This article discusses the appropriateness of western bioethics in the African setting. It focuses on the decision-making process regarding participation in health research as a contested boundary in international bioethics discourse. An ethnomethodological approach is used to explain African ethics, and African ethic is applied to the decision-making process in the African community. An HIV/AIDS surveillance project is used as a case study to explore the concept of communitarianism. The article argues that what exists in Africa is communal or social autonomy as opposed to individual autonomy in the West. As a result, applying the western concept of autonomy to research involving human subjects in the African context without adequate consideration for the important role of the community is inappropriate. It concludes that lack of adequate consideration for community participation in health research involving human subjects in Africa will prevent proper management and lack truly informed consent.
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