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KNOWLEDGE IS VIRTUE NO MORE: THE CASE OF CONTEMPORARY KENYANELITES

David Nderitu

Moi University, Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies,

danderitu@yahoo.com, 0723327980

A Paper to be Presented During the Moi University 6th AnnualInternational Conference to be held in Margaret Thatcher Library from

7th -10th September, 2010.

Conference Theme: “Knowledge Management and Applied Technological Innovations for

Sustainable Development”

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Symposium V Theme: Interdisciplinarity for Sustainable IntegralDevelopment

Sub-theme: Ethics and Knowledge Management

Abstract

A renowned ancient Greek philosopher Socrates held that “virtueis Knowledge”. What he meant by this is that a person withknowledge is bound to do always what is right whereas a personwho does what is immoral or evil does it out of ignorance. Theperson who does not follow the good fails to do so because hedoes not recognize it. Socrates emphasized the need to educatepeople in order for them to gain knowledge and on gaining it theyact according to informed choices. It is generally understoodthat the learned people in any society are in a better positionto lead others in making informed choices in life. In most casesthe educated people in a given society are charged with thebiggest responsibilities because of the obvious assumption. Ingeneral, the elites in society are expected to be the virtuousones given their vast knowledge of issues affecting the society.For this matter they are expected to demonstrate utmost integrityas they address various challenges in society. However,experience in the recent past in Kenya has proven that Socrates’position on the relationship between knowledge and virtue is acase of naïve optimism. A good number of elites in Kenya havebeen on record promoting what is contrary to morality bymisguiding the less educated into what is against the acceptablenorms of the society. This paper seeks to critically analyse whyknowledge has ceased to be the source of morality in thecontemporary Kenya situation. It will offer suggestions for theway forward in restoring ‘the elites’ as the custodians ofmorality in society and therefore show the contribution ofknowledge to ethics and its relevance to sustainable developmentin Kenya.

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Keywords: Knowledge, Elites, Ethics, Sustainable development

Table of Content

Abstract………………………………………………………………………………….. ii

Table of Content………………………………………………………………………… iii

Introduction…………………………………………………………………………….. 1

Statement of the Problem………………………………………………………………. 2

Knowledge and Virtue………………………………………………………………….. 2

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Acquisition of Knowledge………………………………………………………………. 4

The Kenya Elites and Ethics……………………………………………………………. 5

Non-Virtuous Kenyan Elites……………………………………………………………. 6

Knowledge, Ethics and Being Virtuous……………………………………………….. 9

Summary……………………………………………………………………………….. 11

Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………….... 12

References……………………………………………………………………………… 13

Introduction

According the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary of Current

English, knowledge is the information, understanding and skills

that you gain through education or experience. It is also defined

as the state of knowing about a particular fact or situation.

Knowledge is a comprehension of facts. It may also be defined as

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personal acquaintance or familiarity with facts or range of

information (Oniang’o, 1994:2). Virtue is defined as behaviour or

attitudes that show high moral standards. It is also understood

as a particular good quality or habit (Hornby ed., 2005:1643).

Though the act of trying to bring a relationship between

knowledge and virtue may be debatable, several individuals,

traditions and thought systems have tried to draw this

connection. It is basically understood that people need to

acquire information on certain aspects of life in order for them

to make choices based on established and appropriate knowledge

and with this knowledge they act ethically and become virtuous.

In the African Traditional societies, children and young people

were given specialized education in order to make them behave

well in life. Instructions during the rites of passage were meant

to shape people’s behaviour in society. It is the same idea that

informs various religious traditions around the world as they

give education to their followers through preaching and sermons.

This applies even to secular institutions like the civic

education programmes in a given country.

The reason why knowledge is valued as the source of morality or

what is virtuous is basically because it is seen as the

intellectual perception of truth (Oniang’o, 1994:2). A person who

has knowledge is perceived to be having wisdom which is the

capacity for sound evaluation and integration of facts. A wise

person has the capacity of judging rightly in matters relating to

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life and conduct. Wisdom entails soundness of judgment in the

choice of means and ends in practical affairs (Oniang’o, 1994:2).

What is evident here is the fact that there is an established

sequence of relationships: knowledge cultivates wisdom which in

turn begets morality which makes a person virtuous. The

connection between knowledge and virtue is developed in that

sequence. Therefore it is possible to conclude that the person

with knowledge is likely to be virtuous.

Statement of the Problem

Knowledge is developed through education, whether formal or

informal. Many elites in society have undergone a certain system

of education and are expected to portray a certain level of

morality. However, experience with some elites in the

contemporary Kenya has revealed that the connection between

knowledge and virtue is not all that necessary. This is because

some Kenyan elites have been found engaging in and promoting

immorality in society. This study seeks to explore why this is

so and what can be done to restore the positive relationship

between knowledge and virtue.

Knowledge and Virtue

On the relationship between knowledge and virtue, we will analyze

the explanation of the ancient Greek philosopher Socrates.

Socrates believed that there is an important correlation between

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virtue and knowledge; that knowledge is necessary and sufficient

for virtuous conduct (Marias, 1967:40). Two arguments used to

support this idea are as follows:

All rational desires are focused on what is good; therefore

if one knows what is good, he or she will not act on the

contrary.

If one has non-rational desires, but knowledge is sufficient

to overcome them, so if one is knowledgeable of goodness, he

will not act irrationally.

The idea that comes up in Socrates’ postulation is that there is

a necessary connection between knowledge and virtue. A person

with knowledge has to be virtuous because to know is to be aware

of the good. So for him, a person with knowledge will act

according to what is good whereas, “a bad man is bad through

ignorance” (Marias, 1967:40). Thought informs action and so a

person who has knowledge of the good will act according to what

is good.

Perhaps we need to understand why Socrates emphasized on ‘virtue’

for human life. Although he was a great philosopher, his

philosophical interests were restricted. He was concerned

primarily with what is now called moral philosophy; more

specifically, he was concerned with the problem of giving the

right account of what Greeks called the human virtues, such as

piety and courage and temperance (Parkinson, 1988:3). Socrates is

important in the history of philosophy because he turned the

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philosophical debates in ancient Greek thought from the

speculations about the nature of the physical world

characteristic of the pre-Socratic period, and concentrated

attention on the problems of human life.

The tradition of Socrates as the philosopher who ‘brought

philosophy down from the skies’ dominated philosophical thinking

of his followers like Plato, Aristotle and the Hellenistic

period. The dominant object of philosophical quest during that

period turned out to be about the ‘good life’. It was about human

beings turning towards themselves and seeking to know about their

lives. Socrates retorted, “Man know thyself”. He saw an urgent

need to know oneself (Guthrie, 1969:424). He brought a new

paradigm to the understanding of knowledge and by large the

ultimate object of all knowledge. This marked the beginning of a

period where human beings sought to find out more about

themselves.

Even though history of knowledge reveals that the study of the

physical universe was reawakened during the scientific revolution

in the modern era, but since then, the motive of all knowledge

including of the physical universe has adopted one objective; to

improve the life of human beings. This means that the world has

turned out to be human-centred. For this matter, development of

knowledge in any field has to be vetted on how it benefits human

life. No wonder there are ethical codes in any particular

professional field like medicine. This implies that human beings

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have converted every development to aim at some relevance to

their lives. If a discovery has adverse effects on human lives

then it is considered inappropriate. Socrates believed that

knowledge of virtue was the final aim of intellectual inquiry

(Guthrie, 1969:451). This seems to be the case in the present

world. Scholars who were human-centred as Socrates perceived the

end of human as being ‘happiness’. Human life is fulfilled when

he/she is happy. But this happiness is as a result of their

discovery of what is good or virtuous and when he acts according

to the good. Yet what is good is cultivated through knowledge.

Therefore knowledge is virtue and virtue is happiness.

The end of human life is a certain fulfillment which brings about

their happiness. This is what every human long to have though the

means to this end may be debatable. For Socrates, it is through

knowledge if the good that one becomes virtuous and a virtuous

man is happy. Virtue is knowledge and wrongdoing can only be due

to ignorance and must therefore be considered involuntary

(Guthrie, 1969:450). Therefore, anybody who has acquired

knowledge is expected to be virtuous.

Acquisition of Knowledge

Knowledge is mainly acquired through education though there are

other ways of acquiring it like through experience. In this paper

we refer to people who have acquired knowledge through formal

ways as ‘elites’. This includes the professionals, leaders in

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various areas, politicians etc. These learned people in the

society are expected to exhibit certain levels of morality due to

the knowledge that they have acquired in the process of their

education. The kind of knowledge that a people acquire depends on

the system of education that they have undergone. Therefore an

effective system of education has to be adopted in order to

achieve this.

Plato, an ardent student of Socrates suggested a system of

education that he saw as ideal in guiding a society towards the

moral end. In the explanation about his perception of an ‘ideal

state’, he compared it with the human soul, which is considered

as a whole composed of three parts; the appetitive element, the

spirited element and the rational element. The state is composed

of three classes of people which correspond to the three parts of

the soul. These categories are the great social classes that he

recognized as: the mass of citizens; including the tradesmen,

artisans and farmers; the guardians; and the philosophers (Marias

1967:55). According to Plato, the highest class of people in

society is that of the ‘philosopher kings’, then the rest of the

classes fall below this one in that order.

The reason why the class of the philosophers is the highest is

because they are the ones who have rigorously gone through all

stages of knowledge according to the education system that he had

recommended. Each of these social classes of people has its

particular role to play according to its endowment through the

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level of knowledge attained. Plato’s education system is the one

that determines where people belong in the three categories of

people. Education in the state is administered in stages; it

constitutes the selective process among the people, determining

the class that each citizen is to belong to according to his

aptitudes and merits. Those with the fewest natural gifts receive

elementary instruction and go to make up the producing class of

society; those who are more apt continue their education, until a

new selection separates those who are to remain among the

guardians from those who, after further preparation, enter the

class of philosophers and are thus called upon to bear the burden

of government (Marias, 1967:56). The philosophers are supposed to

be leaders in society and the highest class because they are

perceived to have gained wisdom due to their highest level of

education.

This is the same scenario in most contemporary societies where

people who have attained the highest level of education (elites)

are perceived to be the ones with the ability to handle bigger

responsibilities in society. The responsibility that the

philosophers in Plato’s state are given is that of being the

“archons,” or board of governors, charged with the supreme

direction of the state, with legislation and with the education

of all the classes (Marias, 1967:55). This is a similar situation

with the contemporary Kenya elites. Due to their high level of

education, they are assumed to have enough knowledge that

surmounts to wisdom that enables them to be fit for good

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leadership roles, and guiding the rest of the citizens towards

good life that they aspire.

Most of the leaders in all spheres of life are the educated. This

includes the political, economic and social leaders. Their high

level of knowledge is supposed to translate to wisdom in their

respective fields and therefore lead them to be suitable people

to lead others to good life and prosperity. However, experience

in Kenya proves the contrary because the elites in the country

uphold their integrity no more. Their knowledge does not

translate to virtue as it is expected of them.

The Kenyan Elites and Ethics

Kenya as a nation can be compared to Plato’s state with a

definite system of governance and general order. In the similar

fashion as Plato’s ideal state, the elites in Kenya have been

perceived to be capable of big social political, social and

economic responsibilities compared to the rest of the citizenry.

Most of the leaders in various spheres of life in Kenya are the

people of the educated class. The reason why this is so is to a

large extent informed by the perception that the educated are

knowledgeable of what is right for the society. The elites are

expected to bear the knowledge to the good and they should be

virtuous for this matter.

Ethics is a very important component in any field of knowledge.

In every profession, there are ethical codes that spell out the

norms that should guide professionals in particular fields. For

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instance, there are ethical codes that guide the medical

professionals as they handle patients. This applies to many other

professions in Kenya. Particularly, in the national governance

which is directly concerned with the public leadership of the

country, there are some codes of ethics that should guide leaders

as they govern the nation. There exists codes of conduct that

guide the politicians, particularly the members of parliament on

how to handle the public affairs. Various government ministries

have their ethical codes to ensure effective service from the

civil servants.

The election of President Kibaki in 2002 presented Kenyans with a

window of opportunity and a transition period during which

lasting reform of institutions and policies had to be completed

and considered. In the effort to overcome the culture of

corruption which is an unethical act that had characterized the

leadership of the country before his election, President Kibaki

created a department within his own office headed by a permanent

secretary for Governance and Ethics (TI-Kenya, 2004:2). This

shows that the government recognizes the importance of ethics for

effective leadership of the nation.

All elites in Kenya, including the political leaders are expected

to uphold a certain level of moral responsibility as they lead

other people in various issues affecting the society. By virtue

of the knowledge that they posses they are expected to exhibit

high levels of morality which makes them virtuous.

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Non-virtuous Kenyan Elites

Kenya is one of the developing countries in the world. Developing

countries face many social, political and economic challenges as

they strive to be at per with the developed countries. There is

radical poverty affecting these counties. Much of the challenges

that affect contemporary Kenya is perceived to be exacerbated by

the colonial period that left the country with difficult policies

incapable of handling her problems. Also, some of the colonial

activities like land alienation made many people economically

handicapped since they were evicted from land which had been

their main source of livelihood.

However, since independent in 1963, Kenya has been under the

leadership of the native leaders after the British colonialists

left. Kenyan leaders were given an opportunity to rectify the

faulty colonial policies at independence and replace with the

suitable ones. Despite this, the situation has not improved

almost five decades down the line. Experience shows that in fact

the situation has worsened as Many Kenyans are still poor. One

major challenge affecting the country is poor leadership in all

sectors yet most of the people in leadership positions are elites

with relevant knowledge of their fields. The country is affected

by endemic corruption propagated by leaders. There have been

several scandals that are linked with the elites in the country

including the famous Goldenberg Affair, the Anglo Leasing and

Finance Company, the sale of Grand Regency Hotel, the Triton Oil

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saga, Maize scandal, and embezzlement of Free Primary Education

fund among others.

In the year 2001, the National Aids Control Council (NACC) was at

the centre of corruption report that revealed a large chunk of

money entrusted to it for HIV/AIDS mitigation projects which was

misappropriated (TI-Kenya, 2006:4). The NACC director then Dr.

Margaret Gachara was accused of obtaining Kshs. 24 million by

false pretences. It was claimed that on August 20, 2001, for

purpose of gain, she instructed Ms. Caroline Ausukuya and Mr.

Francis Thuku, human resource, and finance manager respectively

at the council to treat her salary figure in her letter of

appointment as net salary and not gross (The People Daily,

2004:3).

There have been many more other cases of corruption by the elites

in Kenya especially those in leadership positions. In the above

mentioned Goldenberg political scam, the Kenyan government was

found to have subsidized exports of gold far beyond standard

arrangement during the 1990s, by paying the Goldenberg

International Company 35% more than their foreign currency

earnings. The scheme is estimated to have cost Kenya the

equivalent of more than 10% of the country’s annual Gross

Domestic Product, and it is possible that no or minimal amounts

of gold were exported. There is also the Anglo Leasing saga which

is about some security-related contracts entered with by the

government of Kenya and the Anglo Leasing Company between 2002

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and 2003. The deal turned out to be a fraud when it was

discovered that the government undertook to pay Kshs. 2.9 Billion

tax payers money for supply of a passport upgrade system valued

at about Kshs. 600 million (Daily Nation, 2009:16). At the centre

of all these scandals is the involvement of the elites who in

most cases are political leaders in charge of certain

responsibilities. The once Finance minister, Amos Kimunya had

been implicated in the controversial sale of the Grand Regency

Hotel in Nairobi.

Recent scandals include the Kshs. 7 Billion Triton oil scandal

which involved the authorized release of oil by the Kenya

Pipeline Company. Ministers for Agriculture, William Ruto and

Education, Sam Ongeri had been told to step aside in pending

investigation of the Maize and Free Primary Education funds saga.

The report by an audit firm, Price Waterhouse Cooper’s revealed

Ruto had asked his personal assistant to write a letter asking

that an individual be allocated 1,000 bags of maize by the

National Cereals and Produce Board. In the Free Primary Education

fund saga, it was feared that more than Kshs. 100 million may

have been lost. The minister of Special Programmes, Naomi Shabaan

had been summoned over the relocation of Internal Displaced

Persons’ fiasco. The minister of Sports, Prof. Hellen Sambili has

been fighting allegations of ‘unprofessionalism and tribalism’ in

the running of the ministry (Aluanga, 2010). Again all these

people implicated in these scandals are elites in our society.

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As these and many other scandals in the country unfold, there is

the Public Officer Act which was enacted in 2003 to enhance the

ethics of the public officers. The elites have continued to

advance unethical acts in dealing with various fields of the

responsibilities entrusted to them. The human rights

organizations have often blamed Kenya’s ethnically divided

politicians of playing a major part in the bloody violence that

immediately followed after the highly controversial elections of

2007. According to the British Broadcasting Corporation’s Mark

Doyle, “Tribal differences in Kenya, normally accepted

peacefully, are exploited by politicians hungry for power who can

manipulate poverty-stricken population” (Human Rights Groups).

The political elites exploit the ethnic divisions for their own

ambitions. Politicians know very well that most of their

followers live in poverty and would like to have a better

standard of living. This makes it easy for the politicians to

exploit them for selfish interests.

Kenyan elites have often misguided the less educated in society

when major decisions are to be made in the country. This applies

during the general elections and referenda. During the campaigns

for the new constitution in the country, the elites came forth

claiming to enlighten the less educated on the contents of the

education in order to make them understand it and thus be able to

make a choice on whether to endorse it or reject it during the

August 4th, 2010 referendum. While there was a body which was

mandated to offer civic education to the people, some politicians

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and religious leaders came forth even before the official

campaign day claiming to guide people on the content of the draft

constitution. What ensued from the purported guidance was some

misguiding on the content of the draft these groups seem to be

interested in some partisan issues. They used all sorts of

convictions including lies in order to convince people to either

accept the new constitution that was being proposed or reject it.

If ‘elite’ means a group of learned and knowledgeable people who

are taken to be authorities in certain fields of life hence the

wise and ethical, why then do they engage in unethical acts of

misguiding others yet according to Socrates knowledge is supposed

to yield to virtue? This paper has observed that the government

of Kenya has come up with various measures to ensure ethics on

the side of national leaders and civil servants. The 2003 Public

Officer Ethics Act was enacted for reasons given above. Upon his

election in 2002, President Kibaki distinguished himself from his

predecessor by stating his personal reputation and the

credibility of his presidency on his commitment to the success of

anti-corruption institutions and policies.

It was on this premise that he created a department mentioned

above within his own office, headed by a permanent secretary for

Governance and Ethics, which would spearhead the president’s

campaign against corruption (TI-Kenya, 2006:2). The Kenya Anti-

Corruption Commission (KACC) was established in May 2003, to

serve the investigative purpose for corrupt institutions and

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individuals. But despite all these, reports suggest that elite

corruption is in resurgence (TI-Kenya, 2006:3). In fact some of

the corruption scandals mentioned above have occurred during the

Kibaki tenure as president of Kenya and some of his cabinet

ministers have been implicated. This situation begs the

questions as to the effectiveness of some of policies and

institutions initiated by the ruling elites. Most of the elites

cannot observe basic tenets of their position’s ethical codes. Is

virtue really knowledge?

Knowledge, Ethics and Being Virtuous

At the core of Socrates’ ethics is the concept ‘virtue’. For him,

virtue is the deepest and most basic propensity of man, that for

which he was actually born (Marias, 1967:40). This virtue is

knowledge. Once people are knowledgeable, they ought to be

virtuous. But this has been proven otherwise with contemporary

Kenyan elites. It is necessary to analyze why it is difficult for

elites to live by the ethics that they learn as they undergo a

system of education.

According to Lillian Aluanga (2010), the Public Officer Ethics

Act in Kenya is but a ‘Dead letter’: ‘Dead letter’ refers to a

law that has not been repealed but remains ineffectual or defunct

(Aluanga, 2010:10). This could be said of all other ethical codes

that ought to guide professionals in their fields but remain un-

adhered to. A culture of impunity has set upon the national

leaders and elites in Kenya and this has contributed to their

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failure to observe ethics and be virtuous. Lack of political will

to fight corruption has been cited as the major cause of breach

of ethics by leaders and professionals (TI-Kenya, 2006:3).

According to Kangu, a law lecturer at Moi University, it would be

difficult for the Ethics Act to be fully implemented given that

those charged with this responsibility are beneficiaries of the

corrupt practices the Act is supposed to curtail (Aluanga,

2010:10). He argues that lack of punitive measures to permanently

lock out public officers implicated in graft has rendered the Act

‘useless’. Center for Multi-party Democracy Chairman, Larry Gumbe

says that while the Ethics Act is good, there is need to impose

stronger sanctions on public officers flouting it (Aluanga,

2010:10).

According to the above observations, it is clear that there has

to be a way of punishing those who go against the ethical codes.

But this has been there all through yet nothing seems to change.

While Socrates brought out his ethical ideal, he never introduced

the aspect of punishment because he assumed that people should be

self-driven in applying the knowledge they have learned and be

motivated by that fact to be virtuous. Any person who has

knowledge is expected to do what is right by virtue of possessing

that knowledge. What is necessary is for everyone to know his own

self. It is thus a moral imperative whereby man may gain

possession of himself and be his own master, through knowledge

(Marias, 1967:40).

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This is what the Kenyan elite are not doing right. They do not

own themselves and their knowledge is not directed towards making

them better people. They are not fulfilled by their knowledge.

This means that the motivation to pursue a certain area of

knowledge is not from within but from some external pressures or

circumstances. The system of education is to be blamed for this

because it encourages people to do what is enough only to secure

them a good job and a good life in future. This in turn leads to

lack of genuineness on the part of students since they would do

any thing to achieve good marks to ensure that they get suitable

academic ground that would propel them to higher ranks in society

through a good job.

Though the impression that Socrates created in linking virtue to

knowledge is that virtue can be taught (Marias, 1967:40), the

kind of knowledge that he emphasized is knowledge of oneself,

thus, “Know yourself”. But the kind of education system in Kenya

encourages knowledge for the sake of gain of social status,

economic empowerment and political power. This is what has made

it difficult for elites to be virtuous. This leads to the

creation of unauthentic elites who do not believe in the value of

the knowledge they possess in transforming their lives. According

to Kangu, the reason why such laws as the Public Officer Ethics

Act cannot be adhered to is because, “the political elite do not

believe in such laws and have no intention of ever keeping them.”

(Aluanga, 2010:10). This shows that the elites in Kenya have not

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reached the level of self knowledge which Socrates was

addressing.

Summary

There is a gap between the learned and their ethical ideals in

Kenya. This is a contradictory situation according since,

knowledge informs action and therefore the learned are expected

to be guided by the content of their mind and act accordingly.

According to Socrates the ultimate end of any form of knowledge

is a moral end that should make people possessing the knowledge

to be virtuous. In all fields professional fields there are

ethical codes to guide people in their actions. But the elites in

Kenya in these professional fields have been involved in

activities that show contradiction between ethics and their

deeds.

Socrates came up with a moral imperative whereby, knowledge is

supposed to beget virtue. For him, a person with knowledge would

always do what is good whereas a person who does the contrary is

informed by ignorance; “the man who does not follow the good

fails to do so because he does not recognize it (Marias,

1967:40). However, in Kenya where elites dominate high positions

in leadership and other responsibilities, unethical deeds have

been reported leading to grand scandals so far experienced in the

recent past.

The intellectuals of the country have in some occasions been

associated with misleading the ordinary citizen into actions

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which do not reflect the moral expectations of people of that

caliber. This is common with political elites who often incite

members of their ethnic communities against other communities. It

was also evident during the constitutional campaigns where some

elites deliberately took advantage of the ignorance of their

followers to lie about the content of the constitution in order

to influence their voting decision in the referendum.

This proves that in Kenya, knowledge is not necessarily virtue as

Socrates perceived it. This means that the Kenyan elites have not

internalized the value of knowledge as a tool for self discovery

and fulfillment. But this has been found to be contributed by the

ineffective education system and the general perception in life

where one’s success in life is highly attributed to the academic

excellence. For this matter, this paper recommends that there is

a need to adopt Socrates’ understanding of the meaning of genuine

knowledge which should aim at helping man gain possession of

himself and be his own master. This would cultivate elites who

are authentic and hence virtuous.

There is also need to come up with an educational system that

encourages students to discover their potentials rather than

force them to be mere scholars but who are not masters of

themselves as is with the current educational system in Kenya.

Such is the kind of system practiced in other parts of the world

where specialization in a certain professional field starts at an

early stage making the student be master of that field at the

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high levels of education. This would make be people more

fulfilled and be obliged to adhere to ethical norms pertaining

particular fields hence making them virtuous.

Conclusion

This paper dwelt on the subject of ethics and knowledge

management. The basic argument was adopted from Socratic teaching

that “virtue is knowledge” meaning that people with knowledge

should be virtuous since they are aware of the good that should

be done whereas those who engage in what is not good do it out of

ignorance. This proved to be the contrary when the Kenyan elites

were highlighted since they were associated with unethical

behaviour. Most of these elites are in positions of leadership

but they engage in activities that do not reflect their status as

the intellectuals. But it has been discovered in this paper that

it is due to a different perception of the meaning of knowledge

that the education system in Kenya instills on people that make

them come out inauthentic after completing their education. This

paper recommended that this system be reviewed to make it

relevant and help people discover who they are at the end and

give rise to genuine elites who are virtuous. This would go a

long way in moulding real elites who are cultured towards self

fulfillment and who would guide other Kenyans into life’s

attitudes geared towards sustainable development for their

prosperity and success in life.

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