another supernatural experience, an apparition of his dead father and his mother, who was still alive. This experience led him to spend some time investigating paranormal phenomena and magic. He was quite critical of the available studies and claimed that they were mostly ignorant or fraudulent, but he did believe that there are authentic cases of such phenomena and tried to explain them through his metaphysics as manifestations of the will.
Upon his arrival in Frankfurt, he experienced a period of depression and declining health. He renewed his correspondence with his mother, and she seemed concerned that he might commit suicide like his father. By now Johanna and Adele were living very modestly. Johanna's writing did not bring her much income, and her popularity was waning. Their correspondence remained reserved, and Arthur seemed undisturbed by her death in 1838. His relationship with his sister grew closer and he corresponded with her until she died in 1849.
In July 1832, Schopenhauer left Frankfurt for Mannheim but returned in July 1833 to remain there for the rest of his life, except for a few short journeys. He lived alone except for a succession of pet poodles named Atman and Butz. In 1836, he published On the Will in Nature. In 1838, he sent his essay "On the Freedom of the Will" to the contest of the Royal Norwegian Society of Sciences in 1838 and won the prize in 1839. He sent another essay, "On the Basis of Morality", to the Royal Danish Society of Sciences in 1839, but did not win the (1840) prize despite being the only contestant. The Society was appalled that several distinguished contemporary philosophers were mentioned in a very offensive manner, and claimed that the essay missed the point of the set topic and that the arguments were inadequate. Schopenhauer, who had been very confident that he would win, was enraged by this rejection. He published both essays as The Two Basic Problems of Ethics. The first edition, published September 1840 but with an 1841 date, again failed to draw attention to his philosophy. In the preface to the second edition, in 1860, he was still pouring insults on the Royal Danish Society. Two years later, after some negotiations, he managed to convince his publisher, Brockhaus, to print the second, updated edition of The World as Will and Representation. That book was again mostly ignored and the few reviews were mixed or negative.
Schopenhauer began to attract some followers, mostly outside academia, among practical professionals (several of them were lawyers) who pursued private philosophical studies. He jokingly referred to them as "evangelists" and "apostles". One of the most active early followers was Julius Frauenstädt, who wrote numerous articles promoting Schopenhauer's philosophy. He was also instrumental in finding another publisher after Brockhaus declined to publish Parerga and Paralipomena, believing that it would be another failure. Though Schopenhauer later stopped corresponding with him, claiming that he did not adhere closely enough to his ideas, Frauenstädt continued to promote Schopenhauer's work. They renewed their communication in 1859 and Schopenhauer named him heir for his literary estate. Frauenstädt also became the editor of the first collected works of Schopenhauer.
In 1848, Schopenhauer witnessed violent upheaval in Frankfurt after General Hans Adolf Erdmann von Auerswald and Prince Felix Lichnowsky were murdered. He became worried for his own safety and property. Even earlier in life he had had such worries and kept a sword and loaded pistols near his bed to defend himself from thieves. He gave a friendly welcome to Austrian soldiers who wanted to shoot revolutionaries from his window and as they were leaving he gave one of the officers his opera glasses to help him monitor rebels. The rebellion passed without any loss to Schopenhauer and he later praised Alfred I, Prince of Windisch-Grätz for restoring order. He even modified his will, leaving a large part of his property to a Prussian fund that helped soldiers who became invalids while fighting rebellion in 1848 or the families of soldiers who died in battle. As Young Hegelians were advocating change and progress, Schopenhauer claimed that misery is natural for humans and that, even if some utopian society were established, people would still fight each other out of boredom, or would starve due to overpopulation.
thumb|left|1855 painting of Schopenhauer by Jules Lunteschütz
In 1851, Schopenhauer published Parerga and Paralipomena, which contains essays that are supplementary to his main work. It was his first successful, widely read book, partly due to the work of his disciples who wrote praising reviews. The essays that proved most popular were the ones that actually did not contain the basic philosophical ideas of his system. Many academic philosophers considered him a great stylist and cultural critic but did not take his philosophy seriously. His early critics liked to point out similarities of his ideas to those of Fichte and Schelling, or to claim that there were numerous contradictions in his philosophy. Both criticisms enraged Schopenhauer. He was becoming less interested in intellectual fights, but encouraged his disciples to do so. His private notes and correspondence show that he acknowledged some of the criticisms regarding contradictions, inconsistencies, and vagueness in his philosophy, but claimed that he was not concerned about harmony and agreement in his propositions and that some of his ideas should not be taken literally but instead as metaphors.
Academic philosophers were also starting to notice his work. In 1856, the University of Leipzig sponsored an essay contest about Schopenhauer's philosophy, which was won by Rudolf Seydel's very critical essay. Schopenhauer's friend Jules Lunteschütz made the first of his four portraits of him—which Schopenhauer did not particularly like—which was soon sold to a wealthy landowner, Carl Ferdinand Wiesike, who built a house to display it. Schopenhauer seemed flattered and amused by this, and would claim that it was his first chapel. As his fame increased, copies of paintings and photographs of him were being sold and admirers were visiting the places where he had lived and written his works. People visited Frankfurt's Englischer Hof to observe him dining. Admirers gave him gifts and asked for autographs. He complained that he still felt isolated due to his not very social nature and the fact that many of his good friends had already died from old age.
thumb|right|Grave at the Hauptfriedhof in Frankfurt
He remained healthy in his own old age, which he attributed to regular walks no matter the weather and always getting enough sleep. He had a great appetite and could read without glasses, but his hearing had been declining since his youth and he developed problems with rheumatism. He remained active and lucid, continued his reading, writing and correspondence until his death. The numerous notes that he made during these years, amongst others on aging, were published posthumously under the title Senilia. In the spring of 1860 his health began to decline, and he experienced shortness of breath and heart palpitations; in September he suffered inflammation of the lungs and, although he was starting to recover, he remained very weak. The last friend to visit him was Wilhelm Gwinner; according to him, Schopenhauer was concerned that he would not be able to finish his planned additions to Parerga and Paralipomena but was at peace with dying. He died of pulmonary-respiratory failureDale Jacquette, The Philosophy of Schopenhauer, Routledge, 2015: "Biographical sketch". on 21 September 1860 while sitting at home on his couch. He died at the age of 72 and had a funeral conducted by a Lutheran minister.Schopenhauer: his life and philosophy by H. Zimmern – 1932 – G. Allen & Unwin. |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Philosophy | Philosophy |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Theory of perception | Theory of perception
In November 1813 Goethe invited Schopenhauer to help him on his Theory of Colours. Although Schopenhauer considered colour theory a minor matter,Letter to Goethe on 23 January 1816: "Ich weiß, daß durch mich die Wahrheit geredet hat, – in dieser kleinen Sache, wie dereinst in größern." he accepted the invitation out of admiration for Goethe. Nevertheless, these investigations led him to his most important discovery in epistemology: finding a demonstration for the a priori nature of causality.
Kant openly admitted that it was Hume's skeptical assault on causality that motivated the critical investigations in Critique of Pure Reason and gave an elaborate proof to show that causality is a priori. After G. E. Schulze had made it plausible that Kant had not disproven Hume's skepticism, it was up to those loyal to Kant's project to prove this important matter.
The difference between the approaches of Kant and Schopenhauer was this: Kant simply declared that the empirical content of perception is "given" to us from outside, an expression with which Schopenhauer often expressed his dissatisfaction. He, on the other hand, was occupied with the questions: how do we get this empirical content of perception; how is it possible to comprehend subjective sensations "limited to my skin" as the objective perception of things that lie "outside" of me?
Causality is therefore not an empirical concept drawn from objective perceptions, as Hume had maintained; instead, as Kant had said, objective perception presupposes knowledge of causality.
By this intellectual operation, comprehending every effect in our sensory organs as having an external cause, the external world arises. With vision, finding the cause is essentially simplified due to light acting in straight lines. We are seldom conscious of the process that interprets the double sensation in both eyes as coming from one object, that inverts the impressions on the retinas, and that uses the change in the apparent position of an object relative to more distant objects provided by binocular vision to perceive depth and distance.
Schopenhauer stresses the importance of the intellectual nature of perception; the senses furnish the raw material by which the intellect produces the world as representation. He set out his theory of perception for the first time in On Vision and Colors, and, in the subsequent editions of Fourfold Root, an extensive exposition is given in § 21. |
Arthur Schopenhauer | World as representation | World as representation
Schopenhauer saw his philosophy as an extension of Kant's, and used the results of Kant's theoretical and epistemological investigations (transcendental idealism) as starting point for his own. Kant had argued that the empirical world is merely a complex of appearances whose existence and connection occur only in our mental representations. Schopenhauer did not deny that the external world existed and was known empirically, yet he followed Kant in claiming that our knowledge and experience of the world is always in some sense dependent on us.See the quotation of Schopenhauer in For Schopenhauer in particular, the spatiotemporal form and causal structure of the external world are contributed to our experiences of it by the mind as it renders perceptions. Schopenhauer reiterates this in the first sentence of his main work: "The world is my representation (Die Welt ist meine Vorstellung)". Everything that there is for cognition (the entire world) exists simply as an object in relation to a subject—a 'representation' to a subject. Everything that belongs to the world is, therefore, 'subject-dependent'. In Book One of The World as Will and Representation, Schopenhauer considers the world from this angle—that is, insofar as it is representation.
Kant had previously argued that we perceive reality as something spatial and temporal not because reality is inherently spatial and temporal, but because that is how our minds operate in perceiving an object. Therefore, understanding objects in space and time represents our 'contribution' to an experience. For Schopenhauer, Kant's 'greatest service' lay in the 'differentiation between phenomena and the thing-in-itself (noumena), based on the proof that between everything and us there is always a perceiving mind.' In other words, Kant's primary achievement is to demonstrate that instead of being a blank slate where reality merely reveals its character, the mind, with sensory support, actively participates in constructing reality. Thus, Schopenhauer believed that Kant had shown that the everyday world of experience, and indeed the entire material world related to space and time, is merely 'appearance' or 'phenomena,' entirely distinct from the thing-in-itself.' |
Arthur Schopenhauer | World as will | World as will
In Book Two of The World as Will and Representation, Schopenhauer considers what the world is beyond the aspect of it that appears to us—that is, the aspect of the world beyond representation, the world considered "in-itself" or "noumena", its inner essence. The very being in-itself of all things, Schopenhauer argues, is will (Wille). The empirical world that appears to us as representation has plurality and is ordered in a spatio-temporal framework. The world as thing in-itself must exist outside the subjective forms of space and time. Although the world manifests itself to our experience as a multiplicity of objects (the "objectivation" of the will), each element of this multiplicity has the same blind essence striving towards existence and life. Human rationality is merely a secondary phenomenon that does not distinguish humanity from the rest of nature at the fundamental, essential level. The advanced cognitive abilities of human beings, Schopenhauer argues, serve the ends of willing—an illogical, directionless, ceaseless striving that condemns the human individual to a life of suffering unredeemed by any final purpose. Schopenhauer's philosophy of the will as the essential reality behind the world as representation is often called metaphysical voluntarism.
For Schopenhauer, understanding the world as will leads to ethical concerns (see the ethics section below for further detail), which he explores in the Fourth Book of The World as Will and Representation and again in his two prize essays on ethics, On the Freedom of the Will and On the Basis of Morality. No individual human actions are free, Schopenhauer argues, because they are events in the world of appearance and thus are subject to the principle of sufficient reason: a person's actions are a necessary consequence of motives and the given character of the individual human. Necessity extends to the actions of human beings just as it does to every other appearance, and thus we cannot speak of freedom of individual willing. Albert Einstein quoted the Schopenhauerian idea that "a man can do as he will, but not will as he will."Einstein, Albert (1935). The World as I See It, p. 14. Snowball Publishing. . Yet the will as thing in-itself is free, as it exists beyond the realm of representation and thus is not constrained by any of the forms of necessity that are part of the principle of sufficient reason.
According to Schopenhauer, salvation from our miserable existence can come through the will's being "tranquillized" by the metaphysical insight that reveals individuality to be merely an illusion. The saint or 'great soul' intuitively "recognizes the whole, comprehends its essence, and finds that it is constantly passing away, caught up in vain strivings, inner conflict, and perpetual suffering".The World as Will and Representation, Vol. 1, §68 The negation of the will, in other words, stems from the insight that the world in-itself (free from the forms of space and time) is one. Ascetic practices, Schopenhauer remarks, are used to aid the will's "self-abolition", which brings about a blissful, redemptive "will-less" state of emptiness that is free from striving or suffering. |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Art and aesthetics | Art and aesthetics
thumb|In his main work, Schopenhauer praised the Dutch Golden Age artists, who "directed such purely objective perception to the most insignificant objects, and set up a lasting monument of their objectivity and spiritual peace in paintings of still life. The aesthetic beholder does not contemplate this without emotion."The World as Will and Representation, Vol. 1, §38
For Schopenhauer, human "willing"—desiring, craving, etc.—is at the root of suffering. A temporary way to escape this pain is through aesthetic contemplation. Here one moves away from ordinary cognizance of individual things to cognizance of eternal Platonic Ideas—in other words, cognizance that is free from the service of will. In aesthetic contemplation, one no longer perceives an object of perception as something from which one is separated; rather "it is as if the object alone existed without anyone perceiving it, and one can thus no longer separate the perceiver from the perception, but the two have become one, the entirety of consciousness entirely filled and occupied by a single perceptual image".The World as Will and Representation, Vol. 1, §34 Subject and object are no longer distinguishable, and the Idea comes to the fore.
From this aesthetic immersion, one is no longer an individual who suffers as a result of servitude to one's individual will but, rather, becomes a "pure, will-less, painless, timeless, subject of cognition". The pure, will-less subject of cognition is cognizant only of Ideas, not individual things: this is a kind of cognition that is unconcerned with relations between objects according to the Principle of Sufficient Reason (time, space, cause and effect) and instead involves complete absorption in the object.
Art is the practical consequence of this brief aesthetic contemplation, since it attempts to depict the essence/pure Ideas of the world. Music, for Schopenhauer, is the purest form of art because it is the one that depicts the will itself without it appearing as subject to the Principle of Sufficient Reason, therefore as an individual object. According to Daniel Albright, "Schopenhauer thought that music was the only art that did not merely copy ideas, but actually embodied the will itself".Daniel Albright, Modernism and Music, 2004, p. 39, footnote 34 He deemed music a timeless, universal language comprehended everywhere, that can imbue global enthusiasm, if in possession of a significant melody. |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Mathematics | Mathematics
Schopenhauer's realist views on mathematics are evident in his criticism of contemporaneous attempts to prove the parallel postulate in Euclidean geometry. Writing shortly before the discovery of hyperbolic geometry demonstrated the logical independence of the axiom—and long before the general theory of relativity revealed that it does not necessarily express a property of physical space—Schopenhauer criticized mathematicians for trying to use indirect concepts to prove what he held was directly evident from intuitive perception.
Throughout his writings,"I wanted in this way to stress and demonstrate the great difference, indeed opposition, between knowledge of perception and abstract or reflected knowledge. Hitherto this difference has received too little attention, and its establishment is a fundamental feature of my philosophy ..." – The World as Will and Representation., vol. 2, ch. 7, p. 88 (trans. Payne) Schopenhauer criticized the logical derivation of philosophies and mathematics from mere concepts, instead of from intuitive perceptions.
Although Schopenhauer could see no justification for trying to prove Euclid's parallel postulate, he did see a reason for examining another of Euclid's axioms.This comment by Schopenhauer was called "an acute observation" by Sir Thomas L. Heath. In his translation of The Elements, vol. 1, Book I, "Note on Common Notion 4", Heath made this judgment and also noted that Schopenhauer's remark "was a criticism in advance of Helmholtz' theory". Helmholtz had "maintained that geometry requires us to assume the actual existence of rigid bodies and their free mobility in space" and is therefore "dependent on mechanics".
This follows Kant's reasoning."Motion of an object in space does not belong in a pure science, and consequently not in geometry. For the fact that something is movable cannot be cognized a priori, but can be cognized only through experience." (Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, B 155, Note) |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Ethics | Ethics
Schopenhauer asserts that the task of ethics is not to prescribe moral actions that ought to be done, but to investigate moral actions. As such, he states that philosophy is always theoretical: its task to explain what is given.
According to Kant's transcendental idealism, space and time are forms of our sensibility in which phenomena appear in multiplicity. Reality in itself is free from multiplicity, not in the sense that an object is one, but that it is outside the possibility of multiplicity. Two individuals, though they appear distinct, are in-themselves not distinct.
Appearances are entirely subordinated to the principle of sufficient reason. The egoistic individual who focuses his aims on his own interests has to deal with empirical laws as well as he can.
What is relevant for ethics are individuals who can act against their own self-interest. If we take a man who suffers when he sees his fellow men living in poverty and consequently uses a significant part of his income to support their needs instead of his own pleasures, then the simplest way to describe this is that he makes less distinction between himself and others than is usually made.
Regarding how things appear to us, the egoist asserts a gap between two individuals, but the altruist experiences the sufferings of others as his own. In the same way a compassionate man cannot hurt animals, though they appear as distinct from himself.
What motivates the altruist is compassion. The suffering of others is for him not a cold matter to which he is indifferent, but he feels connectiveness to all beings. Compassion is thus the basis of morality. |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Eternal justice | Eternal justice
Schopenhauer calls the principle through which multiplicity appears the principium individuationis. When we behold nature we see that it is a cruel battle for existence. Individual manifestations of the will can maintain themselves only at the expense of others—the will, as the only thing that exists, has no other option but to devour itself to experience pleasure. This is a fundamental characteristic of the will, and cannot be circumvented.
Unlike temporal or human justice, which requires time to repay an evil deed and "has its seat in the state, as requiting and punishing", eternal justice "rules not the state but the world, is not dependent upon human institutions, is not subject to chance and deception, is not uncertain, wavering, and erring, but infallible, fixed, and sure".The World as Will and Idea Vol. 1 § 63 Eternal justice is not retributive, because retribution requires time. There are no delays or reprieves. Instead, punishment is tied to the offence, "to the point where the two become one. ... Tormenter and tormented are one. The [Tormenter] errs in that he believes he is not a partaker in the suffering; the [tormented], in that he believes he is not a partaker in the guilt."
Suffering is the moral outcome of our attachment to pleasure. Schopenhauer deemed that this truth was expressed by the Christian dogma of original sin and, in Eastern religions, by the dogma of rebirth. |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Quietism | Quietism
He who sees through the principium individuationis and comprehends suffering in general as his own will see suffering everywhere and, instead of fighting for the happiness of his individual manifestation, will abhor life itself since he knows that it is inseparably connected with suffering. For him, a happy individual life in a world of suffering is like a beggar who dreams one night that he is a king.
Those who have experienced this intuitive knowledge cannot affirm life, but exhibit asceticism and quietism, meaning that they are no longer sensitive to motives, are not concerned about their individual welfare, and accept without resistance the evil that others inflict on them. They welcome poverty and neither seek nor flee death. Schopenhauer referred to asceticism as the denial of the will to live.
Human life is a ceaseless struggle for satisfaction and, instead of continuing their struggle, ascetics break it. It does not matter if these ascetics adhere to the dogmata of Christianity or to Dharmic religions, since their way of living is the result of intuitive knowledge. |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Psychology | Psychology
Philosophers have not traditionally been impressed by the necessity of sex, but Schopenhauer addressed sex and related concepts forthrightly:
He named a force within man that he felt took invariable precedence over reason: the will to live or will to life (Wille zum Leben), defined as an inherent drive within human beings, and all creatures, to stay alive; a force that inveigles us into reproducing.
Schopenhauer refused to conceive of love as either trifling or accidental, but rather understood it as an immensely powerful force that lay unseen within man's psyche, guaranteeing the quality of the human race:
It has often been argued that Schopenhauer's thoughts on sexuality foreshadowed the theory of evolution, a claim met with satisfaction by Darwin as he included a quotation from Schopenhauer in his Descent of Man. This has also been noted about Freud's concepts of the libido and the unconscious mind, and evolutionary psychology in general."Nearly a century before Freud ... in Schopenhauer there is, for the first time, an explicit philosophy of the unconscious and of the body." Safranski p. 345. |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Political and social thought | Political and social thought |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Politics | Politics
thumb|Bust in Frankfurt
Schopenhauer's politics were an echo of his system of ethics, which he elucidated in detail in his Die beiden Grundprobleme der Ethik (the two essays On the Freedom of the Will and On the Basis of Morality).
In occasional political comments in his Parerga and Paralipomena and Manuscript Remains, Schopenhauer described himself as a proponent of limited government. Schopenhauer shared the view of Thomas Hobbes on the necessity of the state and state action to check the innate destructive tendencies of our species. He also defended the independence of the legislative, judicial and executive branches of power, and a monarch as an impartial element able to practise justice (in a practical and everyday sense, not a cosmological one).The World as Will and Representation, Vol. 2, Ch. 47
He declared that monarchy is "natural to man in almost the same way as it is to bees and ants, to cranes in flight, to wandering elephants, to wolves in a pack in search of prey, and to other animals".Parerga and Paralipomena, Vol. 2, "On Jurisprudence and Politics," §127, trans. Payne (p. 254). Intellect in monarchies, he writes, always has "much better chances against stupidity, its implacable and ever-present foe, than it has in republics; but this is a great advantage." On the other hand, Schopenhauer disparaged republicanism as being "as unnatural to man as it is unfavorable to higher intellectual life and thus to the arts and sciences".Parerga and Paralipomena, Vol. 2, "On Jurisprudence and Politics," §127, trans. Payne (p. 255).
By his own admission, Schopenhauer did not give much thought to politics, and several times he wrote proudly of how little attention he paid "to political affairs of [his] day". In a life that spanned several revolutions in French and German government, and a few continent-shaking wars, he maintained his position of "minding not the times but the eternities". He wrote many disparaging remarks about Germany and the Germans. A typical example is: "For a German it is even good to have somewhat lengthy words in his mouth, for he thinks slowly, and they give him time to reflect."The World as Will and Representation, Vol. 2, Ch. 12 |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Punishment | Punishment
The State, Schopenhauer claimed, punishes criminals to prevent future crimes. It places "beside every possible motive for committing a wrong a more powerful motive for leaving it undone, in the inescapable punishment. Accordingly, the criminal code is as complete a register as possible of counter-motives to all criminal actions that can possibly be imagined ..."Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Representation, Vol. I, § 62. He claimed that this doctrine was not original to him but had appeared in the writings of Plato,"... he who attempts to punish in accordance with reason does not retaliate on account of the past wrong (for he could not undo something which has been done) but for the future, so that neither the wrongdoer himself, nor others who see him being punished, will do wrong again." Plato, "Protagoras", 324 B. Plato wrote that punishment should "be an example to other men not to offend". Plato, "Laws", Book IX, 863. Seneca, Hobbes, Pufendorf, and Anselm Feuerbach. |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Races and religions | Races and religions
Schopenhauer attributed civilizational primacy to the northern "white races" due to their sensitivity and creativity (except for the ancient Egyptians and Hindus, whom he saw as equal):
The highest civilization and culture, apart from the ancient Hindus and Egyptians, are found exclusively among the white races; and even with many dark peoples, the ruling caste or race is fairer in colour than the rest and has, therefore, evidently immigrated, for example, the Brahmans, the Incas, and the rulers of the South Sea Islands. All this is due to the fact that necessity is the mother of invention because those tribes that emigrated early to the north, and there gradually became white, had to develop all their intellectual powers and invent and perfect all the arts in their struggle with need, want and misery, which in their many forms were brought about by the climate. This they had to do in order to make up for the parsimony of nature and out of it all came their high civilization.Parerga and Paralipomena, Vol. 2, "On Philosophy and Natural Science," §92, trans. Payne (p. 158-159).
Schopenhauer was fervently opposed to slavery. Speaking of the treatment of slaves in the slave-holding states of the United States, he condemned "those devils in human form, those bigoted, church-going, strict sabbath-observing scoundrels, especially the Anglican parsons among them" for how they "treat their innocent black brothers who through violence and injustice have fallen into their devil's claws". The slave-holding states of North America, Schopenhauer writes, are a "disgrace to the whole of humanity".Parerga and Paralipomena, Vol. 2, "On Ethics," §114, trans. Payne (p. 212).
Schopenhauer also maintained a marked metaphysical and political anti-Judaism. He argued that Christianity constituted a revolt against what he styled the materialistic basis of Judaism, exhibiting an Indian-influenced ethics reflecting the Aryan-Vedic theme of spiritual self-conquest. He saw this as opposed to the ignorant drive toward earthly utopianism and superficiality of a worldly "Jewish" spirit:
[Judaism] is, therefore, the crudest and poorest of all religions and consists merely in an absurd and revolting theism. It amounts to this that the κύριος ['Lord'], who has created the world, desires to be worshipped and adored; and so above all he is jealous, is envious of his colleagues, of all the other gods; if sacrifices are made to them he is furious and his Jews have a bad time ... It is most deplorable that this religion has become the basis of the prevailing religion of Europe; for it is a religion without any metaphysical tendency. While all other religions endeavor to explain to the people by symbols the metaphysical significance of life, the religion of the Jews is entirely immanent and furnishes nothing but a mere war-cry in the struggle with other nations."Fragments for the History of Philosophy", Parerga and Paralipomena, Volume I, trans. Payne (p. 126). |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Women | Women
In his 1851 essay "On Women", Schopenhauer expressed opposition to what he called "Teutonico-Christian stupidity" of "reflexive, unexamined reverence for the female (abgeschmackten Weiberveneration)". He wrote: "Women are directly fitted for acting as the nurses and teachers of our early childhood by the fact that they are themselves childish, frivolous and short-sighted; in a word, they are big children all their life long—a kind of intermediate stage between the child and the full-grown man." He opined that women are deficient in artistic faculties and sense of justice, and expressed his opposition to monogamy.Rodgers (environmentalist) and Thompson in Philosophers Behaving Badly call Schopenhauer "a misogynist without rival in ... Western philosophy". He claimed that "woman is by nature meant to obey". The essay does give some compliments: "women are decidedly more sober in their judgment than [men] are", and are more sympathetic to the suffering of others.
Schopenhauer's writings influenced many, from Friedrich Nietzsche to nineteenth-century feminists,Feminism and the Limits of Equality PA Cain – Ga. L. Rev., 1989 and continue to inspire sexist views today. His biological analysis of the difference between the sexes, and their separate roles in the struggle for survival and reproduction, anticipates some of the claims that were later ventured by sociobiologists and evolutionary psychologists.
When the elderly Schopenhauer sat for a sculpture portrait by the Prussian sculptor Elisabet Ney in 1859, he was much impressed by the young woman's wit and independence, as well as by her skill as a visual artist. After his time with Ney, he told Richard Wagner's friend Malwida von Meysenbug: "I have not yet spoken my last word about women. I believe that if a woman succeeds in withdrawing from the mass, or rather raising herself above the mass, she grows ceaselessly and more than a man."Safranski (1990), Chapter 24. p. 348. |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Pederasty | Pederasty
In the third, expanded edition of The World as Will and Representation (1859), Schopenhauer added an appendix to his chapter on the Metaphysics of Sexual Love. He wrote that pederasty has the benefit of preventing ill-begotten children. Concerning this, he stated that "the vice we are considering appears to work directly against the aims and ends of nature, and that in a matter that is all important and of the greatest concern to her it must in fact serve these very aims, although only indirectly, as a means for preventing greater evils."
Schopenhauer ends the appendix with the statement that "by expounding these paradoxical ideas, I wanted to grant to the professors of philosophy a small favour. I have done so by giving them the opportunity of slandering me by saying that I defend and commend pederasty." |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Heredity and eugenics | Heredity and eugenics
thumb|upright|Schopenhauer at age 58 on 16 May 1846
Schopenhauer viewed personality and intellect as inherited. He quotes Horace's saying, "From the brave and good are the brave descended" (Odes, iv, 4, 29) and Shakespeare's line from Cymbeline, "Cowards father cowards, and base things sire base" (IV, 2) to reinforce his hereditarian argument.Payne, The World as Will and Representation, Vol. II, p. 519
Mechanistically, Schopenhauer believed that a person inherits his intellect through his mother, and personal character through the father.On the Suffering of the World (1970), p. 35. Penguin Books – Great Ideas. This belief in heritability of traits informed Schopenhauer's view of love—placing it at the highest level of importance. For Schopenhauer the "final aim of all love intrigues, be they comic or tragic, is really of more importance than all other ends in human life. What it all turns upon is nothing less than the composition of the next generation. ... It is not the weal or woe of any one individual, but that of the human race to come, which is here at stake." This view of the importance for the species of whom we choose to love was reflected in his views on eugenics or good breeding. Here Schopenhauer wrote:
With our knowledge of the complete unalterability both of character and of mental faculties, we are led to the view that a real and thorough improvement of the human race might be reached not so much from outside as from within, not so much by theory and instruction as rather by the path of generation. Plato had something of the kind in mind when, in the fifth book of his Republic, he explained his plan for increasing and improving his warrior caste. If we could castrate all scoundrels and stick all stupid geese in a convent, and give men of noble character a whole harem, and procure men, and indeed thorough men, for all girls of intellect and understanding, then a generation would soon arise which would produce a better age than that of Pericles.
In another context, Schopenhauer reiterated his eugenic thesis: "If you want Utopian plans, I would say: the only solution to the problem is the despotism of the wise and noble members of a genuine aristocracy, a genuine nobility, achieved by mating the most magnanimous men with the cleverest and most gifted women. This proposal constitutes my Utopia and my Platonic Republic."Essays and Aphorisms, trans. R.J. Hollingdale, Middlesex: London, 1970, p. 154 Analysts (e.g., Keith Ansell-Pearson) have suggested that Schopenhauer's anti-egalitarianist sentiment and his support for eugenics influenced the neo-aristocratic philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche, who initially considered Schopenhauer his mentor.Nietzsche and Modern German Thought by K. Ansell-Pearson – 1991 – Psychology Press. |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Animal rights | Animal rights
As a consequence of his monistic philosophy, Schopenhauer was very concerned about animal welfare and rights.Christina Gerhardt, "Thinking With: Animals in Schopenhauer, Horkheimer and Adorno." Critical Theory and Animals. Ed. John Sanbonmatsu. Lanham: Rowland, 2011. 137–157.Stephen Puryear, "Schopenhauer on the Rights of Animals." European Journal of Philosophy 25/2 (2017):250–269 . For him, all individual animals, including humans, are essentially phenomenal manifestations of the one underlying Will. For him the word "will" designates force, power, impulse, energy, and desire; it is the closest word we have that can signify both the essence of all external things and our own direct, inner experience. Since every living thing possesses will, humans and animals are fundamentally the same and can recognize themselves in each other."Unlike the intellect, it [the Will] does not depend on the perfection of the organism, but is essentially the same in all animals as what is known to us so intimately. Accordingly, the animal has all the emotions of humans, such as joy, grief, fear, anger, love, hatred, strong desire, envy, and so on. The great difference between human and animal rests solely on the intellect's degrees of perfection. On the Will in Nature, "Physiology and Pathology". For this reason, he claimed that a good person would have sympathy for animals, who are our fellow sufferers.
In 1841, he praised the establishment in London of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, and in Philadelphia of the Animals' Friends Society. Schopenhauer went so far as to protest using the pronoun "it" in reference to animals because that led to treatment of them as though they were inanimate things."... in English all animals are of the neuter gender and so are represented by the pronoun 'it,' just as if they were inanimate things. The effect of this artifice is quite revolting, especially in the case of primates, such as dogs, monkeys, and the like...." On the Basis of Morality, § 19. To reinforce his points, Schopenhauer referred to anecdotal reports of the look in the eyes of a monkey who had been shot"I recall having read of an Englishman who, while hunting in India, had shot a monkey; he could not forget the look which the dying animal gave him, and since then had never again fired at monkeys." On the Basis of Morality, § 19. and also the grief of a baby elephant whose mother had been killed by a hunter."[Sir William Harris] describes how he shot his first elephant, a female. The next morning he went to look for the dead animal; all the other elephants had fled from the neighborhood except a young one, who had spent the night with its dead mother. Forgetting all fear, he came toward the sportsmen with the clearest and liveliest evidence of inconsolable grief, and put his tiny trunk round them in order to appeal to them for help. Harris says he was then filled with real remorse for what he had done, and felt as if he had committed a murder." On the basis of morality, § 19.
Schopenhauer was very attached to his succession of pet poodles. He criticized Spinoza's"His contempt for animals, who, as mere things for our use, are declared by him to be without rights, ... in conjunction with Pantheism, is at the same time absurd and abominable." The World as Will and Representation, Vol. 2, Chapter 50. belief that animals are a mere means for the satisfaction of humans.Spinoza, Ethics, Pt. IV, Prop. XXXVII, Note I.: "Still I do not deny that beasts feel: what I deny is, that we may not consult our own advantage and use them as we please, treating them in a way which best suits us; for their nature is not like ours ..." This is the exact opposite of Schopenhauer's doctrine. Also, Ethics, Appendix, 26, "whatsoever there be in nature beside man, a regard for our advantage does not call on us to preserve, but to preserve or destroy according to its various capacities, and to adapt to our use as best we may.""Such are the matters which I engage to prove in Prop. xviii of this Part, whereby it is plain that the law against the slaughtering of animals is founded rather on vain superstition and womanish pity than on sound reason. The rational quest of what is useful to us further teaches us the necessity of associating ourselves with our fellow-men, but not with beasts, or things, whose nature is different from our own; we have the same rights in respect to them as they have in respect to us. Nay, as everyone's right is defined by his virtue, or power, men have far greater rights over beasts than beasts have over men. Still I affirm that beasts feel. But I also affirm that we may consult our own advantage and use them as we please, treating them in the way which best suits us; for their nature is not like ours, and their emotions are naturally different from human emotions." Ethics, Part 4, Prop. 37, Note 1. Tim Madigan wrote that despite all of his bombast, Schopenhauer was a sympathetic character who had concerns for the suffering of animals. |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Intellectual interests and affinities | Intellectual interests and affinities |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Indology | Indology
thumb|Schopenhauer, 1852
Schopenhauer read the Latin translation of the ancient Hindu texts, the Upanishads, translated by French writer Anquetil du Perron from the Persian translation of Prince Dara Shukoh entitled Sirre-Akbar ("The Great Secret"). He was so impressed by its philosophy that he called it "the production of the highest human wisdom", and believed it contained superhuman concepts. Schopenhauer considered India as "the land of the most ancient and most pristine wisdom, the place from which Europeans could trace their descent and the tradition by which they had been influenced in so many decisive ways", and regarded the Upanishads as "the most profitable and elevating reading which [...] is possible in the world. It has been the solace of my life, and will be the solace of my death."
Schopenhauer was first introduced to Anquetil du Perron's translation by Friedrich Majer in 1814. They met during the winter of 1813–1814 in Weimar at the home of Schopenhauer's mother, according to the biographer Safranski. Majer was a follower of Herder, and an early Indologist. Schopenhauer did not begin serious study of the Indic texts until the summer of 1814. Safranski maintains that, between 1815 and 1817, Schopenhauer had another important cross-pollination with Indian thought in Dresden. This was through his neighbor of two years, Karl Christian Friedrich Krause. Krause was then a minor and rather unorthodox philosopher who attempted to mix his own ideas with ancient Indian wisdom. Krause had also mastered Sanskrit, unlike Schopenhauer, and they developed a professional relationship. It was from Krause that Schopenhauer learned meditation and received the closest thing to expert advice concerning Indian thought.Christopher McCoy, 3–4
For Schopenhauer, will had ontological primacy over the intellect; desire is prior to thought. Schopenhauer felt this was similar to notions of puruṣārtha or goals of life in Vedānta Hinduism.
In Schopenhauer's philosophy, denial of the will is attained by:
personal experience of an extremely great suffering that leads to loss of the will to live; or
knowledge of the essential nature of life in the world through observation of the suffering of other people.
The book Oupnekhat (Upanishad) always lay open on his table, and he invariably studied it before going to bed. He called the opening up of Sanskrit literature "the greatest gift of our century", and predicted that the philosophy and knowledge of the Upanishads would become the cherished faith of the West. Most noticeable, in the case of Schopenhauer's work, was the significance of the Chandogya Upanishad, whose Mahāvākya, Tat Tvam Asi, is mentioned throughout The World as Will and Representation.Christopher McCoy, 54–56 |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Buddhism | Buddhism
Schopenhauer noted a correspondence between his doctrines and the Four Noble Truths of Buddhism.Abelson, Peter (April 1993).
Schopenhauer and Buddhism . Philosophy East and West Volume 43, Number 2, pp. 255–278. University of Hawaii Press. Retrieved on: 12 April 2008. Similarities centered on the principles that life involves suffering, that suffering is caused by desire (taṇhā), and that the extinction of desire leads to liberation. Thus three of the four "truths of the Buddha" correspond to Schopenhauer's doctrine of the will.Janaway, Christopher, Self and World in Schopenhauer's Philosophy, pp. 28 ff. In Buddhism, while greed and lust are always unskillful, desire is ethically variable – it can be skillful, unskillful, or neutral.David Burton, "Buddhism, Knowledge and Liberation: A Philosophical Study." Ashgate Publishing, Ltd., 2004, p. 22.
Buddhist nirvāṇa is not equivalent to the condition that Schopenhauer described as denial of the will. Nirvāṇa is not the extinguishing of the person as some Western scholars have thought, but only the "extinguishing" (the literal meaning of nirvana) of the flames of greed, hatred, and delusion that assail a person's character.John J. Holder, Early Buddhist Discourses. Hackett Publishing Company, 2006, p. xx. Schopenhauer made the following statement in his discussion of religions:"Schopenhauer is often said to be the first modern Western philosopher to attempt integration of his work with Eastern ways of thinking. That he was the first is true, but the claim that he was influenced by Indian thought needs qualification. There is a remarkable correspondence in broad terms between some central Schopenhauerian doctrines and Buddhism: notably in the views that empirical existence is suffering, that suffering originates in desires, and that salvation can be attained by the extinction of desires. These three 'truths of the Buddha' are mirrored closely in the essential structure of the doctrine of the will." (On this, see Dorothea W. Dauer, Schopenhauer as Transmitter of Buddhist Ideas. Note also the discussion by Bryan Magee, The Philosophy of Schopenhauer, pp. 14–15, 316–321). Janaway, Christopher, Self and World in Schopenhauer's Philosophy, p. 28 f.
If I wished to take the results of my philosophy as the standard of truth, I should have to concede to Buddhism pre-eminence over the others. In any case, it must be a pleasure to me to see my doctrine in such close agreement with a religion that the majority of men on earth hold as their own, for this numbers far more followers than any other. And this agreement must be yet the more pleasing to me, inasmuch as in my philosophizing I have certainly not been under its influence [emphasis added]. For up till 1818, when my work appeared, there was to be found in Europe only a very few accounts of Buddhism.The World as Will and Representation, Vol. 2, Ch. 17
Buddhist philosopher Keiji Nishitani sought to distance Buddhism from Schopenhauer.Artistic detachment in Japan and the West: psychic distance in comparative aesthetics by S. Odin – 2001 – University of Hawaii Press. While Schopenhauer's philosophy may sound rather mystical in such a summary, his methodology was resolutely empirical, rather than speculative or transcendental:
Philosophy ... is a science, and as such has no articles of faith; accordingly, in it nothing can be assumed as existing except what is either positively given empirically, or demonstrated through indubitable conclusions.Parerga & Paralipomena, vol. I, p. 106., trans. E.F.J. Payne.
Also note:
This actual world of what is knowable, in which we are and which is in us, remains both the material and the limit of our consideration.World as Will and Representation, vol. I, p. 273, trans. E.F.J. Payne.
The argument that Buddhism affected Schopenhauer's philosophy more than any other Dharmic faith loses credence since he did not begin a serious study of Buddhism until after the publication of The World as Will and Representation in 1818.Christopher McCoy, 3 Scholars have started to revise earlier views about Schopenhauer's discovery of Buddhism. Proof of early interest and influence appears in Schopenhauer's 1815–16 notes (transcribed and translated by Urs App) about Buddhism. They are included in a recent case study that traces Schopenhauer's interest in Buddhism and documents its influence.App, Urs Arthur Schopenhauer and China. Sino-Platonic Papers Nr. 200 (April 2010) (PDF, 8.7 Mb PDF, 164 p.; Schopenhauer's early notes on Buddhism reproduced in Appendix). This study provides an overview of the actual discovery of Buddhism by Schopenhauer. Other scholarly work questions how similar Schopenhauer's philosophy actually is to Buddhism.Hutton, Kenneth Compassion in Schopenhauer and Śāntideva. Journal of Buddhist Ethics Vol. 21 (2014) |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Magic and occultism | Magic and occultism
Some traditions in Western esotericism and parapsychology interested Schopenhauer and influenced his philosophical theories. He praised animal magnetism as evidence for the reality of magic in his On the Will in Nature, and went so far as to accept the division of magic into left-hand and right-hand magic, although he doubted the existence of demons.
Schopenhauer grounded magic in the Will and claimed all forms of magical transformation depended on the human Will, not on ritual. This theory notably parallels Aleister Crowley's system of magic and its emphasis on human will. Given the importance of the Will to Schopenhauer's overarching system, this amounts to "suggesting his whole philosophical system had magical powers."Quote from Josephson-Storm (2017), p. 188. Schopenhauer rejected the theory of disenchantment and claimed philosophy should synthesize itself with magic, which he believed amount to "practical metaphysics".Josephson-Storm (2017), pp. 188–189.
Neoplatonism, including the traditions of Plotinus and to a lesser extent Marsilio Ficino, has also been cited as an influence on Schopenhauer. |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Interests | Interests
Schopenhauer had a wide range of interests, from science and opera to occultism and literature.
In his student years, Schopenhauer went more often to lectures in the sciences than philosophy. He kept a strong interest as his personal library contained near to 200 books of scientific literature at his death, and his works refer to scientific titles not found in the library.
Many evenings were spent in the theatre, opera and ballet; Schopenhauer especially liked the operas of Mozart, Rossini and Bellini. Schopenhauer considered music the highest art, and played the flute during his whole life.
As a polyglot, he knew German, Italian, Spanish, French, English, Latin and ancient Greek, and was an avid reader of poetry and literature. He particularly revered Goethe, Petrarch, Calderón and Shakespeare.
If Goethe had not been sent into the world simultaneously with Kant in order to counterbalance him, so to speak, in the spirit of the age, the latter would have been haunted like a nightmare many an aspiring mind and would have oppressed it with great affliction. But now the two have an infinitely wholesome effect from opposite directions and will probably raise the German spirit to a height surpassing even that of antiquity.
In philosophy, his most important influences were, according to himself, Kant, Plato and the Upanishads. Concerning the Upanishads and Vedas, he writes in The World as Will and Representation:
If the reader has also received the benefit of the Vedas, the access to which by means of the Upanishads is in my eyes the greatest privilege which this still young century (1818) may claim before all previous centuries, if then the reader, I say, has received his initiation in primeval Indian wisdom, and received it with an open heart, he will be prepared in the very best way for hearing what I have to tell him. It will not sound to him strange, as to many others, much less disagreeable; for I might, if it did not sound conceited, contend that every one of the detached statements which constitute the Upanishads, may be deduced as a necessary result from the fundamental thoughts which I have to enunciate, though those deductions themselves are by no means to be found there.The World as Will and Representation Preface to the first edition, p. xiii |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Thoughts on other philosophers | Thoughts on other philosophers |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Giordano Bruno and Spinoza | Giordano Bruno and Spinoza
Schopenhauer saw Bruno and Spinoza as philosophers not bound to their age or nation. "Both were fulfilled by the thought, that as manifold the appearances of the world may be, it is still one being, that appears in all of them. ... Consequently, there is no place for God as creator of the world in their philosophy, but God is the world itself."
Schopenhauer expressed regret that Spinoza stuck, for the presentation of his philosophy, with the concepts of scholasticism and Cartesian philosophy, and tried to use geometrical proofs that do not hold because of vague and overly broad definitions. Bruno on the other hand, who knew much about nature and ancient literature, presented his ideas with Italian vividness, and is amongst philosophers the only one who comes near Plato's poetic and dramatic power of exposition.
Schopenhauer noted that their philosophies do not provide any ethics, and it is therefore very remarkable that Spinoza called his main work Ethics. In fact, it could be considered complete from the standpoint of life-affirmation, if one completely ignores morality and self-denial. It is yet even more remarkable that Schopenhauer mentions Spinoza as an example of the denial of the will, if one uses the French biography by Jean Maximilien Lucas as the key to Tractatus de Intellectus Emendatione. |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Immanuel Kant | Immanuel Kant
thumb|right|Schopenhauer's philosophy took Kant's work as its foundation. While he praised Kant's greatness, he nonetheless included a highly detailed criticism of Kantian philosophy as an appendix to The World as Will and Representation.
Kant's influence on Schopenhauer's development, personally as well as in philosophy, was extensive. Kant's philosophy lies at the foundation of Schopenhauer's, and he had high praise for the Transcendental Aesthetic section of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. Schopenhauer maintained that Kant stands in the same relation to philosophers such as Berkeley and Plato, as Copernicus to Hicetas, Philolaus, and Aristarchus: Kant succeeded in demonstrating what previous philosophers merely asserted.
Schopenhauer writes about Kant's influence on his work in the preface to the second edition of The World as Will and Representation:
In his study room, one bust was of Buddha, the other was of Kant. The bond which Schopenhauer felt with the philosopher of Königsberg is demonstrated in an unfinished poem he dedicated to Kant (included in volume 2 of the Parerga):
Schopenhauer dedicated one fifth of his main work, The World as Will and Representation, to a detailed criticism of the Kantian philosophy.
Schopenhauer praised Kant for his distinction between appearance and the thing-in-itself, whereas the general consensus in German idealism was that this was the weakest spot of Kant's theory, since, according to Kant, causality can find application on objects of experience only, and consequently, things-in-themselves cannot be the cause of appearances. The inadmissibility of this reasoning was also acknowledged by Schopenhauer. He insisted that this was a true conclusion, drawn from false premises. |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Post-Kantian school | Post-Kantian school
The leading figures of post-Kantian philosophy—Johann Gottlieb Fichte, F. W. J. Schelling and G. W. F. Hegel—were not respected by Schopenhauer. He argued that they were not philosophers at all, for they lacked "the first requirement of a philosopher, namely a seriousness and honesty of inquiry."Parerga and Paralipomena, Vol. 1, Appendix to "Sketch of a History of the Doctrine of the Ideal and the Real," trans. E. J. Payne (Oxford, 1974), p. 21. Rather, they were merely sophists who, excelling in the art of beguiling the public, pursued their own selfish interests (such as professional advancement within the university system). Diatribes against the alleged vacuity, dishonesty, pomposity, and self-interest of these contemporaries are to be found throughout Schopenhauer's published writings. The following passage is an example:
Schopenhauer deemed Schelling the most talented of the three and wrote that he would recommend his "elucidatory paraphrase of the highly important doctrine of Kant" concerning the intelligible character, if he had been honest enough to admit he was parroting Kant, instead of hiding this relation in a cunning manner.
Schopenhauer reserved his most unqualified damning condemnation for Hegel, whom he considered less worthy than Fichte or Schelling. Whereas Fichte was merely a windbag (Windbeutel), Hegel was a "commonplace, inane, loathsome, repulsive, and ignorant charlatan."Parerga and Paralipomena, Vol. I, "Fragments for the History of Philosophy", Sec. 13, trans. E. J. Payne (Oxford, 1974), p. 96. The philosophers Karl Popper and Mario Bunge agreed with this distinction. Hegel, Schopenhauer wrote in the preface to his Two Fundamental Problems of Ethics, not only "performed no service to philosophy, but he has had a detrimental influence on philosophy, and thereby on German literature in general, really a downright stupefying, or we could even say a pestilential influence, which it is therefore the duty of everyone capable of thinking for himself and judging for himself to counteract in the most express terms at every opportunity."The Two Fundamental Problems of Ethics, Preface to the First Edition, trans. Christopher Janaway (Cambridge, 2009), p. 15. |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Influence and legacy | Influence and legacy
thumb|Sculpture of Schopenhauer by Elisabeth Ney
Schopenhauer remained the most influential German philosopher until the First World War. His philosophy was a starting point for a new generation of philosophers including Julius Bahnsen, Paul Deussen, Lazar von Hellenbach, Karl Robert Eduard von Hartmann, Ernst Otto Lindner, Philipp Mainländer, Friedrich Nietzsche, Olga Plümacher and Agnes Taubert. His legacy shaped the intellectual debate, and forced movements that were utterly opposed to him, neo-Kantianism and positivism, to address issues they would otherwise have completely ignored, and in doing so he changed them markedly. The French writer Maupassant commented that "to-day even those who execrate him seem to carry in their own souls particles of his thought".Beside Schopenhauer's Corpse Other philosophers of the 19th century who cited his influence include Hans Vaihinger, Volkelt, Solovyov and Weininger.
Schopenhauer was well read by physicists, most notably Einstein, Schrödinger, Wolfgang Pauli, and Majorana. Einstein described Schopenhauer's thoughts as a "continual consolation" and called him a genius. In his Berlin study three figures hung on the wall: Faraday, Maxwell, Schopenhauer.Howard (1997). p. 87 Konrad Wachsmann recalled: "He often sat with one of the well-worn Schopenhauer volumes, and as he sat there, he seemed so pleased, as if he were engaged with a serene and cheerful work."Howard (1997). p. 92
When Erwin Schrödinger discovered Schopenhauer ("the greatest savant of the West") he considered switching his study of physics to philosophy. He maintained the idealistic views during the rest of his life.Howard (1997). p. 132 Wolfgang Pauli accepted the main tenet of Schopenhauer's metaphysics, that the thing-in-itself is will.
But most of all Schopenhauer is famous for his influence on artists. Richard Wagner became one of the earliest and most famous adherents of the Schopenhauerian philosophy.See e.g. Magee (2000) 276–278. The admiration was not mutual, and Schopenhauer proclaimed: "I remain faithful to Rossini and Mozart!" So he has been nicknamed "the artist's philosopher". See also Influence of Schopenhauer on Tristan und Isolde.
Under the influence of Schopenhauer, Leo Tolstoy became convinced that the truth of all religions lies in self-renunciation. When he read Schopenhauer's philosophy, Tolstoy exclaimed "at present I am convinced that Schopenhauer is the greatest genius among men. ... It is the whole world in an incomparably beautiful and clear reflection."Tolstoy's letter to Afanasy Fet on 30 August 1869. "Do you know what this summer has meant for me? Constant raptures over Schopenhauer and a whole series of spiritual delights as I've never experienced before. I have brought all of his works and read him over and over, Kant too by the way. Assuredly no student has ever learned and discovered so much in one semester as I have during this summer. I do not know if I shall ever change my opinion, but at present I am convinced that Schopenhauer is the greatest genius among men. You say he is so-so, he has written a few things on philosophy? What is so-so? It is the whole world in an incomparably beautiful and clear reflection. I have started to translate him. Won't you help me? Indeed, I cannot understand how his name can be unknown. The only explanation for this can only be the one he so often repeats, that is, that there is scarcely anyone but idiots in the world." He said that what he has written in War and Peace is also said by Schopenhauer in The World as Will and Representation.
Jorge Luis Borges remarked that the reason he had never attempted to write a systematic account of his world view, despite his penchant for philosophy and metaphysics in particular, was because Schopenhauer had already written it for him.
Other figures in literature who were strongly influenced by Schopenhauer were Thomas Mann, Thomas Hardy, Afanasy Fet, J.-K. Huysmans and George Santayana. In Herman Melville's final years, while he wrote Billy Budd, he read Schopenhauer's essays and marked them heavily. Scholar Brian Yothers notes that Melville "marked numerous misanthropic and even suicidal remarks, suggesting an attraction to the most extreme sorts of solitude, but he also made note of Schopenhauer's reflection on the moral ambiguities of genius." Schopenhauer's attraction to and discussions of both Eastern and Western religions in conjunction with each other made an impression on Melville in his final years.
Sergei Prokofiev, although initially reluctant to engage with works noted for their pessimism, became fascinated with Schopenhauer after reading Aphorisms on the Wisdom of Life in Parerga and Paralipomena. "With his truths Schopenhauer gave me a spiritual world and an awareness of happiness."
Friedrich Nietzsche owed the awakening of his philosophical interest to reading The World as Will and Representation and admitted that he was one of the few philosophers that he respected, dedicating to him his essay "Schopenhauer als Erzieher",Schopenhauer as Educator one of his Untimely Meditations.
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Early in his career, Ludwig Wittgenstein adopted Schopenhauer's epistemological idealism, and some traits of Schopenhauer's influence (particularly Schopenhauerian transcendentalism) can be observed in the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus. Later on, Wittgenstein rejected epistemological transcendental idealism for Gottlob Frege's conceptual realism. In later years, Wittgenstein became highly dismissive of Schopenhauer, describing him as an ultimately shallow thinker.Culture & Value, p. 24, 1933–34Malcolm, Norman. Ludwig Wittgenstein: A Memoir. Oxford University Press, 1958, p. 6 His friend Bertrand Russell had a low opinion on the philosopher, and even came to attack him in his History of Western Philosophy for hypocritically praising asceticism yet not acting upon it.
Opposite to Russell on the foundations of mathematics, the Dutch mathematician L. E. J. Brouwer incorporated Kant's and Schopenhauer's ideas in the philosophical school of intuitionism, where mathematics is considered as a purely mental activity instead of an analytic activity wherein objective properties of reality are revealed. Brouwer was also influenced by Schopenhauer's metaphysics, and wrote an essay on mysticism.
Schopenhauer's philosophy has made its way into a novel, The Schopenhauer Cure, by American existential psychiatrist and emeritus professor of psychiatry Irvin Yalom.
Schopenhauer's philosophy, and the discussions on philosophical pessimism it has engendered, has been the focus of contemporary thinkers such as David Benatar, Thomas Ligotti, and Eugene Thacker. Their work also served as an inspiration for the popular HBO TV series True Detective as well as Life Is Beautiful. In this regard, Schopenhauer is sometimes considered the founding father of today's antinatalism.M.Morioka What Is Antinatalism? and Other Essays , pp.8–12.
Advocates of idealism in contemporary analytic philosophy and neuroscience such as Bernardo Kastrup and Christof Koch owe their philosophical system, in part, to the metaphysics of Schopenhauer.Kastrup, Bernardo Decoding Schopenhauer’s Metaphysics: The Key to Understanding How It Solves the Hard Problem of Consciousness and the Paradoxes of Quantum Mechanics Iff Books (July 31, 2020)Koch, Christof Then I Am Myself the World: What Consciousness Is and How to Expand It Basic Books (May 7, 2024) pp. 49, 127, 132, 139, 209, 244. |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Selected bibliography | Selected bibliography
On the Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason (Ueber die vierfache Wurzel des Satzes vom zureichenden Grunde), 1813
On Vision and Colors (Ueber das Sehn und die Farben), 1816
Theory of Colors (Theoria colorum physiologica), 1830.
The World as Will and Representation (alternatively translated as The World as Will and Idea; original German is Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung): vol. 1, 1818–1819, vol. 2, 1844 Världen som vilja och föreställning
Vol. 1 Dover edition 1966,
Vol. 2 Dover edition 1966,
Peter Smith Publisher hardcover set 1969,
Everyman Paperback combined abridged edition (290 pp.)
The Longman Library of Primary Sources in Philosophy, vol. 1, 2008; vol. 2, 2010. Title translated as The World as Will and Presentation, rather than Representation.
The Art of Being Right (Eristische Dialektik: Die Kunst, Recht zu Behalten), 1831
On the Will in Nature (Ueber den Willen in der Natur), 1836
On the Freedom of the Will (Ueber die Freiheit des menschlichen Willens), 1838
On the Basis of Morality (Ueber die Grundlage der Moral), 1839
Contains On the Freedom of the Will and On the Basis of Morality.
Freely available from Internet Archive. Contains Preisschrift über die Freiheit des Willens and Preisschrift über die Grundlage der Moral.
Parerga and Paralipomena (2 vols., 1851) – Reprint: (Oxford: Clarendon Press) (2 vols., 1974) (English translation by E. F. J. PayneEric Francis Jules Payne (17 February 1895 – 12 January 1983))
Printings:
1974 Hardcover, by ISBN
Vols. 1 and 2, ,
Vol. 1, ISBN
Vol. 2, ,
1974–1980 Paperback, Vol. 1, , Vol. 2, ,
2001 Paperback, Vol. 1, , Vol. 2,
Essays and Aphorisms, being excerpts from Volume 2 of Parerga und Paralipomena, selected and translated by R. J. Hollingdale, with Introduction by R J Hollingdale, Penguin Classics, 1970, Paperback 1973:
An Enquiry concerning Ghost-seeing, and what is connected therewith (Versuch über das Geistersehn und was damit zusammenhangt), 1851
Arthur Schopenhauer, Manuscript Remains, Volume II, Berg Publishers Ltd., |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Online | Online
The Art of Controversy (Die Kunst, Recht zu behalten) . (bilingual) [The Art of Being Right]
Studies in Pessimism – audiobook from LibriVox
The World as Will and Idea at the Internet Archive:
Volume I
Volume II
Volume III
"On the fourfold root of the principle of sufficient reason" and "On the will in nature". Two essays:
Internet Archive. Translated by Mrs. Karl Hillebrand (1903).
Cornell University Library Historical Monographs Collection. Reprinted by Cornell University Library Digital Collections
Facsimile edition of Schopenhauer's manuscripts in SchopenhauerSource
Essays of Schopenhauer |
Arthur Schopenhauer | See also | See also
Antinatalism
Existential nihilism
Eye of a needle
God in Buddhism
Massacre of the Innocents (Guido Reni)
Misotheism
Mortal coil
Nihilism
Post-Schopenhauerian pessimism |
Arthur Schopenhauer | References | References |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Sources | Sources
Albright, Daniel (2004) Modernism and Music: An Anthology of Sources. University of Chicago Press.
Beiser, Frederick C., Weltschmerz: Pessimism in German Philosophy, 1860–1900 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016).
Hannan, Barbara, The Riddle of the World: A Reconsideration of Schopenhauer's Philosophy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009).
Magee, Bryan, Confessions of a Philosopher, Random House, 1998, . Chapters 20, 21.
Safranski, Rüdiger (1990) Schopenhauer and the Wild Years of Philosophy. Harvard University Press, ; orig. German Schopenhauer und Die wilden Jahre der Philosophie, Carl Hanser Verlag (1987)
Thomas Mann editor, The Living Thoughts of Schopenhauer, Longmans Green & Co., 1939 |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Further reading | Further reading |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Biographies | Biographies
Copleston, Frederick, Arthur Schopenhauer, philosopher of pessimism (Burns, Oates & Washbourne, 1946)
Damm, O. F., Arthur Schopenhauer – eine Biographie (Reclam, 1912)
Fischer, Kuno, Arthur Schopenhauer (Heidelberg: Winter, 1893); revised as Schopenhauers Leben, Werke und Lehre (Heidelberg: Winter, 1898).
Grisebach, Eduard, Schopenhauer – Geschichte seines Lebens (Berlin: Hofmann, 1876).
Hamlyn, D. W., Schopenhauer, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul (1980, 1985)
Hasse, Heinrich, Schopenhauer. (Reinhardt, 1926)
Hübscher, Arthur, Arthur Schopenhauer – Ein Lebensbild (Leipzig: Brockhaus, 1938).
Mann, Thomas, Schopenhauer (Bermann-Fischer, 1938)
Matthews, Jack, Schopenhauer's Will: Das Testament, Nine Point Publishing, 2015. . A recent creative biography by philosophical novelist Jack Matthews.
Safranski, Rüdiger, Schopenhauer und die wilden Jahre der Philosophie – Eine Biographie, hard cover Carl Hanser Verlag, München 1987, , pocket edition Fischer: .
Safranski, Rüdiger, Schopenhauer and the Wild Years of Philosophy, trans. Ewald Osers (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1989)
Schneider, Walther, Schopenhauer – Eine Biographie (Vienna: Bermann-Fischer, 1937).
Wallace, William, Life of Arthur Schopenhauer (London: Scott, 1890; repr., St. Clair Shores, Mich.: Scholarly Press, 1970)
Zimmern, Helen, Arthur Schopenhauer: His Life and His Philosophy (London: Longmans, Green & Co, 1876) |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Other books | Other books
App, Urs. Arthur Schopenhauer and China. Sino-Platonic Papers Nr. 200 (April 2010) (PDF, 8.7 Mb PDF, 164 p.). Contains extensive appendixes with transcriptions and English translations of Schopenhauer's early notes about Buddhism and Indian philosophy.
App, Urs, Schopenhauers Kompass. Die Geburt einer Philosophie. UniversityMedia, Rorschach/ Kyoto 2011.
Atwell, John. Schopenhauer on the Character of the World, The Metaphysics of Will.
Atwell, John, Schopenhauer, The Human Character.
Edwards, Anthony. An Evolutionary Epistemological Critique of Schopenhauer's Metaphysics. 123 Books, 2011.
Copleston, Frederick, Schopenhauer: Philosopher of Pessimism, 1946 (reprinted London: Search Press, 1975).
Gardiner, Patrick, 1963. Schopenhauer. Penguin Books.
Janaway, Christopher, 2002. Schopenhauer: A Very Short introduction. Oxford University Press.
Janaway, Christopher, 2003. Self and World in Schopenhauer's Philosophy. Oxford University Press.
Magee, Bryan, The Philosophy of Schopenhauer, Oxford University Press (1988, reprint 1997).
Marcin, Raymond B. In Search of Schopenhauer's Cat: Arthur Schopenhauer's Quantum-Mystical Theory of Justice. Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2005.
Norberg, Jakob, Schopenhauer's Politics
Mannion, Gerard, "Schopenhauer, Religion and Morality – The Humble Path to Ethics", Ashgate Press, New Critical Thinking in Philosophy Series, 2003, 314pp.
Whittaker, Thomas, Schopenhauer
Zimmern, Helen, Arthur Schopenhauer, his Life and Philosophy, London, Longman, and Co., 1876.
Kastrup, Bernardo. Decoding Schopenhauer's Metaphysics – The key to understanding how it solves the hard problem of consciousness and the paradoxes of quantum mechanics. Winchester/Washington, iff Books, 2020.
de Botton, Alain: The Consolations of Philosophy. Hamish Hamilton, London 2000. (Chapter: Consolation for a Broken Heart). |
Arthur Schopenhauer | Articles | Articles
Jiménez, Camilo, 2006, "Tagebuch eines Ehrgeizigen: Arthur Schopenhauers Studienjahre in Berlin," Avinus Magazin (in German).
Luchte, James, 2009, "The Body of Sublime Knowledge: The Aesthetic Phenomenology of Arthur Schopenhauer," Heythrop Journal, Volume 50, Number 2, pp. 228–242.
Mazard, Eisel, 2005, "Schopenhauer and the Empirical Critique of Idealism in the History of Ideas. " On Schopenhauer's (debated) place in the history of European philosophy and his relation to his predecessors.
Sangharakshita, 2004, "Schopenhauer and aesthetic appreciation."
Oxenford's "Iconoclasm in German Philosophy," (See p. 388)
Thacker, Eugene, 2020. "A Philosophy in Ruins, An Unquiet Void." Introduction to Arthur Schopenhauer, On the Suffering of the World. Repeater Books. . |
Arthur Schopenhauer | External links | External links
"Arthur Schopenhauer" an article by Mary Troxell in the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2011
Kant's philosophy as rectified by Schopenhauer
Timeline of German Philosophers
A Quick Introduction to Schopenhauer
Ross, Kelley L., 1998, "Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860)". Two short essays, on Schopenhauer's life and work, and on his dim view of academia.
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Arthur Schopenhauer | Table of Content | Short description, Early life, Education, Early work, Later life, Philosophy, Theory of perception, World as representation, World as will, Art and aesthetics, Mathematics, Ethics, Eternal justice, Quietism, Psychology, Political and social thought, Politics, Punishment, Races and religions, Women, Pederasty, Heredity and eugenics, Animal rights, Intellectual interests and affinities, Indology, Buddhism, Magic and occultism, Interests, Thoughts on other philosophers, Giordano Bruno and Spinoza, Immanuel Kant, Post-Kantian school, Influence and legacy, Selected bibliography, Online, See also, References, Sources, Further reading, Biographies, Other books, Articles, External links |
Angola | Short description | Angola, officially the Republic of Angola, is a country on the west-central coast of Southern Africa. It is the second-largest Portuguese-speaking (Lusophone) country in both total area and population and is the seventh-largest country in Africa. It is bordered by Namibia to the south, the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the north, Zambia to the east, and the Atlantic Ocean to the west. Angola has an exclave province, the province of Cabinda, that borders the Republic of the Congo and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The capital and most populous city is Luanda.
Angola has been inhabited since the Paleolithic Age. After the Bantu expansion reached the region, states were formed by the 13th century and organised into confederations. The Kingdom of Kongo ascended to achieve hegemony among the other kingdoms from the 14th century. Portuguese explorers established relations with Kongo in 1483. To the south were the kingdoms of Ndongo and Matamba, with the Ovimbundu kingdoms further south, and the Mbunda Kingdom in the east.
The Portuguese began colonising the coast in the 16th century. Kongo fought three wars against the Portuguese, ending in the Portuguese conquest of Ndongo. The banning of the slave trade in the 19th century severely disrupted Kongo's undiversified economic system and European settlers gradually began to establish their presence in the interior of the region. The Portuguese colony that became Angola did not achieve its present borders until the early 20th century and experienced strong resistance from native groups such as the Cuamato, the Kwanyama, and the Mbunda.
After a protracted anti-colonial struggle (1961–1974), Angola achieved independence in 1975 as a one-party Republic, but the country descended into a devastating civil war the same year, between the ruling People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), backed by the Soviet Union and Cuba; the insurgent National Union for the Total Independence of Angola, an originally Maoist and later anti-communist group supported by the United States and South Africa; the militant organization National Liberation Front of Angola, backed by Zaire; and the Front for the Liberation of the Enclave of Cabinda seeking the independence of the Cabinda exclave, also backed by Zaire.
Since the end of the civil war in 2002, Angola has emerged as a relatively stable constitutional republic, and its economy is among the fastest-growing in the world, with China, the European Union, and the United States being the country's largest investment and trade partners. However, the economic growth is highly uneven, with most of the nation's wealth concentrated in a disproportionately small part of the population as most Angolans have a low standard of living; life expectancy is among the lowest in the world, while infant mortality is among the highest.
Angola is a member of the United Nations, African Union, the Community of Portuguese Language Countries, and the Southern African Development Community. , the Angolan population is estimated at 37.2 million. Angolan culture reflects centuries of Portuguese influence, namely the predominance of the Portuguese language and of the Catholic Church, intermingled with a variety of indigenous customs and traditions. |
Angola | Etymology | Etymology
The name Angola comes from the Portuguese colonial name ('Kingdom of Angola'), which appeared as early as Paulo Dias de Novais's 1571 charter. The toponym was derived by the Portuguese from the title ngola, held by the kings of Ndongo and Matamba. Ndongo in the highlands, between the Kwanza and Lucala rivers, was nominally a possession of the Kingdom of Kongo. But in the 16th century it was seeking greater independence. |
Angola | History | History |
Angola | Early migrations and political units | Early migrations and political units
thumb|upright|left|King João I, Manikongo of the Kingdom of Kongo
Modern Angola was populated predominantly by nomadic Khoi and San peoples prior to the first Bantu migrations. The Khoi and San peoples were hunter-gatherers, rather than practicing pastoralism or cultivation of crops.
In the first millennium BC, they were displaced by Bantu peoples arriving from the north, most of whom likely originated in what is today northwestern Nigeria and southern Niger. Bantu speakers introduced the cultivation of bananas and taro, as well as maintenance of large cattle herds, to Angola's central highlands and the Luanda plain. Due to a number of inhibiting geographic factors throughout the territory of Angola, namely harshly traversable land, hot/humid climate, and a plethora of deadly diseases, intermingling of pre-colonial tribes in Angola had been rare.
After settlement of the migrants, a number of political entities developed. The best-known of these was the Kingdom of Kongo, based in Angola. It extended northward to what are now the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Republic of the Congo, and Gabon. It established trade routes with other city-states and civilisations up and down the coast of southwestern and western Africa. Its traders even reached Great Zimbabwe and the Mutapa Empire, although the kingdom engaged in little or no trans-oceanic trade. To its south lay the Kingdom of Ndongo, from which the area of the later Portuguese colony was sometimes known as Dongo. Next to that was the Kingdom of Matamba. The lesser Kingdom of Kakongo to the north was later a vassal of the Kingdom of Kongo. The people in all of these states spoke Kikongo as a common language. |
Angola | Portuguese colonization | Portuguese colonization
thumb|upright|left|Coat of arms granted to King Afonso I of Kongo by King Manuel I of Portugal
Portuguese explorer Diogo Cão reached the area in 1484. The previous year, the Portuguese had established relations with the Kingdom of Kongo, which stretched at the time from modern Gabon in the north to the Kwanza River in the south. The Portuguese established their primary early trading post at Soyo, which is now the northernmost city in Angola apart from the Cabinda exclave.
Paulo Dias de Novais founded São Paulo de Loanda (Luanda) in 1575 with a hundred families of settlers and four hundred soldiers. Benguela was fortified in 1587 and became a township in 1617. An authoritarian state, the Kingdom of Kongo was highly centralised around its monarch and controlled neighbouring states as vassals. It had a strong economy, based on the industries of copper, ivory, salt, hides, and, to a lesser extent, slaves. The transition from a feudal system of slavery to a capitalist one with Portugal would prove crucial to the history of the Kingdom of Kongo.
As relations between Kongo and Portugal grew in the early 16th century, trade between the kingdoms also increased. Most of the trade was in palm cloth, copper, and ivory, but also increasing numbers of slaves. Kongo exported few slaves, and its slave market had remained internal. But, following the development of a successful sugar-growing colony after Portuguese settlement of São Tomé, Kongo became a major source of slaves for the island's traders and plantations. Correspondence by King Afonso documents the purchase and sale of slaves within the country. His accounts also detail which slaves captured in war were given or sold to Portuguese merchants.
Afonso continued to expand the kingdom of Kongo into the 1540s, expanding its borders to the south and east. The expansion of Kongo's population, coupled with Afonso's earlier religious reforms, allowed the ruler to centralize power in his capital and increase the power of the monarchy. He also established a royal monopoly on some trade. To govern the growing slave trade, Afonso and several Portuguese kings claimed a joint monopoly on the external slave trade.
The slave trade increasingly became Kongo's primary, and arguably sole, economic sector. A major obstacle for the Kingdom of Kongo was that slaves were the only commodity for which the European powers were willing to trade. Kongo lacked an effective international currency. Kongolese nobles could buy slaves with the national currency of nzimbu shells, which could be traded for slaves. These could be sold to gain international currency.
As the slave trade was the only commodity in which Europeans were interested in the region during the 16th and 17th centuries, the Kongo economy was unable to diversify or later industrialise outside of sectors in which slavery was involved, such as the arms industry.Rinquist, John: Kongo Iron: Symbolic Power, Superior Technology and Slave Wisdom, African Diaspora Archaeology Newsletter, Volume 11, Issue 3, September 2008, Article 3, pp.14–15 The increased production and sale of guns within the kingdom was due to the salient issue of the slave trade, which had become an increasingly violent struggle. There was a constant need for slaves for the kings and queens to sell in exchange for foreign commodities, the absence of which would prevent them from having any influence with European powers such as Portugal and eventually the Dutch Republic.
Kongolese kings needed this influence to garner support from European powers for quelling internal rebellions. The situation became increasingly complicated during the rule of Garcia II, who needed the assistance of the Dutch military to drive out the Portuguese from Luanda, in spite of the fact that Portugal was Kongo's primary slave trading partner.
By the early 17th century, the supply of foreign slaves captured by the Kongolese externally was waning. The government began to approve the enslavement of freeborn Kongolese citizens for relatively minor infractions, nearly any disobeying of the authoritarian system and the aristocracy. If several villagers were deemed guilty of a crime, it became relatively common for the whole village to be enslaved. The resulting chaos and internal conflict from Garcia II's reign would lead into that of his son and successor, António I. He was killed in 1665 by Portuguese at the Battle of Mbwila 1665, together with a substantial proportion of the aristocracy. The colonists were expanding their power.Thornton, John K: Warfare in Atlantic Africa 1500–1800, 1999. Routledge. Page 103.
War broke out more widely in the Kingdom of Kongo after the death of António I. Much of the stability and access to iron ore and charcoal necessary for gunsmiths to maintain the arms industry was disrupted. From then on, in this period almost every Kongolese citizen was in danger of being enslaved.Thornton, John K: The Kongolese Saint Anthonty: Dona Beatriz Kimpa Vita and the Antonian Movement, 1684–1706, page 69. Cambridge University, 1998 Many Kongolese subjects were adroit in making guns, and they were enslaved to have their skills available to colonists in the New World, where they worked as blacksmiths, ironworkers, and charcoal makers.
The Portuguese established several other settlements, forts and trading posts along the Angolan coast, principally trading in Angolan slaves for plantations. Local slave dealers provided a large number of slaves for the Portuguese Empire, usually in exchange for manufactured goods from Europe. This part of the Atlantic slave trade continued until after Brazil's independence in the 1820s.
thumb|right|Queen Ana de Sousa of Ndongo meeting with the Portuguese, 1657
thumb|left|Depiction of Luanda from 1755
Despite Portugal's territorial claims in Angola, its control over much of the country's vast interior was minimal. In the 16th century Portugal gained control of the coast through a series of treaties and wars. Life for European colonists was difficult and progress was slow. John Iliffe notes that "Portuguese records of Angola from the 16th century show that a great famine occurred on average every seventy years; accompanied by epidemic disease, it might kill one-third or one-half of the population, destroying the demographic growth of a generation and forcing colonists back into the river valleys".Iliffe, John (2007) Africans: the history of a continent . Cambridge University Press. p. 68. . For valuable complements for the 16th and 17th centuries see Beatrix Heintze, Studien zur Geschichte Angolas im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert, Colónia/Alemanha: Köppe, 1996
During the Portuguese Restoration War, the Dutch West India Company occupied the principal settlement of Luanda in 1641, using alliances with local peoples to carry out attacks against Portuguese holdings elsewhere. A fleet under Salvador de Sá retook Luanda in 1648; reconquest of the rest of the territory was completed by 1650. New treaties with the Kongo were signed in 1649; others with Njinga's Kingdom of Matamba and Ndongo followed in 1656. The conquest of Pungo Andongo in 1671 was the last major Portuguese expansion from Luanda, as attempts to invade Kongo in 1670 and Matamba in 1681 failed. Colonial outposts also expanded inward from Benguela, but until the late 19th century the inroads from Luanda and Benguela were very limited. Hamstrung by a series of political upheavals in the early 1800s, Portugal was slow to mount a large scale annexation of Angolan territory.
thumb|right|upright|History of Angola; written in Luanda in 1680.
The slave trade was abolished in Angola in 1836, and in 1854 the colonial government freed all its existing slaves. Four years later, a more progressive administration appointed by Portugal abolished slavery altogether. However, these decrees remained largely unenforceable, and the Portuguese depended on assistance from the British Royal Navy and what became known as the Blockade of Africa to enforce their ban on the slave trade. This coincided with a series of renewed military expeditions into the bush.
By the mid-nineteenth century Portugal had established its dominion as far north as the Congo River and as far south as Mossâmedes. Until the late 1880s, Portugal entertained proposals to link Angola with its colony in Mozambique but was blocked by British and Belgian opposition. In this period, the Portuguese came up against different forms of armed resistance from various peoples in Angola.See René Pélissier, Les guerres grises: Résistance et revoltes en Angola, (1845-1941), Éditions Pélissier, Montamets, 78630 Orgeval (France), 1977
The Berlin Conference in 1884–1885 set the colony's borders, delineating the boundaries of Portuguese claims in Angola, although many details were unresolved until the 1920s.See René Pélissier, La colonie du Minotaure. Nationalismes et révoltes en Angola (1926–1961), éditions Pélissier, Montamets, 78630 Orgeval (France), 1979 Trade between Portugal and its African territories rapidly increased as a result of protective tariffs, leading to increased development, and a wave of new Portuguese immigrants.
In 1925, an expedition to Angola was conducted by American naturalist explorer Arthur Stannard Vernay.
Between 1939 and 1943, Portuguese army operations against the Mucubal, who they accused of rebellion and cattle-thieving, resulted in hundreds of Mucubal killed. During the campaign, 3,529 were taken prisoner, 20% of whom were women and children, and imprisoned in concentration camps. Many died in captivity from undernourishment, violence and forced labor. Around 600 were sent to Sao Tome and Principe. Hundreds were also sent to a camp in Damba, where 26% died. |
Angola | Angolan War of Independence | Angolan War of Independence
thumb|left|Portuguese Armed Forces marching in Luanda during the Portuguese Colonial Wars (1961–74).
Under colonial law, black Angolans were forbidden from forming political parties or labour unions. The first nationalist movements did not take root until after World War II, spearheaded by a largely Westernised and Portuguese-speaking urban class, which included many mestiços. During the early 1960s they were joined by other associations stemming from ad hoc labour activism in the rural workforce. Portugal's refusal to address increasing Angolan demands for self-determination provoked an armed conflict, which erupted in 1961 with the Baixa de Cassanje revolt and gradually evolved into a protracted war of independence that persisted for the next twelve years. Throughout the conflict, three militant nationalist movements with their own partisan guerrilla wings emerged from the fighting between the Portuguese government and local forces, supported to varying degrees by the Portuguese Communist Party.
The National Front for the Liberation of Angola (FNLA) recruited from Bakongo refugees in Zaire. Benefiting from particularly favourable political circumstances in Léopoldville, and especially from a common border with Zaire, Angolan political exiles were able to build up a power base among a large expatriate community from related families, clans, and traditions. People on both sides of the border spoke mutually intelligible dialects and enjoyed shared ties to the historical Kingdom of Kongo. Though as foreigners skilled Angolans could not take advantage of Mobutu Sese Seko's state employment programme, some found work as middlemen for the absentee owners of various lucrative private ventures. The migrants eventually formed the FNLA with the intention of making a bid for political power upon their envisaged return to Angola.
thumb|upright|Members of the National Liberation Front of Angola training in 1973.
A largely Ovimbundu guerrilla initiative against the Portuguese in central Angola from 1966 was spearheaded by Jonas Savimbi and the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA). It remained handicapped by its geographic remoteness from friendly borders, the ethnic fragmentation of the Ovimbundu, and the isolation of peasants on European plantations where they had little opportunity to mobilise.
During the late 1950s, the rise of the Marxist–Leninist Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) in the east and Dembos hills north of Luanda came to hold special significance. Formed as a coalition resistance movement by the Angolan Communist Party, the organisation's leadership remained predominantly Ambundu and courted public sector workers in Luanda. Although both the MPLA and its rivals accepted material assistance from the Soviet Union or the People's Republic of China, the former harboured strong anti-imperialist views and was openly critical of the United States and its support for Portugal. This allowed it to win important ground on the diplomatic front, soliciting support from nonaligned governments in Morocco, Ghana, Guinea, Mali, and the United Arab Republic.
The MPLA attempted to move its headquarters from Conakry to Léopoldville in October 1961, renewing efforts to create a common front with the FNLA, then known as the Union of Angolan Peoples (UPA) and its leader Holden Roberto. Roberto turned down the offer. When the MPLA first attempted to insert its own insurgents into Angola, the cadres were ambushed and annihilated by UPA partisans on Roberto's orders—setting a precedent for the bitter factional strife which would later ignite the Angolan Civil War. |
Angola | Angolan Civil War | Angolan Civil War
thumb|left|upright|Agostinho Neto, first President of Angola.
Throughout the war of independence, the three rival nationalist movements were severely hampered by political and military factionalism, as well as their inability to unite guerrilla efforts against the Portuguese. Between 1961 and 1975 the MPLA, UNITA, and the FNLA competed for influence in the Angolan population and the international community. The Soviet Union and Cuba became especially sympathetic towards the MPLA and supplied that party with arms, ammunition, funding, and training. They also backed UNITA militants until it became clear that the latter was at irreconcilable odds with the MPLA.
The collapse of Portugal's Estado Novo government following the 1974 Carnation Revolution suspended all Portuguese military activity in Africa and the brokering of a ceasefire pending negotiations for Angolan independence. Encouraged by the Organisation of African Unity, Holden Roberto, Jonas Savimbi, and MPLA chairman Agostinho Neto met in Mombasa in early January 1975 and agreed to form a coalition government. This was ratified by the Alvor Agreement later that month, which called for general elections and set the country's independence date for 11 November 1975. All three factions, however, followed up on the ceasefire by taking advantage of the gradual Portuguese withdrawal to seize various strategic positions, acquire more arms, and enlarge their militant forces. The rapid influx of weapons from numerous external sources, especially the Soviet Union and the United States, as well as the escalation of tensions between the nationalist parties, fueled a new outbreak of hostilities. With tacit American and Zairean support the FNLA began massing large numbers of troops in northern Angola in an attempt to gain military superiority. Meanwhile, the MPLA began securing control of Luanda, a traditional Ambundu stronghold. Sporadic violence broke out in Luanda over the next few months after the FNLA attacked the MPLA's political headquarters in March 1975. The fighting intensified with street clashes in April and May, and UNITA became involved after over two hundred of its members were massacred by an MPLA contingent that June. An upswing in Soviet arms shipments to the MPLA influenced a decision by the Central Intelligence Agency to likewise provide substantial covert aid to the FNLA and UNITA.
In August 1975, the MPLA requested direct assistance from the Soviet Union in the form of ground troops. The Soviets declined, offering to send advisers but no troops; however, Cuba was more forthcoming and in late September dispatched nearly five hundred combat personnel to Angola, along with sophisticated weaponry and supplies. By independence, there were over a thousand Cuban soldiers in the country. They were kept supplied by a massive airbridge carried out with Soviet aircraft. The persistent buildup of Cuban and Soviet military aid allowed the MPLA to drive its opponents from Luanda and blunt an abortive intervention by Zairean and South African troops, which had deployed in a belated attempt to assist the FNLA and UNITA. The FNLA was largely annihilated after the decisive Battle of Quifangondo, although UNITA managed to withdraw its civil officials and militia from Luanda and seek sanctuary in the southern provinces. From there, Savimbi continued to mount a determined insurgent campaign against the MPLA.
thumb|Soviet made Cuban PT-76 tank in Luanda during the Cuban intervention in Angola, 1976
Between 1975 and 1991, the MPLA implemented an economic and political system based on the principles of scientific socialism, incorporating central planning and a Marxist–Leninist one-party state. It embarked on an ambitious programme of nationalisation, and the domestic private sector was essentially abolished. Privately owned enterprises were nationalised and incorporated into a single umbrella of state-owned enterprises known as Unidades Economicas Estatais (UEE). Under the MPLA, Angola experienced a significant degree of modern industrialisation. However, corruption and graft also increased and public resources were either allocated inefficiently or simply embezzled by officials for personal enrichment. The ruling party survived an attempted coup d'état by the Maoist-oriented Communist Organisation of Angola (OCA) in 1977, which was suppressed after a series of bloody political purges left thousands of OCA supporters dead.
The MPLA abandoned its former Marxist ideology at its third party congress in 1990, and declared social democracy to be its new platform. Angola subsequently became a member of the International Monetary Fund; restrictions on the market economy were also reduced in an attempt to draw foreign investment. By May 1991 it reached a peace agreement with UNITA, the Bicesse Accords, which scheduled new general elections for September 1992. When the MPLA secured a major electoral victory, UNITA objected to the results of both the presidential and legislative vote count and returned to war. Following the election, the Halloween massacre occurred from 30 October to 1 November, where MPLA forces killed thousands of UNITA supporters. |
Angola | 21st century | 21st century
thumb|right|Luanda is experiencing widespread urban renewal and redevelopment in the 21st century, backed largely by profits from the oil and diamond industries.
On 22 February 2002, government troops killed Savimbi in a skirmish in the Moxico province. UNITA and the MPLA consented to the Luena Memorandum of Understanding in April; UNITA agreed to give up its armed wing. With the elections in 2008 and 2012, an MPLA-ruled dominant-party system emerged, with UNITA and the FNLA as opposition parties.
Angola has a serious humanitarian crisis; the result of the prolonged war, of the abundance of minefields, and the continued political agitation in favour of the independence of the exclave of Cabinda (carried out in the context of the protracted Cabinda conflict by the FLEC). While most of the internally displaced have now squatted around the capital, in musseques (shanty towns) the general situation for Angolans remains desperate.Lari (2004), Human Rights Watch (2005)For an overall analysis see Ricardo Soares de Oliveira, Magnificent and Beggar Land: Angola since the Civil War, London: Hurst, 2015
A drought in 2016 caused the worst food crisis in Southern Africa in 25 years, affecting 1.4 million people across seven of Angola's eighteen provinces. Food prices rose and acute malnutrition rates doubled, impacting over 95,000 children.
José Eduardo dos Santos stepped down as President of Angola after 38 years in 2017, being peacefully succeeded by João Lourenço, Santos' chosen successor. Some members of the dos Santos family were later linked to high levels of corruption. In July 2022, ex-president José Eduardo dos Santos died in Spain.
In August 2022, the ruling party, MPLA, won another majority and President Lourenço won a second five-year term in the election. However, the election was the tightest in Angola's history. |
Angola | Geography | Geography
thumb|upright|Topography of Angola
At , Angola is the world's twenty-second largest country – comparable in size to Mali, or twice the size of France or of Texas. It lies mostly between latitudes 4° and 18°S, and longitudes 12° and 24°E.
Angola borders Namibia to the south, Zambia to the east, the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the north-east and the South Atlantic Ocean to the west.
The coastal exclave of Cabinda in the north has borders with the Republic of the Congo to the north and with the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the south. Angola has a favorable coastline for maritime trade, with four natural harbors: Luanda, Lobito, Moçâmedes, and Porto Alexandre. These natural indentations contrast with Africa's typical coastline of rocky cliffs and deep bays. Angola's capital, Luanda, lies on the Atlantic coast in the northwest of the country.
Angola had a 2018 Forest Landscape Integrity Index mean score of 8.35/10, ranking it 23rd globally out of 172 countries. In Angola forest cover is around 53% of the total land area, equivalent to 66,607,380 hectares (ha) of forest in 2020, down from 79,262,780 hectares (ha) in 1990. In 2020, naturally regenerating forest covered 65,800,190 hectares (ha) and planted forest covered 807,200 hectares (ha). Of the naturally regenerating forest 40% was reported to be primary forest (consisting of native tree species with no clearly visible indications of human activity) and around 3% of the forest area was found within protected areas. For the year 2015, 100% of the forest area was reported to be under public ownership.
thumb|right|300px|Satellite imagery of Angola, 2022 |
Angola | Climate | Climate
thumb|300px|Angola map of Köppen climate classification.
Like the rest of tropical Africa, Angola experiences distinct, alternating rainy and dry seasons. In the north, the rainy season may last for as long as seven months—usually from September to April, with perhaps a brief slackening in January or February. In the south, the rainy season begins later, in November, and lasts until about February. The dry season (cacimbo) is often characterized by a heavy morning mist. In general, precipitation is higher in the north, but at any latitude it is greater in the interior than along the coast and increases with altitude. Temperatures fall with distance from the equator and with altitude and tend to rise closer to the Atlantic Ocean. Thus, at Soyo, at the mouth of the Congo River, the average annual temperature is about 26 °C, but it is under 16 °C at Huambo on the temperate central plateau. The coolest months are July and August (in the middle of the dry season), when frost may sometimes form at higher altitudes.
Due to climate change, Angola's annual average temperature has increased by 1.4.°C since 1951, and is expected to keep rising while rainfall is becoming more variable. Angola is highly vulnerable to climate change impacts. Natural hazards such as floods, erosion, droughts, and epidemics (e.g.: malaria, cholera and typhoid fever) are expected to worsen with climate change. Rising sea levels also pose a significant risk to Angola's coastal areas, where around 50% of the population lives.
In 2023 Angola emitted 174.71 million tonnes of greenhouse gases, around 0.32% of the world's total emissions, making it the 46th highest emitting country. In its Nationally Determined Contribution, Angola has pledged a 14% reduction in its greenhouse gas emissions by 2025 and an additional 10% reduction conditional on international support. According to the World Bank, achieving climate resilience in Angola requires diversifying the country's economy away from its dependence on oil. |
Angola | Wildlife | Wildlife |
Angola | Government and politics | Government and politics
thumb|right|The National Assembly of Angola
The Angolan government is composed of three branches of government: executive, legislative and judicial. The executive branch of the government is composed of the President, the vice-presidents and the Council of Ministers.
The legislative branch comprises a 220-seat unicameral legislature, the National Assembly of Angola, elected from multi-member province-wide and nationwide constituencies using party-list proportional representation. For decades, political power has been concentrated in the presidency.
After 38 years of rule, in 2017 President dos Santos stepped down from MPLA leadership.Angolan Leader Dos Santos to Step Down After 38 Years in Power . Bloomberg (3 February 2017). Retrieved 26 April 2017. The leader of the winning party at the parliamentary elections in August 2017 would become the next president of Angola. The MPLA selected the former Defense Minister João Lourenço as Santos' chosen successor.
In what has been described as a political purge to cement his power and reduce the influence of the Dos Santos family, Lourenço subsequently sacked the chief of the national police, Ambrósio de Lemos, and the head of the intelligence service, Apolinário José Pereira. Both are considered allies of former president Dos Santos. He also removed Isabel dos Santos, daughter of the former president, as head of the country's state oil company Sonangol. In August 2020, José Filomeno dos Santos, son of Angola's former president, was sentenced for five years in jail for fraud and corruption. |
Angola | Constitution | Constitution
thumb|right|João Lourenço, President of Angola
The Constitution of 2010 establishes the broad outlines of government structure and delineates the rights and duties of citizens. The legal system is based on Portuguese law and customary law but is weak and fragmented, and courts operate in only 12 of more than 140 municipalities. A Supreme Court serves as the appellate tribunal; a Constitutional Court does not hold the powers of judicial review. Governors of the 18 provinces are appointed by the president. After the end of the civil war, the regime came under pressure from within as well as from the international community to become more democratic and less authoritarian. Its reaction was to implement a number of changes without substantially changing its character.Péclard, Didier (ed.) (2008) L'Angola dans la paix: Autoritarisme et reconversions, special issue of Politique africains (Paris), p. 110.
The new constitution, adopted in 2010, did away with presidential elections, introducing a system in which the president and the vice-president of the political party that wins the parliamentary elections automatically become president and vice-president. Directly or indirectly, the president controls all other organs of the state, so there is de facto no separation of powers.Miranda, Jorge (2010) "A Constituição de Angola de 2010", O Direito (Lisbon), vol. 142. In the classifications used in constitutional law, this government falls under the category of authoritarian regime. |
Angola | Justice | Justice
A Supreme Court serves as a court of appeal. The Constitutional Court is the supreme body of the constitutional jurisdiction, established with the approval of Law no. 2/08, of 17 June – Organic Law of the Constitutional Court and Law n. 3/08, of 17 June – Organic Law of the Constitutional Process. The legal system is based on Portuguese and customary law. There are 12 courts in more than 140 counties in the country. Its first task was the validation of the candidacies of the political parties to the legislative elections of 5 September 2008. Thus, on 25 June 2008, the Constitutional Court was institutionalized and its Judicial Counselors assumed the position before the President of the Republic. Currently, seven advisory judges are present, four men and three women.
In 2014, a new penal code took effect in Angola. The classification of money-laundering as a crime is one of the novelties in the new legislation.Angola com novo Código Penal ainda este ano , Notícias ao Minuto, 24 September 2014 |
Angola | Administrative divisions | Administrative divisions
thumb|300px|right|Map of the provinces of Angola
thumb|300px|right|Provincial Government of Huambo.
, Angola is divided into twenty-one provinces (províncias) and 162 municipalities. The municipalities are further divided into 559 communes (townships). The provinces are:
+NumberProvinceCapitalArea (km2)Population (2014 Census)1BengoCaxito31,371356,6412BenguelaBenguela39,8262,231,3853BiéCuíto70,3141,455,2554CabindaCabinda7,270716,0765CuandoMavinga??6Cuanza NorteN'dalatando24,110443,3867Cuanza SulSumbe55,6001,881,8738CubangoMenongue??9CuneneOndjiva87,342990,08710HuamboHuambo34,2702,019,55511HuílaLubango79,0232,497,42212Icolo e BengoCatete??13LuandaLuanda??14Lunda Norte Dundo103,760862,56615Lunda SulSaurimo77,637537,58716MalanjeMalanje97,602986,36317Moxico LesteCazombo??18MoxicoLuena??19NamibeMoçâmedes57,091495,32620UígeUíge58,6981,483,11821ZaireM'banza-Kongo40,130594,428 |
Angola | Exclave of Cabinda | Exclave of Cabinda
thumb|right|Provincial Government of Namibe.
With an area of approximately , the Northern Angolan province of Cabinda is unusual in being separated from the rest of the country by a strip, some wide, of the Democratic Republic of Congo along the lower Congo River. Cabinda borders the Congo Republic to the north and north-northeast and the DRC to the east and south. The city of Cabinda is the chief population centre.
According to a 1995 census, Cabinda had an estimated population of 600,000, approximately 400,000 of whom are citizens of neighboring countries. Population estimates are, however, highly unreliable. Consisting largely of tropical forest, Cabinda produces hardwoods, coffee, cocoa, crude rubber, and palm oil.
The product for which it is best known, however, is its oil, which has given it the nickname the Kuwait of Africa. Cabinda's petroleum production from its considerable offshore reserves now accounts for more than half of Angola's output. Most of the oil along its coast was discovered under Portuguese rule by the Cabinda Gulf Oil Company (CABGOC) from 1968 onwards.
Ever since Portugal handed over sovereignty of its former overseas province of Angola to the local independence groups (MPLA, UNITA and FNLA), the territory of Cabinda has been a focus of separatist guerrilla actions opposing the Government of Angola (which has employed its armed forces, the FAA—Forças Armadas Angolanas) and Cabindan separatists. |
Angola | Foreign relations | Foreign relations
thumb|upright|Foreign Minister of Angola Manuel Domingos Augusto.
Angola is a founding member state of the Community of Portuguese Language Countries (CPLP), also known as the Lusophone Commonwealth, an international organization and political association of Lusophone nations across four continents, where Portuguese is an official language.
On 16 October 2014, Angola was elected for the second time a non-permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, with 190 favorable votes out of a total of 193. The term of office began on 1 January 2015 and expired on 31 December 2016. Public, 16 October 2014
Since January 2014, the Republic of Angola has been chairing the International Conference for the Great Lakes Region (CIRGL). [80] In 2015, CIRGL Executive Secretary Ntumba Luaba said that Angola is the example to be followed by the members of the organization, due to the significant progress made during the 12 years of peace, namely in terms of socio-economic stability and political-military. Expansion, 8 January 2015 |
Angola | Military | Military
thumb|right|Soldiers of the Angolan Armed Forces in full dress uniform
The Angolan Armed Forces (Forças Armadas Angolanas, FAA) are headed by a Chief of Staff who reports to the Minister of Defence. There are three divisions—the Army (Exército), Navy (Marinha de Guerra, MGA) and National Air Force (Força Aérea Nacional, FAN). Total manpower is 107,000; plus paramilitary forces of 10,000 (2015 est.).
Its equipment includes Russian-manufactured fighters, bombers and transport planes. There are also Brazilian-made EMB-312 Tucanos for training, Czech-made L-39 Albatroses for training and bombing, and a variety of western-made aircraft such as the C-212\Aviocar, Sud Aviation Alouette III, etc. A small number of FAA personnel are stationed in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (Kinshasa) and 500 more were deployed in March 2023 due to the resurgence of the M23. The FAA has also participated in the Southern African Development Community (SADC)'s mission for peace in Cabo Delgado, Mozambique. |
Angola | Police | Police
thumb|right|Angolan National Police officers
The National Police departments are Public Order, Criminal Investigation, Traffic and Transport, Investigation and Inspection of Economic Activities, Taxation and Frontier Supervision, Riot Police and the Rapid Intervention Police. The National Police are in the process of standing up an air wing, to provide helicopter support for operations. The National Police are developing their criminal investigation and forensic capabilities. The force consists of an estimated 6,000 patrol officers, 2,500 taxation and frontier supervision officers, 182 criminal investigators, 100 financial crimes detectives, and approximately 90 economic activity inspectors.
The National Police have implemented a modernisation and development plan to increase the capabilities and efficiency of the total force. In addition to administrative reorganisation, modernisation projects include procurement of new vehicles, aircraft and equipment, construction of new police stations and forensic laboratories, restructured training programmes and the replacement of AKM rifles with 9 mm Uzis for officers in urban areas. |
Angola | Human rights | Human rights
Angola was classified as 'not free' by Freedom House in the Freedom in the World 2014 report and the 2024 report, however the report has noted increases in freedoms under João Lourenço. The 2014 report noted that the August 2012 parliamentary elections, in which the ruling Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola won more than 70% of the vote, suffered from serious flaws, including outdated and inaccurate voter rolls. Voter turnout dropped from 80% in 2008 to 60%.
A 2012 report by the U.S. Department of State said, "The three most important human rights abuses [in 2012] were official corruption and impunity; limits on the freedoms of assembly, association, speech, and press; and cruel and excessive punishment, including reported cases of torture and beatings as well as unlawful killings by police and other security personnel."
Angola ranked forty-two of forty-eight sub-Saharan African states on the 2007 Index of African Governance list and scored poorly on the 2013 Ibrahim Index of African Governance. It was ranked 39 out of 52 sub-Saharan African countries, scoring particularly badly in the areas of participation and human rights, sustainable economic opportunity and human development. The Ibrahim Index uses a number of variables to compile its list which reflects the state of governance in Africa.
In 2019, homosexual acts were decriminalized in Angola, and the government also prohibited discrimination based on sexual orientation. The vote was overwhelming: 155 for, 1 against, 7 abstaining. |
Angola | Economy | Economy
thumb|GDP per capita 1950 to 2018
Angola has diamonds, oil, gold, copper, rich wildlife (which was dramatically depleted during the civil war), forest, and fossil fuels. Since independence, oil and diamonds have been the most important economic resources. Smallholder and plantation agriculture dramatically dropped during the Angolan Civil War, but began to recover after 2002.
Angola's economy has in recent years moved on from the disarray caused by a quarter-century of Angolan civil war to become the fastest-growing economy in Africa and one of the fastest-growing in the world, with an average GDP growth of 20% between 2005 and 2007.Angola Financial Sector Profile: MFW4A – Making Finance Work for Africa . MFW4A. Retrieved 9 August 2013. In the period 2001–10, Angola had the world's highest annual average GDP growth, at 11.1%.
In 2004, the Exim Bank of China approved a $2 billion line of credit to Angola, to be used for rebuilding Angola's infrastructure, and to limit the influence of the International Monetary Fund there.
China is Angola's biggest trade partner and export destination as well as a significant source of imports. Bilateral trade reached $27.67 billion in 2011, up 11.5% year-on-year. China's imports, mainly crude oil and diamonds, increased 9.1% to $24.89 billion while China's exports to Angola, including mechanical and electrical products, machinery parts and construction materials, surged 38.8%. The oil glut led to a local price for unleaded gasoline of £0.37 a gallon.
As of 2021, the biggest import partners were the European Union, followed by China, Togo, the United States, and Brazil. More than half of Angola's exports go to China, followed by a significantly smaller amount to India, the European Union, and the United Arab Emirates.
The Angolan economy grew 18% in 2005, 26% in 2006 and 17.6% in 2007. Due to the global recession, the economy contracted an estimated −0.3% in 2009. The security brought about by the 2002 peace settlement has allowed the resettlement of 4 million displaced persons and a resulting large-scale increase in agriculture production. Angola's economy is expected to grow by 3.9 per cent in 2014 said the International Monetary Fund (IMF), robust growth in the non-oil economy, mainly driven by a very good performance in the agricultural sector, is expected to offset a temporary drop in oil production.
thumb|right|The National Bank of Angola.
Angola's financial system is maintained by the National Bank of Angola and managed by the governor Jose de Lima Massano. According to a study on the banking sector, carried out by Deloitte, the monetary policy led by Banco Nacional de Angola (BNA), the Angolan national bank, allowed a decrease in the inflation rate put at 7.96% in December 2013, which contributed to the sector's growth trend. Estimates released by Angola's central bank, said the country's economy should grow at an annual average rate of 5 per cent over the next four years, boosted by the increasing participation of the private sector. Angola was ranked 133rd in the Global Innovation Index in 2024.
Although the country's economy has grown significantly since Angola achieved political stability in 2002, mainly due to fast-rising earnings in the oil sector, Angola faces huge social and economic problems. These are in part a result of almost continual armed conflict from 1961 on, although the highest level of destruction and socio-economic damage took place after the 1975 independence, during the long years of civil war. However, high poverty rates and blatant social inequality chiefly stems from persistent authoritarianism, "neo-patrimonial" practices at all levels of the political, administrative, military and economic structures, and of a pervasive corruption.Anti-corruption watchdog Transparency International rates Angola one of the 10 most corrupt countries in the world.Dolan, Kerry A. (23 January 2013). "Isabel Dos Santos, Daughter Of Angola's President, Is Africa's First Woman Billionaire" . Forbes. The main beneficiaries are political, administrative, economic and military power holders, who have accumulated (and continue to accumulate) enormous wealth.This process is well analyzed by authors like Christine Messiant, Tony Hodges and others. For an eloquent illustration, see the Angolan magazine Infra-Estruturas África 7/2010.
thumb|left|Luanda Financial City
"Secondary beneficiaries" are the middle strata that are about to become social classes. However, almost half the population has to be considered poor, with dramatic differences between the countryside and the cities, where slightly more than 50% of the people reside.
A study carried out in 2008 by the Angolan Instituto Nacional de Estatística found that in rural areas roughly 58% must be classified as "poor" according to UN norms but in the urban areas only 19%, and an overall rate of 37%. In cities, a majority of families, well beyond those officially classified as poor, must adopt a variety of survival strategies.Udelsmann Rodrigues, Cristina (2006) O Trabalho Dignifica o Homem: Estratégias de Sobrevivência em Luanda, Lisbon: Colibri. In urban areas social inequality is most evident and it is extreme in Luanda.As an excellent illustration see Luanda: A vida na cidade dos extremos, in: Visão, 11 November 2010. In the Human Development Index Angola constantly ranks in the bottom group.The HDI 2010 lists Angola in the 146th position among 169 countries—one position below that of Haiti. MLP l Human Development Index and its components.
thumb|right|Tourism in Angola has grown with the country's economy and stability.
In January 2020, a leak of government documents known as the Luanda Leaks showed that U.S. consulting companies such as Boston Consulting Group, McKinsey & Company, and PricewaterhouseCoopers had helped members of the family of former President José Eduardo dos Santos (especially his daughter Isabel dos Santos) corruptly run Sonangol for their own personal profit, helping them use the company's revenues to fund vanity projects in France and Switzerland. After further revelations in the Pandora Papers, former generals Dias and do Nascimento and former presidential advisers were also accused of misappropriating significant public funds for personal benefit.
The enormous differences between the regions pose a serious structural problem for the Angolan economy, illustrated by the fact that about one third of economic activities are concentrated in Luanda and neighbouring Bengo province, while several areas of the interior suffer economic stagnation and even regression.Manuel Alves da Rocha (2010) Desigualdades e assimetrias regionais em Angola: Os factores da competitividade territorial , Luanda: Centro de Estudos e Investigação Científica da Universidade Católica de Angola.
One of the economic consequences of social and regional disparities is a sharp increase in Angolan private investments abroad. The small fringe of Angolan society where most of the asset accumulation takes place seeks to spread its assets, for reasons of security and profit. For the time being, the biggest share of these investments is concentrated in Portugal where the Angolan presence (including the family of the state president) in banks as well as in the domains of energy, telecommunications, and mass media has become notable, as has the acquisition of vineyards and orchards as well as of tourism enterprises."A força do kwanza", Visão (Lisbon), 993, 15 May 2012, pp. 50–54
thumb|Corporate headquarters in Luanda
Angola has upgraded critical infrastructure, an investment made possible by funds from the country's development of oil resources.The New Prosperity: Strategies for Improving Well-Being in Sub-Saharan Africa Tony Blair Africa Governance Initiative 1 May 2013 According to a report, just slightly more than ten years after the end of the civil war Angola's standard of living has overall greatly improved. Life expectancy, which was just 46 years in 2002, reached 51 in 2011. Mortality rates for children fell from 25 per cent in 2001 to 19 per cent in 2010 and the number of students enrolled in primary school has tripled since 2001.The New Prosperity: Strategies for Improving Well-Being in Sub-Saharan Africa Report by The Boston Consulting Group and Tony Blair Africa Governance Initiative, May 2013 However, at the same time the social and economic inequality that has characterised the country for so long has not diminished, but has deepened in all respects.
With a stock of assets corresponding to 70 billion Kz (US$6.8 billion), Angola is now the third-largest financial market in sub-Saharan Africa, surpassed only by Nigeria and South Africa. According to the Angolan Minister of Economy, Abraão Gourgel, the financial market of the country grew modestly since 2002 and now occupies third place in sub-Saharan Africa.Angola is the third-largest sub-Saharan financial market , MacauHub, 23 July 2014
On 19 December 2014, the Capital Market in Angola was launched. BODIVA (Angola Stock Exchange and Derivatives, in English) was allocated the secondary public debt market, and was expected to launch the corporate debt market by 2015, though the stock market itself was only expected to commence trading in 2016.CMC prepares launch of debt secondary market Angola Press Agency, 16 December 2014 |
Angola | Natural resources | Natural resources
thumb|right|An offshore oil drilling platform off the coast of central Angola
The Economist reported in 2008 that diamonds and oil make up 60% of Angola's economy, almost all of the country's revenue and all of its dominant exports."Marching towards riches and democracy?" The Economist. 30 August 2008. p. 46. Growth is almost entirely driven by rising oil production which surpassed in late 2005 and was expected to grow to by 2007. Control of the oil industry is consolidated in Sonangol Group, a conglomerate owned by the Angolan government. In December 2006, Angola was admitted as a member of OPEC. In 2022, the country produced an average of 1.165 million barrels of oil per day, according to Agência Nacional de Petróleo, Gás e Biocombustíveis (ANPG), the national oil, gas and biofuels agency.
According to the Heritage Foundation, a conservative American think tank, oil production from Angola has increased so significantly that Angola now is China's biggest supplier of oil. "China has extended three multi-billion dollar lines of credit to the Angolan government; two loans of $2 billion from China Exim Bank, one in 2004, the second in 2007, as well as one loan in 2005 of $2.9 billion from China International Fund Ltd."
Growing oil revenues also created opportunities for corruption: according to a recent Human Rights Watch report, US$32 billion disappeared from government accounts in 2007–2010. Furthermore, Sonangol, the state-run oil company, controls 51% of Cabinda's oil. Due to this market control, the company ends up determining the profit received by the government and the taxes it pays. The council of foreign affairs states that the World Bank mentioned that Sonangol is a taxpayer, it carries out quasi-fiscal activities, it invests public funds, and, as concessionaire, it is a sector regulator. This multifarious work program creates conflicts of interest and characterises a complex relationship between Sonangol and the government that weakens the formal budgetary process and creates uncertainty as regards the actual fiscal stance of the state."
In 2002, Angola demanded compensation for oil spills allegedly caused by Chevron Corporation, the first time it had fined a multinational corporation operating in its waters.
Operations in its diamond mines include partnerships between state-run Endiama and mining companies such as ALROSA which operate in Angola.
Access to biocapacity in Angola is higher than world average. In 2016, Angola had 1.9 global hectares of biocapacity per person within its territory, slightly more than world average of 1.6 global hectares per person. In 2016, Angola used 1.01 global hectares of biocapacity per person – their ecological footprint of consumption. This means they use about half as much biocapacity as Angola contains. As a result, Angola is running a biocapacity reserve. |
Angola | Agriculture | Agriculture
thumb|right|Capanda Dam on the Cuanza
Agriculture and forestry is an area of potential opportunity for the country. The African Economic Outlook organization states that "Angola requires 4.5 million tonnes a year of grain but grows only about 55% of the maize it needs, 20% of the rice and just 5% of its required wheat".Muzima, Joel. Mazivila, Domingos. "Angola 2014" Retrieved from www.africaneconomicoutlook.org
In addition, the World Bank estimates that "less than 3 per cent of Angola's abundant fertile land is cultivated and the economic potential of the forestry sector remains largely unexploited"."Country partnership strategy for the Republic of Angola" (15 August 2013). World Bank (Report No. 76225-A0)
Before independence in 1975, Angola was a bread-basket of southern Africa and a major exporter of bananas, coffee and sisal, but three decades of civil war destroyed fertile countryside, left it littered with landmines and drove millions into the cities. The country now depends on expensive food imports, mainly from South Africa and Portugal, while more than 90% of farming is done at the family and subsistence level. Thousands of Angolan small-scale farmers are trapped in poverty.Redvers, Louise POVERTY-ANGOLA: Inter Press Service News Agency – NGOs Sceptical of Govt's Rural Development Plans . |
Angola | Transport | Transport
thumb|right|TAAG Angola Airlines is the country's state-owned national carrier.
Transport in Angola consists of:
Three separate railway systems totalling
of highway of which is paved
1,295 navigable inland waterways
five major sea ports
243 airports, of which 32 are paved.
Angola centers its port trade in five main ports: Namibe, Lobito, Soyo, Cabinda and Luanda. The port of Luanda is the largest of the five, as well as being one of the busiest on the African continent.thumb|left|Catumbela Bridge in Benguela.
Two trans-African automobile routes pass through Angola: the Tripoli-Cape Town Highway and the Beira-Lobito Highway. Travel on highways outside of towns and cities in Angola (and in some cases within) is often not best advised for those without four-by-four vehicles. While reasonable road infrastructure has existed within Angola, time and war have taken their toll on the road surfaces, leaving many severely potholed, littered with broken asphalt. In many areas drivers have established alternative tracks to avoid the worst parts of the surface, although careful attention must be paid to the presence or absence of landmine warning markers by the side of the road. The Angolan government has contracted the restoration of many of the country's roads. The road between Lubango and Namibe, for example, was completed recently with funding from the European Union,ec.europa.eu: 1992 and is comparable to many European main routes. Completing the road infrastructure is likely to take some decades, but substantial efforts are already being made.
The old airport in Luanda, Quatro de Fevereiro Airport, will be replaced by the new Dr. Antonio Agostinho Neto International Airport. |
Angola | Telecommunications | Telecommunications
thumb|right|Lobito hosts a major seaport.
thumb|right|Luanda's construction boom is financed largely by oil and diamonds.
The telecommunications industry is considered one of the main strategic sectors in Angola.
In October 2014, the building of an optic fiber underwater cable was announced. This project aims to turn Angola into a continental hub, thus improving Internet connections both nationally and internationally.
On 11 March 2015, the First Angolan Forum of Telecommunications and Information Technology was held in Luanda under the motto "The challenges of telecommunications in the current context of Angola", to promote debate on topical issues on telecommunications in Angola and worldwide. A study of this sector, presented at the forum, said Angola had the first telecommunications operator in Africa to test LTE – with speeds up to 400 Mbit/s – and mobile penetration of about 75%; there are about 3.5 million smartphones in the Angolan market; There are about of optical fibre installed in the country.
The first Angolan satellite, AngoSat-1, was launched into orbit on 26 December 2017. It was launched from the Baikonur space center in Kazakhstan on board a Zenit 3F rocket. The satellite was built by Russia's RSC Energia, a subsidiary of the state-run space industry player Roscosmos. The satellite payload was supplied by Airbus Defence & Space. Due to an on-board power failure during solar panel deployment, on 27 December, RSC Energia revealed that they lost communications contact with the satellite. Although, subsequent attempts to restore communications with the satellite were successful, the satellite eventually stopped sending data and RSC Energia confirmed that AngoSat-1 was inoperable. The launch of AngoSat-1 was aimed at ensuring telecommunications throughout the country. According to Aristides Safeca, Secretary of State for Telecommunications, the satellite was aimed at providing telecommunications services, TV, internet and e-government and was expected to remain in operation "at best" for 18 years.
A replacement satellite named AngoSat-2 was pursued and was expected to be in service by 2020. As of February 2021, Ango-Sat-2 was about 60% ready. The officials reported the launch was expected in about 17 months, by July 2022.[ The launch of AngoSat-2 occurred on 12 October 2022. |
Angola | Technology | Technology
The management of the top-level domain '.ao' passed from Portugal to Angola in 2015, following new legislation.Angola to manage own internet domain from 2015 Telecompaper, 16 September 2014 A joint decree of Minister of Telecommunications and Information Technologies José Carvalho da Rocha and the minister of Science and Technology, Maria Cândida Pereira Teixeira, states that "under the massification" of that Angolan domain, "conditions are created for the transfer of the domain root '.ao' of Portugal to Angola".Angola manages its own Internet domain Macauhub, 16 September 2014 |
Angola | Demographics | Demographics
thumb|right|upright=1.2|Historical ethnic divisions of Angola
Angola has a population of 24,383,301 inhabitants according to the preliminary results of its 2014 census, the first one conducted or carried out since 15 December 1970. It is composed of Ovimbundu (language Umbundu) 37%, Ambundu (language Kimbundu) 23%, Bakongo 13%, and 32% other ethnic groups (including the Chokwe, the Ovambo, the Ganguela and the Xindonga) as well as about 2% mulattos (mixed European and African), 1.6% Chinese and 1% European. The Ambundu and Ovimbundu ethnic groups combined form a majority of the population, at 62%.As no reliable census data exist at this stage (2011), all these numbers are rough estimates only, subject to adjustments and updates.2050 Population as a Multiple of 2014 . PRB 2014 World Population Data Sheet However, on 23 March 2016, official data revealed by Angola's National Statistic Institute – Instituto Nacional de Estatística (INE), states that Angola has a population of 25,789,024 inhabitants.
It is estimated that Angola was host to 12,100 refugees and 2,900 asylum seekers by the end of 2007. 11,400 of those refugees were originally from the Democratic Republic of Congo, who arrived in the 1970s.U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants. "World Refugee Survey 2008". p. 37 there were an estimated 400,000 Democratic Republic of the Congo migrant workers,World Refugee Survey 2008 – Angola , United Nations High Commission for Refugees. NB: This figure is highly doubtful, as it makes no clear distinction between migrant workers, refugees and immigrants. at least 220,000 Portuguese, and about 259,000 Chinese living in Angola. 1 million Angolans are mixed race (black and white). Also, 40,000 Vietnamese live in the country.
Since 2003, more than 400,000 Congolese migrants have been expelled from Angola."Calls for Angola to Investigate Abuse of Congolese Migrants ". Inter Press Service. 21 May 2012 Prior to independence in 1975, Angola had a community of approximately 350,000 Portuguese,"Flight from Angola ", The Economist , 16 August 1975, puts the number at 500,000, but this is an estimate lacking appropriate sources. . but the vast majority left after independence and the ensuing civil war. However, Angola has recovered its Portuguese minority in recent years; currently, there are about 200,000 registered with the consulates, and increasing due to the debt crisis in Portugal and the relative prosperity in Angola. The Chinese population stands at 258,920, mostly composed of temporary migrants. Also, there is a small Brazilian community of about 5,000 people. The Roma were deported to Angola from Portugal.
, the total fertility rate of Angola is 5.54 children born per woman (2012 estimates), the 11th highest in the world. |
Angola | Urbanization | Urbanization |
Angola | Languages | Languages
thumb|Situation of Portuguese in each province of Angola:
The languages in Angola are those originally spoken by the different ethnic groups and Portuguese, introduced during the Portuguese colonial era. The most widely spoken indigenous languages are Umbundu, Kimbundu and Kikongo, in that order. Portuguese is the official language of the country.
Although the exact numbers of those fluent in Portuguese or who speak Portuguese as a first language are unknown, a 2012 study mentions that Portuguese is the first language of 39% of the population.Silva, José António Maria da Conceição (2004) Angola . 7th World Urban Forum In 2014, a census carried out by the Instituto Nacional de Estatística in Angola mentions that 71.15% of the nearly 25.8 million inhabitants of Angola (meaning around 18.3 million people) use Portuguese as a first or second language.
According to the 2014 census, Portuguese is spoken by 71.1% of Angolans, Umbundu by 23%, Kikongo by 8.2%, Kimbundu by 7.8%, Chokwe by 6.5%, Nyaneka by 3.4%, Ngangela by 3.1%, Fiote by 2.4%, Kwanyama by 2.3%, Muhumbi by 2.1%, Luvale by 1%, and other languages by 4.1%. |
Angola | Religion | Religion
left|thumb|Catholic church of Uaco Cungo
There are about 1,000 religious communities, mostly Christian, in Angola.Viegas, Fátima (2008) Panorâmica das Religiões em Angola Independente (1975–2008), Ministério da Cultura/Instituto Nacional para os Assuntos Religiosos, Luanda While reliable statistics are nonexistent, estimates have it that more than half of the population are Catholics, while about a quarter adhere to the Protestant churches introduced during the colonial period: the Congregationalists mainly among the Ovimbundu of the Central Highlands and the coastal region to its west, the Methodists concentrating on the Kimbundu speaking strip from Luanda to Malanje, the Baptists almost exclusively among the Bakongo of the north-west (now present in Luanda as well) and dispersed Adventists, Reformed, and Lutherans.
In Luanda and region there subsists a nucleus of the "syncretic" Tocoists and in the north-west a sprinkling of Kimbanguism can be found, spreading from the Congo/Zaïre. Since independence, hundreds of Pentecostal and similar communities have sprung up in the cities, whereby now about 50% of the population is living; several of these communities/churches are of Brazilian origin.
the U.S. Department of State estimates the Muslim population at 80,000–90,000, less than 1% of the population, while the Islamic Community of Angola puts the figure closer to 500,000.Surgimento do Islão em Angola . O Pais. 2 September 2011. p. 18 Muslims consist largely of migrants from West Africa and the Middle East (especially Lebanon), although some are local converts.Oyebade, Adebayo O. Culture And Customs of Angola, 2006. pp. 45–46. The Angolan government does not legally recognize any Muslim organizations and often shuts down mosques or prevents their construction.
In a study assessing nations' levels of religious regulation and persecution with scores ranging from 0 to 10 where 0 represented low levels of regulation or persecution, Angola was scored 0.8 on Government Regulation of Religion, 4.0 on Social Regulation of Religion, 0 on Government Favoritism of Religion and 0 on Religious Persecution.Angola: Religious Freedom Profile at the Association of Religion Data Archives Brian J Grim and Roger Finke. "International Religion Indexes: Government Regulation, Government Favoritism and Social Regulation of Religion". Interdisciplinary Journal of Research on Religion. 2 (2006) Article 1: religjournal.com.
Foreign missionaries were very active prior to independence in 1975, although since the beginning of the anti-colonial fight in 1961 the Portuguese colonial authorities expelled a series of Protestant missionaries and closed mission stations based on the belief that the missionaries were inciting pro-independence sentiments. Missionaries have been able to return to the country since the early 1990s, although security conditions due to the civil war have prevented them until 2002 from restoring many of their former inland mission stations.
The Catholic Church and some major Protestant denominations mostly keep to themselves in contrast to the "New Churches" which actively proselytize. Catholics, as well as some major Protestant denominations, provide help for the poor in the form of crop seeds, farm animals, medical care and education. |
Angola | Health | Health
thumb|right|Lucrécia Paím Maternity Hospital
Epidemics of cholera, malaria, rabies and African hemorrhagic fevers like Marburg hemorrhagic fever, are common diseases in several parts of the country. Many regions in this country have high incidence rates of tuberculosis and high HIV prevalence rates. Dengue, filariasis, leishmaniasis and onchocerciasis (river blindness) are other diseases carried by insects that also occur in the region. Angola has one of the highest infant mortality rates in the world and one of the world's lowest life expectancies. A 2007 survey concluded that low and deficient niacin status was common in Angola. Demographic and Health Surveys is currently conducting several surveys in Angola on malaria, domestic violence and more.Angola Surveys , measuredhs.com
In September 2014, the Angolan Institute for Cancer Control (IACC) was created by presidential decree, and it will integrate the National Health Service in Angola.Novo instituto oncológico de Angola quer ser referência em África , Notícias ao Minuto (Source: Lusa Agency), 9 September 2014 The purpose of this new centre is to ensure health and medical care in oncology, policy implementation, programmes and plans for prevention and specialised treatment.Novo instituto oncológico de Angola quer ser referência em África , Diário Digital (Source: Lusa Agency), 9 September 2014 This cancer institute will be assumed as a reference institution in the central and southern regions of Africa.Novo instituto oncológico angolano quer ser instituição de referência no continente , Ver Angola, 11 September 2014
In 2014, Angola launched a national campaign of vaccination against measles, extended to every child under ten years old and aiming to go to all 18 provinces in the country.Angola: Over 30,000 Children Vaccinated Against Measles in Huila , All Africa, 30 September 2014 The measure is part of the Strategic Plan for the Elimination of Measles 2014–2020 created by the Angolan Ministry of Health which includes strengthening routine immunisation, a proper dealing with measles cases, national campaigns, introducing a second dose of vaccination in the national routine vaccination calendar and active epidemiological surveillance for measles. This campaign took place together with the vaccination against polio and vitamin A supplementation.
A yellow fever outbreak, the worst in the country in three decades began in December 2015. By August 2016, when the outbreak began to subside, nearly 4,000 people were suspected of being infected. As many as 369 may have died. The outbreak began in the capital, Luanda, and spread to at least 16 of the 18 provinces. In the 2024 Global Hunger Index (GHI), Angola has a serious level of hunger and ranks 103rd out of 127 countries. Angola's GHI score is 26.6 |
Angola | Education | Education
thumb|right|Agostinho Neto University
Although by law education in Angola is compulsory and free for eight years, the government reports that a percentage of pupils are not attending due to a lack of school buildings and teachers."Botswana". 2005 Findings on the Worst Forms of Child Labor. Bureau of International Labor Affairs, U.S. Department of Labor (2006). This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain. Pupils are often responsible for paying additional school-related expenses, including fees for books and supplies.
In 1999, the gross primary enrollment rate was 74 per cent and in 1998, the most recent year for which data are available, the net primary enrollment rate was 61 per cent. Gross and net enrollment ratios are based on the number of pupils formally registered in primary school and therefore do not necessarily reflect actual school attendance. There continue to be significant disparities in enrollment between rural and urban areas. In 1995, 71.2 per cent of children ages 7 to 14 years were attending school. It is reported that higher percentages of boys attend school than girls. During the Angolan Civil War (1975–2002), nearly half of all schools were reportedly looted and destroyed, leading to current problems with overcrowding.
thumb|upright|A primary school in Province of Cuanza Sul
The Ministry of Education recruited 20,000 new teachers in 2005 and continued to implement teacher training. Teachers tend to be underpaid, inadequately trained and overworked (sometimes teaching two or three shifts a day). Some teachers may reportedly demand payment or bribes directly from their pupils. Other factors, such as the presence of landmines, lack of resources and identity papers, and poor health prevent children from regularly attending school. Although budgetary allocations for education were increased in 2004, the education system in Angola continues to be extremely under-funded.
According to estimates by the UNESCO Institute for Statistics, the adult literacy rate in 2011 was 70.4%. By 2015, this had increased to 71.1%. 82.9% of men and 54.2% of women are literate as of 2001. Since independence from Portugal in 1975, a number of Angolan students continued to be admitted every year at high schools, polytechnical institutes and universities in Portugal and Brazil through bilateral agreements; in general, these students belong to the elites.
thumb|left|Mutu-ya Kevela Prep. School
In September 2014, the Angolan Ministry of Education announced an investment of 16 million Euros in the computerisation of over 300 classrooms across the country. The project also includes training teachers at a national level, "as a way to introduce and use new information technologies in primary schools, thus reflecting an improvement in the quality of teaching".Angola investe 16 milhões na informatização de 300 salas de aula em todo o país , jornal i (28 September 2014)
In 2010, the Angolan government started building the Angolan Media Libraries Network, distributed throughout several provinces in the country to facilitate the people's access to information and knowledge. Each site has a bibliographic archive, multimedia resources and computers with Internet access, as well as areas for reading, researching and socialising. The plan envisages the establishment of one media library in each Angolan province by 2017. The project also includes the implementation of several media libraries, in order to provide the several contents available in the fixed media libraries to the most isolated populations in the country.Government to open digital libraries in every province Angola Press Agency, 8 January 2015 At this time, the mobile media libraries are already operating in the provinces of Luanda, Malanje, Uíge, Cabinda and Lunda South. As for REMA, the provinces of Luanda, Benguela, Lubango and Soyo have currently working media libraries.Mediateca móvel aberta ao público Jornal de Angola, 9 January 2015 |
Angola | Culture | Culture
thumb|upright|Agostinho Neto National Memorial in Luanda
Angolan culture has been heavily influenced by Portuguese culture, especially in language and religion, and the culture of the indigenous ethnic groups of Angola, predominantly Bantu culture.
The diverse ethnic communities—the Ovimbundu, Ambundu, Bakongo, Chokwe, Mbunda and other peoples—to varying degrees maintain their own cultural traits, traditions and languages, but in the cities, where slightly more than half of the population now lives, a mixed culture has been emerging since colonial times; in Luanda, since its foundation in the 16th century.
In this urban culture, Portuguese heritage has become more and more dominant. African roots are evident in music and dance and is moulding the way in which Portuguese is spoken. This process is well reflected in contemporary Angolan literature, especially in the works of Angolan authors.
In 2014, Angola resumed the National Festival of Angolan Culture after a 25-year break. The festival took place in all the provincial capitals and lasted for 20 days, with the theme "Culture as a Factor of Peace and Development.Retrospect2014: Fenacult marks cultural year Angola Press Agency, 18 December 2014 |
Angola | Media | Media |
Angola | Cinema | Cinema
In 1972, one of Angola's first feature films, Sarah Maldoror's internationally co-produced Sambizanga, was released at the Carthage Film Festival to critical acclaim, winning the Tanit d'Or, the festival's highest prize. |
Angola | Sports | Sports
thumb|upright=1.15|The National Stadium in Benguela
Basketball is the second most popular sport in Angola. Its national team has won the AfroBasket 11 times and holds the record of most titles. As a top team in Africa, it is a regular competitor at the Summer Olympic Games and the FIBA World Cup. Angola is home to one of Africa's first competitive leagues. Bruno Fernando, a player for the Atlanta Hawks, is the only current NBA player from Angola.
In football, Angola hosted the 2010 Africa Cup of Nations. The Angola national football team qualified for the 2006 FIFA World Cup, their first appearance in the World Cup finals. They were eliminated after one defeat and two draws in the group stage. They won three COSAFA Cups and finished runner-up in the 2011 African Nations Championship.
Angola has participated in the World Women's Handball Championship for several years. The country has also appeared in the Summer Olympics for seven years and both regularly competes in and once has hosted the FIRS Roller Hockey World Cup, where the best finish is sixth. Angola is also often believed to have historic roots in the martial art "Capoeira Angola" and "Batuque" which were practised by enslaved African Angolans transported as part of the Atlantic slave trade. |
Angola | See also | See also
Outline of Angola
Index of Angola-related articles |
Angola | Notes | Notes |
Angola | References | References |
Angola | Further reading | Further reading
Birmingham, David (2006) Empire in Africa: Angola and its Neighbors, Ohio University Press: Athens, Ohio.
Bösl, Anton (2008) Angola's Parliamentary Elections in 2008. A Country on its Way to One-Party-Democracy, KAS Auslandsinformationen 10/2008. Die Parlamentswahlen in Angola 2008
Cilliers, Jackie and Christian Dietrich, Eds. (2000). Angola's War Economy: The Role of Oil and Diamonds. Pretoria, South Africa, Institute for Security Studies.
Global Witness (1999). A Crude Awakening, The Role of Oil and Banking Industries in Angola's Civil War and the Plundering of State Assets. London, UK, Global Witness. A Crude Awakening
Hodges, Tony (2001). Angola from Afro-Stalinism to Petro-Diamond Capitalism. Oxford: James Currey.
Hodges, Tony (2004). Angola: The Anatomy of an Oil State. Oxford, UK and Indianapolis, US, The Fridtjol Nansen Institute & The International African Institute in association with James Currey and Indiana University Press.
Human Rights Watch (2004). Some Transparency, No Accountability: The Use of Oil Revenues in Angola and Its Impact on Human Rights. New York, Human Rights Watch. Some Transparency, No Accountability: The Use of Oil Revenue in Angola and Its Impact on Human Rights (Human Rights Watch Report, January 2004)
Human Rights Watch (2005). Coming Home, Return and Reintegration in Angola. New York, Human Rights Watch. Coming Home: Return and Reintegration in Angola
James, Walter (1992). A political history of the civil war in Angola, 1964–1990. New Brunswick, Transaction Publishers.
Kapuściński, Ryszard. Another Day of Life, Penguin, 1975. . A Polish journalist's account of Portuguese withdrawal from Angola and the beginning of the civil war.
Kevlihan, R. (2003). "Sanctions and humanitarian concerns: Ireland and Angola, 2001-2". Irish Studies in International Affairs 14: 95–106.
Lari, A. (2004). Returning home to a normal life? The plight of displaced Angolans. Pretoria, South Africa, Institute for Security Studies.
Lari, A. and R. Kevlihan (2004). "International Human Rights Protection in Situations of Conflict and Post-Conflict, A Case Study of Angola". African Security Review 13(4): 29–41.
Le Billon, Philippe (2005) Aid in the Midst of Plenty: Oil Wealth, Misery and Advocacy in Angola, Disasters 29(1): 1–25.
Le Billon, Philippe (2001). "Angola's Political Economy of War: The Role of Oil and Diamonds". African Affairs (100): 55–80.
MacQueen, Norrie An Ill Wind? Rethinking the Angolan Crisis and the Portuguese Revolution, 1974–1976, Itinerario: European Journal of Overseas History, 26/2, 2000, pp. 22–44
Médecins Sans Frontières (2002). Angola: Sacrifice of a People. Luanda, Angola, MSF.
Mwakikagile, Godfrey Nyerere and Africa: End of an Era, Third Edition, Pretoria, South Africa, 2006, on Angola in Chapter 11, "American Involvement in Angola and Southern Africa: Nyerere's Response", pp. 324–346, .
Pearce, Justin (2004). "War, Peace and Diamonds in Angola: Popular perceptions of the diamond industry in the Lundas". African Security Review 13 (2), pp 51–64. Wayback Machine
Porto, João Gomes (2003). Cabinda: Notes on a soon to be forgotten war. Pretoria, South Africa, Institute for Security Studies.
Tvedten, Inge (1997). Angola, Struggle for Peace and Reconstruction. Boulder, Colorado, Westview Press.
Vines, Alex (1999). Angola Unravels: The Rise and Fall of the Lusaka Peace Process. New York and London, UK, Human Rights Watch. |
Angola | External links | External links
Angola. The World Factbook. Central Intelligence Agency.
Angola from UCB Libraries GovPubs.
Angola profile from the BBC News.
Key Development Forecasts for Angola from International Futures.
Bertelsmann Transformation Index 2012 – Angola Country Report
Markus Weimer, "The Peace Dividend: Analysis of a Decade of Angolan Indicators, 2002–2012".
The participation of Hungarian soldiers in UN peacekeeping operations in Angola
Category:1975 establishments in Angola
Category:Central African countries
Category:Countries in Africa
Category:Former Portuguese colonies
Category:Least developed countries
Category:Former OPEC member states
Category:Member states of the African Union
Category:Member states of the Community of Portuguese Language Countries
Category:Member states of the United Nations
Category:Countries and territories where Portuguese is an official language
Category:Republics
Category:Southern African countries
Category:States and territories established in 1975 |
Angola | Table of Content | Short description, Etymology, History, Early migrations and political units, Portuguese colonization, Angolan War of Independence, Angolan Civil War, 21st century, Geography, Climate, Wildlife, Government and politics, Constitution, Justice, Administrative divisions, Exclave of Cabinda, Foreign relations, Military, Police, Human rights, Economy, Natural resources, Agriculture, Transport, Telecommunications, Technology, Demographics, Urbanization, Languages, Religion, Health, Education, Culture, Media, Cinema, Sports, See also, Notes, References, Further reading, External links |
Demographics of Angola | Short description | Demographic features of the population of Angola include population density, ethnicity, education level, health of the populace, economic status, religious affiliations and other aspects.
350px|alt=|thumb|Angolas population between 1960 and 2017.
According to 2014 census data, Angola had a population of 25,789,024 inhabitants in 2014.
Ethnically, there are three main groups, each speaking a Bantu language: the Ovimbundu who represent 37% of the population, the Ambundu with 25%, and the Bakongo 11%. Other numerically important groups include the closely interrelated Chokwe and Lunda, the Ganguela and Nyaneka-Khumbi (in both cases classification terms that stand for a variety of small groups), the Ovambo, the Herero, the Xindonga and scattered residual groups of San. In addition, mixed race (European and African) people amount to about 7%, with nearly 1% of the population being whites, mainly ethnically Portuguese.
As a former overseas territory of Portugal until 1975, Angola possesses a Portuguese population of over 200,000, a number that has been growing from 2000 onwards, because of Angola's growing demand for qualified human resources. Currently, Around 300,000 Angolans are white, around 500,000 Angolans are mixed race or black and white, and around 50,000 Angolans are from China. This accounts for around 850,000 people. In 1974, white Angolans made up a population of 350,000 people in an overall population of 6.3 million Angolans at that time. The only reliable source on these numbers is Gerald Bender & Stanley Yoder, Whites in Angola on the Eve of Independence: The Politics of Numbers, Africa Today, 21 (4) 1974, pp. 23 – 37. Today, many Angolans who are not ethnic Portuguese can claim Portuguese nationality under Portuguese law. Estimates on the overall population are given in O Pais.O País Portugueses em Angola quadruplicaram , Jornal de Notícias (March 10, 2009) Besides the Portuguese, significant numbers of people from other European and from diverse Latin American countries (especially Brazil) can be found. From the 2000s, many Chinese have settled and started up small businesses, while at least as many have come as workers for large enterprises (construction or other). Observers claim that the Chinese community in Angola might include as many as 300,000 persons at the end of 2010, but reliable statistics are not at this stage available. In 1974/75, over 25,000 Cuban soldiers arrived in Angola to help the MPLA forces at the beginning of the Angolan Civil War. Once this was over, a massive development cooperation in the field of health and education brought in numerous civil personnel from Cuba. However, only a very small percentage of all these people has remained in Angola, either for personal reasons (intermarriage) or as professionals (e.g., medical doctors).
The largest religious denomination is Catholicism, to which adheres about half the population. Roughly 26% are followers of traditional forms of Protestantism (Congregationals, Methodists, Baptista, Lutherans, Reformed), but over the last decades there has in addition been a growth of Pentecostal communities and African Initiated Churches. In 2006, one out of 221 people were Jehovah's Witnesses. Africans from Mali, Nigeria and Senegal are mostly Sunnite Muslims, but do not make up more than 1 - 2% of the population. By now few Angolans retain African traditional religions following different ethnic faiths. |
Demographics of Angola | Population | Population
thumb|450px|Demographics development according to the United Nations
According to the 2022 revision of the world factbook the total population was 34,795,287 in 2022. The proportion of children below the age of 14 in 2020 was 47.83%, 49.87% was between 15 and 65 years of age, while 2.3% was 65 years or older.
Total populationPopulation aged 0–14 (%)Population aged 15–64 (%)Population aged 65+ (%) 19504,148,00041.255.73.1 19554,542,00042.454.92.7 19604,963,00043.753.62.7 19655,431,00045.352.02.7 19705,926,00046.051.32.7 19756,637,00046.251.12.7 19807,638,00046.550.82.7 19859,066,00047.050.42.7 199010,335,00047.549.92.6 199512,105,00047.649.82.5 200013,926,00047.749.92.5 200516,489,00047.649.92.5 201019,082,00046.650.92.5 201425,789,00047.350.32.4 202032,522,33947.849.92.3
Age GroupMaleFemaleTotal% Total 12 499 041 13 289 983 25 789 024 100 0–4 2 484 582 2 513 566 4 998 148 19.38 5–9 2 062 888 2 097 287 4 160 174 16.13 10–14 1 504 180 1 533 993 3 038 173 11.78 15–19 1 222 700 1 287 736 2 510 436 9.73 20–24 1 020 699 1 153 802 2 174 501 8.43 25–29 913 726 1 031 323 1 945 050 7.54 30–34 714 239 789 281 1 503 520 5.83 35–39 654 408 728 550 1 382 959 5.36 40–44 510 344 539 742 1 050 085 4.07 45–49 417 953 446 951 864 904 3.35 50–54 332 638 376 532 709 169 2.75 55–59 229 641 253 678 483 319 1.87 60–64 165 937 190 217 356 154 1.38 65–69 95 614 119 773 215 387 0.84 70–74 78 673 101 494 180 167 0.70 75–79 39 257 53 687 92 944 0.36 80–84 28 351 38 441 66 792 0.26 85–89 9 967 14 861 24 828 0.10 90–94 7 603 10 572 18 175 0.07 95+ 5 640 8 498 14 138 0.05Age group MaleFemaleTotalPercent 0–14 6 051 650 6 144 846 12 196 496 47.29 15–64 6 182 286 6 797 811 12 980 097 50.33 65+ 265 105 347 326 612 431 2.37
Age GroupMaleFemaleTotal% Total 15 168 180 15 959 494 31 127 674 100 0–4 2 499 013 2 501 045 5 000 058 16.06 5–9 2 486 762 2 525 617 5 012 379 16.10 10–14 2 109 413 2 147 502 4 256 915 13.68 15–19 1 646 467 1 703 593 3 350 060 10.76 20–24 1 324 586 1 389 321 2 713 907 8.72 25–29 1 080 096 1 160 339 2 240 435 7.20 30–34 893 015 978 811 1 871 826 6.01 35–39 743 420 828 169 1 571 589 5.05 40–44 618 724 692 419 1 311 143 4.21 45–49 503 305 556 808 1 060 113 3.41 50–54 401 888 445 257 847 145 2.72 55–59 304 199 343 355 647 554 2.08 60–64 222 814 258 393 481 207 1.55 65–69 148 455 180 188 328 643 1.06 70–74 93 883 119 433 213 316 0.69 75–79 53 235 71 070 124 305 0.40 80+ 38 905 58 174 97 079 0.31Age group MaleFemaleTotalPercent 0–14 7 095 188 7 174 164 14 269 352 45.84 15–64 7 738 514 8 356 465 16 094 979 51.71 65+ 334 478 428 865 763 343 2.45 |
Demographics of Angola | Vital statistics | Vital statistics
Registration of vital events in Angola is not complete. The website Our World in Data prepared the following estimates based on statistics from the Population Department of the United Nations.
Mid-year population (thousands)Live births (thousands)Deaths (thousands)Natural change (thousands)Crude birth rate (per 1000)Crude death rate (per 1000)Natural change (per 1000)Total fertility rate (TFR)Infant mortality (per 1000 live births)Life expectancy (in years)19504 478 207 119 8846.126.519.75.77181.336.351951 4 570 212 122 9146.526.719.85.83180.936.391952 4 664 220 125 9547.226.820.45.95180.036.521953 4 759 227 128 10047.826.821.06.06179.136.731954 4 850 235 130 10548.426.821.56.17178.136.891955 4 938 242 133 10948.926.822.06.27177.037.121956 5 022 249 136 11349.426.922.56.36175.837.281957 5 104 256 138 11849.926.923.06.46174.637.501958 5 186 262 140 12250.326.923.56.54173.337.701959 5 270 268 142 12750.726.824.06.63171.937.971960 5 357 275 143 13151.026.724.46.71170.438.211961 5 441 280 150 13051.327.523.86.79168.937.271962 5 521 285 151 13451.327.224.16.87167.237.541963 5 600 289 152 13751.326.924.46.95165.537.821964 5 673 293 152 14151.326.624.77.04163.838.131965 5 737 296 151 14551.326.225.17.12161.938.501966 5 787 300 151 14851.325.925.47.19160.138.761967 5 828 302 151 15151.325.625.77.27158.139.091968 5 868 304 149 15551.325.226.27.33156.239.481969 5 928 307 148 15851.424.826.57.39154.339.831970 6 030 310 148 16251.324.426.97.43152.440.191971 6 177 313 148 16550.723.926.87.47150.540.551972 6 365 320 149 17250.523.427.07.49148.640.911973 6 578 331 151 18050.523.027.57.50146.841.271974 6 802 342 153 18950.522.627.97.50145.041.651975 7 033 354 161 19450.522.927.67.49144.641.191976 7 267 366 166 20150.522.827.77.49143.641.161977 7 512 378 169 20950.522.628.07.48142.041.441978 7 772 392 172 22050.622.228.47.47140.541.831979 8 043 407 176 23150.721.928.87.46139.142.181980 8 330 423 180 24250.921.729.27.46137.842.451981 8 631 440 185 25551.121.529.67.46136.542.771982 8 947 458 190 26851.321.230.17.46135.243.051983 9 277 477 203 27451.622.029.67.46136.142.091984 9 618 498 209 28951.921.830.17.46135.042.351985 9 971 519 215 30452.121.630.67.45134.042.651986 10 333 538 221 31752.221.430.87.44133.242.841987 10 694 557 245 31252.122.929.27.41136.540.921988 11 060 574 247 32752.022.429.67.37135.241.551989 11 439 590 253 33751.722.229.57.33134.841.771990 11 829 606 260 34751.322.029.47.27134.541.891991 12 229 622 250 37250.920.530.57.21131.143.811992 12 633 635 273 36350.421.628.77.14134.642.211993 13 038 650 279 37149.921.428.57.07131.242.101994 13 462 666 274 39249.620.429.26.99129.043.421995 13 912 683 262 42249.218.830.46.92128.645.851996 14 383 702 268 43448.918.630.26.85127.846.031997 14 871 719 273 44648.418.430.06.79126.546.311998 15 367 737 293 44348.019.128.96.73127.245.061999 15 871 757 296 46147.818.729.16.68123.745.392000 16 394 780 299 48147.618.329.46.64122.446.022001 16 942 805 301 50447.617.829.86.60118.546.592002 17 516 830 302 52847.417.330.26.57116.047.392003 18 124 855 286 56947.215.831.46.53110.049.622004 18 771 883 284 59947.115.231.96.50105.750.592005 19 451 912 282 63046.914.532.46.46101.151.572006 20 162 939 281 65846.613.932.76.4296.552.372007 20 910 966 274 69246.313.133.26.3791.453.642008 21 692 994 270 72445.912.533.46.3286.554.632009 22 508 1 022 265 75845.511.833.76.2681.855.752010 23 364 1 049 261 78845.011.233.86.1977.256.732011 24 259 1 074 257 81744.410.633.76.1273.057.602012 25 188 1 103 252 85143.910.033.86.0468.858.622013 26 147 1 130 251 87943.39.633.75.9565.259.312014 27 128 1 156 249 90742.79.233.55.8662.060.042015 28 128 1 181 248 93342.08.833.25.7759.460.662016 29 155 1 205 249 95641.48.632.85.6957.061.092017 30 209 1 231 249 98340.88.232.65.6054.961.682018 31 274 1 257 250 1 00840.28.032.25.5253.062.142019 32 354 1 284 253 1 03239.77.831.95.4451.362.452020 33 428 1 313 261 1 05139.37.831.55.3749.662.262021 34 504 1 339 276 1 06338.88.030.85.3048.161.642022 35 635 1 358 253 1 10538.17.131.05.2150.261.72023 36 750 1 381 254 1 12737.66.930.75.1248.662.1 |
Demographics of Angola | Demographic and Health Surveys | Demographic and Health Surveys
Total Fertility Rate (TFR) (Wanted TFR) and Crude Birth Rate (CBR):
Year Total Urban Rural CBR TFR CBR TFR CBR TFR 2006–2007 42.4 5.8 35.0 4.4 50.2 7.7 2011 45.5 6.3 36.5 4.6 51.8 7.7 2014 (census) 5.7 5.2 6.5 2015–16 43.4 6.2 (5.2) 40.6 5.3 (4.4) 48.4 8.2 (7.1) 2023-24 33.7 4.8 29.4 3.8 40.5 6.9
thumb|Development of life expectancy |
Demographics of Angola | Ethnic groups | Ethnic groups
thumb|right|300px|Ethnic groups of Angola 1970
Roughly 37% of Angolans are Ovimbundu, 25% are Ambundu, 13% are Bakongo, 7% are mestiço, 1-2% are white Africans, and people from other African ethnicities make up 22% of Angola's population.
Romani people were deported to Angola from Portugal.REPORT ON ROMA PEOPLE - Romaninet |
Demographics of Angola | Languages | Languages
Portuguese is the official language of Angola, but Bantu and other African languages are also widely spoken. In fact, Kikongo, Kimbundu, Umbundu, Tuchokwe, Ganguela, and Ukanyama have the official status of "national languages". The mastery of Portuguese is widespread; in the cities the overwhelming majority are either fluent in Portuguese or have at least a reasonable working knowledge of this language; an increasing minority are native Portuguese speakers and have a poor, if any, knowledge of an African language. |
Demographics of Angola | Religion | Religion
Angola is a majority Christian country. Official statistics do not exist, however it is estimated that over 80% belong to a Christian church or community. More than half are Catholic, the remaining ones comprising members of traditional Protestant churches as well as of Pentecostal communities. Only 0.1% are Muslims - generally immigrants from other African countries. Some insider news says that there is an unofficial ban on Islam in Angola. Traditional indigenous religions are practiced by a very small minority, generally in peripheral rural societies. |
Demographics of Angola | References | References
Attribution:
2003 |
Demographics of Angola | External links | External links
Population cartogram of Angola
Category:Society of Angola |
Demographics of Angola | Table of Content | Short description, Population, Vital statistics, Demographic and Health Surveys, Ethnic groups, Languages, Religion, References, External links |
Politics of Angola | Short description | The current political regime in Angola is presidentialism, in which the President of the Republic is also head of state and government; it is advised by a Council of Ministers, which together with the President form the national executive power. Legislative power rests with the 220 parliamentarians elected to the National Assembly. The President of the Republic, together with the parliament, appoints the majority of the members of the two highest bodies of the judiciary, that is, the Constitutional Court and the Supreme Court. The judiciary is still made up of the Court of Auditors and the Supreme Military Court.
The Angolan government is composed of three branches of government: executive, legislative and judicial. For decades, political power has been concentrated in the presidency with the People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola. |
Politics of Angola | History | History
Since the adoption of a new constitution in 2010, the politics of Angola takes place in a framework of a presidential republic, whereby the President of Angola is both head of state and head of government, and of a multi-party system. Executive power is exercised by the government. Legislative power is vested in the President, the government and parliament.
Angola changed from a one-party Marxist-Leninist system ruled by the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), in place since independence in 1975, to a multiparty democracy based on a new constitution adopted in 1992. That same year the first parliamentary and presidential elections were held. The MPLA won an absolute majority in the parliamentary elections. In the presidential elections, President José Eduardo dos Santos won the first round election with more than 49% of the vote to Jonas Savimbi's 40%. A runoff election would have been necessary, but never took place. The renewal of civil war immediately after the elections, which were considered as fraudulent by UNITA, and the collapse of the Lusaka Protocol, created a split situation. To a certain degree the new democratic institutions worked, notably the National Assembly, with the active participation of UNITA's and the FNLA's elected MPs - while José Eduardo dos Santos continued to exercise his functions without democratic legitimation. However the armed forces of the MPLA (now the official armed forces of the Angolan state) and of UNITA fought each other until the leader of UNITA, Jonas Savimbi, was killed in action in 2002.From 1998 to 2002, there existed even a Government of National Unity and Reconciliation which included ministers from both FNLA and UNITA.
From 2002 to 2010, the system as defined by the constitution of 1992 functioned in a relatively normal way. The executive branch of the government was composed of the President, the Prime Minister and Council of Ministers. The Council of Ministers, composed of all ministers and vice ministers, met regularly to discuss policy issues. Governors of the 18 provinces were appointed by and served at the pleasure of the president. The Constitutional Law of 1992 established the broad outlines of government structure and the rights and duties of citizens. The legal system was based on Portuguese and customary law but was weak and fragmented. Courts operated in only 12 of more than 140 municipalities. A Supreme Court served as the appellate tribunal; a Constitutional Court with powers of judicial review was never constituted despite statutory authorization. In practice, power was more and more concentrated in the hands of the President who, supported by an ever-increasing staff, largely controlled parliament, government, and the judiciary.http://www.bertensmann-transformation-index.de/bti/laendergutachten/laendergutachten/oestliches-und-suedliches-afrika/angola
The 26-year-long civil war has ravaged the country's political and social institutions. The UN estimates of 1.8 million internally displaced persons (IDPs), while generally the accepted figure for war-affected people is 4 million. Daily conditions of life throughout the country and specifically Luanda (population approximately 6 million) mirror the collapse of administrative infrastructure as well as many social institutions. The ongoing grave economic situation largely prevents any government support for social institutions. Hospitals are without medicines or basic equipment, schools are without books, and public employees often lack the basic supplies for their day-to-day work.
José Eduardo dos Santos stepped down as President of Angola after 38 years in 2017, being peacefully succeeded by João Lourenço, Santos' chosen successor. However, President João Lourenço started a campaign against corruption of the dos Santos era. In November 2017, Isabel dos Santos, the billionaire daughter of former President José Eduardo dos Santos, was fired from her position as head of the country's state oil company Sonangol. In August 2020, José Filomeno dos Santos, son of Angola's former president, was sentenced for five years in jail for fraud and corruption.
In August 2022, the ruling party, MPLA, won another outright majority and President Joao Lourenco won a second five-year term in the election. However, the election was the tightest in Angola's history. |
Politics of Angola | Executive branch | Executive branch
The 2010 constitution grants the President almost absolute power. Elections for the National assembly are to take place every five years, and the President is automatically the leader of the winning party or coalition. It is for the President to appoint (and dismiss) all of the following:
The members of the government (state ministers, ministers, state secretaries and vice-ministers);
The members of the Constitutional Court;
The members of the Supreme Court;
The members of the Court of Auditors;
The members of the Military Supreme Court;
The Governor and Vice-Governors of the National Angolan Bank;
The General-Attorney, the Vice-General-Attorneys and their deputies (as well as the military homologous);
The Governors of the provinces;
The members of the Republic Council;
The members of the National Security Council;
The members of the Superior Magistrates Councils;
The General Chief of the Armed Forces and his deputy;
All other command posts in the military;
The Police General Commander, and the 2nd in command;
All other command posts in the police;
The chiefs and directors of the intelligence and security organs.
The President is also provided a variety of powers, like defining the policy of the country. Even though it's not up to him/her to make laws (only to promulgate them and make edicts), the President is the leader of the winning party.
The only "relevant" post that is not directly appointed by the President is the vice-president, which is the second in the winning party.
José Eduardo dos Santos stepped down as President of Angola after 38 years in 2017, being peacefully succeeded by João Lourenço, Santos' chosen successor. |
Politics of Angola | Legislative branch | Legislative branch
The National Assembly (Assembleia Nacional) has 223 members, elected for a four-year term, 130 members by proportional representation, 90 members in provincial districts, and 3 members to represent Angolans abroad. The general elections in 1997 were rescheduled for 5 September 2008. The ruling party MPLA won 82% (191 seats in the National Assembly) and the main opposition party won only 10% (16 seats). The elections however have been described as only partly free but certainly not fair. A White Book on the elections in 2008 lists up all irregularities surrounding the Parliamentary elections of 2008.http://www.kas.de/proj/home/pub/8/2/year-2009/dokument_id-17396/index.html |
Politics of Angola | Political parties and elections | Political parties and elections |
Politics of Angola | Judicial branch | Judicial branch
Supreme Court (or "Tribunal da Relacao") judges of the Supreme Court are appointed by the president. The Constitutional Court, with the power of judicial review, contains 11 justices. Four are appointed by the President, four by the National Assembly, two by the Superior Council of the Judiciary, and one elected by the public. |
Politics of Angola | Administrative divisions | Administrative divisions
Angola has eighteen provinces: Bengo, Benguela, Bie, Cabinda, Cuando Cubango, Cuanza Norte, Cuanza Sul, Cunene, Huambo, Huila, Luanda, Lunda Norte, Lunda Sul, Malanje, Moxico, Namibe, Uige, Zaire |
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