Kofi Abrefa Busia (1914-1978) was a Ghanaian political leader and sociologist. A scholar by inclination and temperament, he symbolized the dilemma of the intellectual in politics--the man of thought forced by events to become the man of action.

Kofi Busia was born a member of the royal house of Wenchi, a subgroup of the Ashanti, Ghana's largest tribe. Educated at church missions and at Mfantsipim School, he became a teacher at Achimoto, Ghana's leading secondary school. After three years he attained his goal of a scholarship to Oxford, where he went in 1939. His subsequent career alternated between, and sometimes combined, scholarship, government, and politics.

In 1941 Busia returned to the Gold Coast to begin research on the Ashanti political system. In 1942 he became one of the two first African administrative officers in the colonial service. Finding the experience frustrating, he returned to Oxford, where he received a doctorate. Afterward...