Abstract

The quest for what constitutes knowledge and the authentic means of attaining it have been a subject of intense philosophical speculations from time immemorial. This is to say that the discourse about theory of knowledge had stated from the ancient era in philosophical parlance. Knowledge, in turn, is a co-efficient of social order, democratic ideology and development, which implies that for there to be any form of tranquility and peace in any society at all; its leaders must necessarily have the right sort of intelligence and ability. And that is why leadership problem is the deadliest monster a state and its people can suffer from. Plato’s understanding of knowledge is apt and germane in the discourse of social orderliness essentially as it relates to and with the training of the guardians for the growth, progress and development of human society. In Plato’s view, the guardians must be courageous with instinctive love for wisdom and understanding, which by so doing will make a really noble guardian of commonwealth to be swift, strong, spirited and philosophic. But an attempt to understand the impact of knowledge on leaders of societies among societies of the Global South especially in Africa had become a phenomenal mirage as many of the leaders are not properly ‘schooled’ and are also bereft of ideas to lead human societies.The thrust of this paper will be to examine the impact of knowledge on the kind of leaders societies supposed to have through the prism of Plato’s training of the guardians in the quest for democratic ideology and setting in the Global South. The intent will be to engender political harmony, trust and ‘normalcy’ between the state and society, that is, between the leaders and the led.