The Middle Class in Mozambique: the state and the politics of transformation in Southern Africa by Jason Sumich (review)

The Middle Class in Mozambique by Jason Sumich is an insightful contribution to the history of Mozambique and class formation under colonial and postcolonial conditions. The monograph details how the weaknesses of the Portuguese colonial state allowed and enabled a diversity of class trajectories among the so-called sertanejos, ‘local African leaders and prominent Afro-Portuguese families’ (p. 30), and assimilados, those Africans who were legally integrated into the settler-colonial state. These historical formations came to form ‘the nucleus of much of the post-independence political elite in Maputo’ (p. 26). Sumich’s argument draws on long-term fieldwork and reflects a deep understanding of local realities and experiences.

Sumich argues that the Portuguese colonial state was different from other colonial formations in that it did not establish strong controls during its early phase. This allowed Africans to carve out a niche for themselves within the colonial state. However, it is not entirely clear from the argument why Africans would choose to be drawn into the colonial state instead of continuing their own political and economic traditions and institutions. In other words, if the colonial state was weak, then local populations had other options than collaboration, and we would want to better understand what benefits were derived from integration into the colonial project.

With regard to the early colonial period, I would have also appreciated more discussion of the precolonial resources and material as well as social bases that were in the hands of indigenous elites. This would have allowed for forms of social differentiation that predated the arrival of colonialism. It is my view that paying attention to the longue durée is important in African historiography, a historiography that far too often starts with the arrival of colonial rule.

The book shows clearly that, with the consolidation of the Portuguese colonial project, assimilation became the vehicle for class mobility. This meant that many Africans were drawn into a colonial civil service. Similar processes took place throughout the colonial world. For example, in South Africa, the early black middle class found employment as clerks, teachers, police and interpreters in the colonial administration. Given the diversity of middle-class professions in neighbouring South Africa, it is surprising that Sumich only mentions one profession, that of translators. I would be interested to know whether this was indeed the only profession open to Africans, or whether there were other professional avenues.

Turning to the postcolonial period, the central role of Frelimo is made very clear in the monograph. Party loyalty and cadre deployment were central strategies in filling the now vacant positions in the state apparatus. This, in turn, enabled the swift expansion of Mozambique’s African middle class, a development that is mirrored across the continent. It would be interesting to reflect on Frantz Fanon’s critique of the national bourgeoisie, a scathing critique he first formulated in The Wretched of the Earth (1963). The question that faces many postcolonial African states is whether the middle class is a positive force or whether it uses mechanisms of elite closure and self-interest to consolidate its position vis-àvis the many who still struggle to find some level of prosperity. This development is especially surprising in Mozambique, where the vanguard party, Frelimo, defined itself as Marxist-Leninist.

Engaging with these questions on a continental rather than a national level would be important. It would allow us to see parallels and differences, and perhaps question the neoliberal narrative of middle-class growth as necessarily positive for democracy. It is striking that across Southern Africa we see a postliberation growth of inequalities, despite continuing Marxist-Leninist rhetoric. Sumich notes this for Mozambique, but it is a larger trend in the region: Zimbabwe, Zambia, South Africa and Namibia. In this context, the continued use of the term ‘middle class’ is puzzling: in terms of income and privilege, many...