Jason Sumich. The Middle Class in : The State and the Politics of Transformation in Southern Africa. The International African Library Series. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018. 190 pp. $24.00, e-book, ISBN 978-1-108-57702-1.

Reviewed by Colin Darch (University of Cape Town)

Published on H-Luso-Africa (November, 2020)

Commissioned by Philip J. Havik (Instituto de Higiene e Medicina Tropical (IHMT))

As far as I am aware, Jason Sumich's new book chapters follow a broad and highly conventional is the first full-length contribution—in English at periodization of, successively, the late colonial least—to the study of the middle class focusing on period; the early independent state; the "civil war Mozambique, a topic on which he has previously and the economic chaos"; a chapter titled "Demo‐ published widely and has perhaps made his own. cratisation," covering the period from 1992 to 2004; [1] It is therefore pioneering and should be warmly and a final chapter titled "Decay," the heart of the welcomed, and indeed the narrative, although book, focusing on the period from 2005 to 2015. short, is engaging, readable, and well structured. These are bracketed by an introduction that ad‐ Sumich might have done more in this book to dresses theoretical (but not methodological) issues, tackle long-standing ambiguities about the social especially around the question of what the term category of the "middle class" as an object of study, "middle class" actually means, and a conclusion and in addition the text raises questions about the that brings the narrative up to 2016. Perhaps sur‐ rigor of his method as an anthropologist writing prisingly, given Sumich's evident enthusiasm for historically. I will expand on these two points in João Paulo Borges Coelho's concept of the "libera‐ the course of this review. tion script," which he references several times, he It is already clear that the book can be and does not argue for this periodization in any detail. will be (mis)read as a historical text—for example, But the power of Borges Coelho's concept hangs as "an insightful contribution to the history of precisely on its identification of a semiofficial his‐ Mozambique and class formation under colonial torical metanarrative that is not arbitrary in its di‐ and postcolonial conditions" or as an "introduc‐ vision into periods and that makes sense only in tion to the contemporary history of Mozambique," terms of a view of history in which the armed to quote two recent reviewers.[2] This is mainly be‐ struggle against the Portuguese from 1964 to 1974 cause the book is organized historically rather becomes the history of modern Mozambique in than, as one might expect, thematically, and is and of itself, occupying the whole available histor‐ presented as a narrative around a periodization ical space from the early 1960s onward. As Borges that takes the moments of independence in 1975 Coelho says, the liberation script consists of "a co‐ and of the Acordo Geral de Paz (AGP) in 1992 as herent and fixed narrative corpus made of a se‐ two of its key inflection points. The five narrative quence of events in a timeline and ordered in a H-Net Reviews number of broad phases separated by Frelimo text of a "party-state") and Renamo has unwill‐ Congresses which operate as periodization marks. ingly played the apparently permanent role of Each congress occurs to solve a crisis that was "loyal opposition." Other parties, by and large and aggravating within each period, and to neutralize designedly, do not get a look-in. the threat that that crisis represented to the na‐ In the last few decades, the middle class has tionalist endeavor. The opening of a new phase [is] become a fashionable object of study for sociolo‐ only made possible by the resolution of the crisis gists, anthropologists, and economists around the of the previous one."[3] world, including the global south. Indeed, the emer‐ Thus, the second congress in 1968 marked the gence of a growing middle class has been held out sharpening to the point of crisis of the struggle by some as the latest (and still teleological) solu‐ between the two lines (if not its resolution) and the tion to the problem of socioeconomic develop‐ consequent militarization of FRELIMO; the formal ment, especially in Africa, as Sumich points out.[5] adoption of Marxism-Leninism in 1977 at the third On the broader African middle class, Henning Mel‐ congress supposedly equipped what is now the ber's edited volume The Rise of Africa's Middle vanguard Frelimo Party with the tools to bend the Classes: Myths, Realities and Critical Engagements inherited colonial state structures to its will; and (2017), to which Sumich contributed a chapter, and the fourth congress in April 1983 offered a demo‐ the collection The Emerging Middle Class in Africa cratic moment in which a space opened up for or‐ (2015) edited by the economists Mthuli Ncube and dinary cadres to criticize the party leadership.[4] Charles Leyeka Lufumpa have brought the concept The fifth congress in July 1989 involved a shake-up to the fore.[6] However, it remains a slippery idea. at the top levels of the party while the possibility of Apart from the obvious economic categorization a negotiated peace slowly emerged, and the "ex‐ that locates the middle class between the poor and traordinary" sixth congress in August 1991 went a the wealthy in terms of income and/or consump‐ step further and dropped Marxism as Frelimo's of‐ tion, multiple competing definitions based on soci‐ ficial ideology, after the single-party parliament ological variables—such as educational level, pro‐ had already preemptively approved a pluralist fessional status, educational achievement, "life‐ constitution, without Renamo participation, late style," and even aspiration—have all been de‐ in 1990. ployed. Simple classifications based on income These steps, viewed with hindsight, show some can be relative (that is, within a national distribu‐ agility as well as opportunism on Frelimo's part in tion) or absolute (for example, per capita income laying the groundwork for holding on to power (or in US dollars). An absence of theoretical agree‐ rather "solving the crisis" as Borges Coelho has it) ment around these issues makes cross-national and open up questions about the real character of comparative analysis generally difficult, a prob‐ Mozambique's process of so-called democratiza‐ lem that Sumich chooses not to address despite ac‐ tion. Luciano Canfora has argued in another con‐ knowledging it: "For my purposes, the middle class text that democratization can all too often have shares some general sociological characteristics the effect of stabilizing existing relations of prop‐ that make this social category more or less recog‐ erty and power rather than marking a rupture, nizable across the globe. These characteristics in‐ and in hindsight it is clear that the painfully nego‐ clude broad economic factors, such as a degree of tiated AGP did exactly that, creating space not so material power, and social marks of distinction much for multipartidarismo as for what is effect‐ such as certain levels of formal education and cul‐ ively a two-party system in which Frelimo has re‐ tural capital, employment in a professional capa‐ mained dominant (although not always in the con‐ city, and a largely urban-based lifestyle" (p. 8).

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All this has presented me with a problem of presidential candidate) in 2002, when he took on lecture, of leitura: how is the book meant to be the role of party secretary-general. The "hidden read? Sumich paints a picture of a broadly dissatis‐ debt" scandal, involving secret loans of around fied urban "middle class" in based on re‐ two billion dollars to the government—on Gue‐ search carried out over a decade, between 2002 buza's watch—broke in 2016, shortly after he had and 2016. During those years, he immersed himself left office (pp. 150-51). The period of Sumich's im‐ in this particular urban social milieu, and his nar‐ mersion in Maputo society was, therefore, marked rative relies mainly on the testimonies—in effect, by the fairly rapid breakdown of the then domin‐ the petits récits—of a narrow group of a couple of ant narrative of the country as a post-conflict suc‐ dozen lightly disguised informants, with multiple cess story, after the negotiated end (in 1992-94) of direct quotations. The book is organized around the sixteen-year post-independence war with Ren‐ this cadre's largely unfiltered perceptions of amo and a long period of uninterrupted economic present-day social reality and contemporary polit‐ growth. The quotations from Sumich's informants, ical history—a discourse of signification, to appro‐ however, also reveal a final and parallel break‐ priate Sumich's preferred terminology—with ex‐ down of popular belief, not only in post-conflict tensive references to the experience of a range of success but also in the heroic narrative of the other countries, both in Africa and elsewhere. In armed struggle for national liberation and the fact, Sumich's theoretical reading is impressively failed post-independence social revolution. The wide-ranging: in a bibliography of around two consequent sense of collective disillusionment in hundred referenced publications he cites material both founding mythos and present reality per‐ on Hungary, Indonesia, Bengal, and Melanesia, meates the book. This is a direct consequence of among many other places. However, only a third Sumich's methodology: by privileging the percep‐ of his sources deal directly with Mozambique, and tions of a small selection of Mozambican inter‐ of those only a handful are in Portuguese or by locutors, their collective disillusionment emerges Mozambican scholars, such as Yussuf Adam, clearly. Nonetheless, the extent to which it is valid Teresa Cruz e Silva, Benedito Machava, or Borges to generalize from their experience remains an Coelho. For whatever reason, he ignores the ex‐ open question. tensive memoir and biographical literature of the Anthropological method is both the book's last two decades, by and on Frelimo as well as op‐ strength and its weakness. On the one hand, from position figures, which reveals their subjects' wide the extensive quotations of direct (but presumably range of social origin in the families of teachers, translated) testimony we gain an understanding minor state functionaries, health workers, and so of how a (rather small) sample of privileged urban on. Frelimo's own voice is barely heard: Sérgio Vie‐ Mozambicans—twenty-five or so people are men‐ ira and Samora Machel are quoted once each, on tioned by name—see themselves and their society. both occasions from English translations. Sumich [7] On the other hand, Sumich does not provide us cites a handful of statistics from secondary with any basis for evaluating the extent to which sources but is generally dismissive of Mozambican his informants' representation of such issues as statistical data—presumably including the Insti‐ corruption, levels of violent criminality, the com‐ tuto Nacional de Estatística's various household petence of state structures, and so on does in fact surveys—as being "vague and unreliable" (p. 9). reflect what is empirically known. He refrains These were the years of the presidential man‐ from discussing the problem, and indeed, it may be dates of Armando Guebuza (in office from early that such an interrogation of the relationship of 2005 to early 2015), who had already become the analysis to evidence, of the idiographic and the Frelimo Party's official presidenciável (eligible local to the nomothetic, in the construction of a

3 H-Net Reviews chronological narrative is irrelevant to what he is speeches were "programmatic" and spelled out trying to achieve. The contradictions and exagger‐ how transformation was to be achieved (p. 84). ations may be the point, although this is not stated This is not entirely inaccurate. However, little is in so many words. In a recent brief response to a known about the internal Frelimo Party processes group of three reviewers, all of whom have pub‐ by which policy was developed within the Polit‐ lished on the middle class elsewhere, Sumich buro or the Central Committee, or what debates offered the following comments about his object‐ took place in the closed sessions of the Assembleia ives in the book: "My goal was not to try to map a Popular, and it may well be that Machel's positions category of 'middleclassness' as an empirical real‐ were sometimes defeated (for example, regarding ity, especially as it is debatable how beneficial the the executions of the Nachingwea "traitors"), in a concept of a middle class is as an analytical cat‐ way that it is hard to imagine Stalin's were.[9] Sim‐ egory. However, it can be very meaningful as a ilarly, Sumich's assertion that Joaquim Chissano, folk concept. My interlocutors generally saw after 1986, "found it difficult to assume Samora's themselves as occupying some sort of middle in role" seems to discount the extent to which Chis‐ their social world. To varying degrees they felt sub‐ sano was his own man and had the confidence of ject to, or hostages of, the whims of a 'they' who oc‐ the party (p. 88). cupy the summit of society and the roiling discon‐ Popular narratives of contemporary history, tent of a 'them' below. Building from this, I under‐ especially in a society in which independent stand the concept of a middle class as a discourse sources of information are few and far between, among those with significant if differing levels of exercise a powerful grip, and Sumich's reproduc‐ privilege. It is a claim concerning the nature of tion of what is frequently middle-class gossip (boa‐ reality and one's role within it. In my view, the tos, fofoca, papos da esquina; synonyms for gos‐ middle class ... is a system of signification where sip) about current or recent events provides mul‐ global influences combine with pre-existing social tiple vivid examples of this.[10] "Rumors" have logics to form the hierarchies—with their often long been a focus of anthropological attention, of amorphous middles—that have drawn our atten‐ course; it may also be worth noting the level of dis‐ tion."[8] The idea expressed here that the middle approval of boateiros (rumor-mongers) as little class is a kind of narrative rather than an actual better than bandits during the revolutionary peri‐ social group emerges from anthropology's long- od.[11] Sumich reproduces widely circulated jokes, standing preoccupation with questions of identity, such as the one about a fish (p. 86n1) that was pop‐ self-identification, and representation. The term ular in the 1980s but misses the point about cara‐ "folk concept" is anthropologists' expression de‐ pau (p. 90), a nutritious species of mackerel that noting a vague idea that is popularly understood was widely believed at that time to have been within a given social group but that does not have overfished by Spanish vessels in the Mozambique a specific or formal definition. Hence, Sumich's Channel, leaving only the "small bony" juveniles two dozen friends define themselves as middle for local consumption. class, and that is apparently sufficient both for his Sumich briefly discusses Operação Produção, and their purposes. a brutal attempt by the government to resolve the In a passage in which he seems to be arguing problem of urban unemployment by inventing a that Samora Machel occupied a dominant position social category of marginais or improdutivos (mar‐ in Mozambique that was analogous to Joseph Stal‐ ginal or unproductive people). These unfortunates in's in the Soviet Union, Sumich argues that Machel were identified bureaucratically through the ab‐ was "the living embodiment of Frelimo's social re‐ sence of certain kinds of ID cards, and were then volution ... the public face of the party." His

4 H-Net Reviews flown off to the countryside in the far north to ary Statute were the basis for a system carefully work in agriculture. This project was launched in designed to keep Africans in their place as cheap the aftermath of the Fourth Congress, and there is labor (p. 69). This was an intervention with a clear some evidence that it was initially popular (as political objective not the abandonment of the Sumich acknowledges) among people who saw the field to chance and the Presbyterians. The food ri‐ unemployed as responsible for crime and as an ots of 2008, 2010, and 2012 are mentioned several economic burden in a period of scarce resources. times with no reference to analyses and testimon‐ The Frelimo Party has never renounced the meas‐ ies published by Luís de Brito at the Instituto de ure, and indeed, has sometimes defended it.[12] Estudos Sociais e Económicos in Maputo.[14] There Sumich states that between thirty thousand and are other examples. fifty thousand people were removed in this way, In the end, despite these criticisms, what but this is almost certainly an inflated figure of the Sumich does achieve is to provide a snapshot of kind that his interlocutors would likely believe in the attitudes and perceptions of a narrow social (p. 85). Official data has it that in phase two, com‐ stratum that is purposefully vaguely defined ex‐ pulsory removals totaled around ten thousand cept in terms of the common belief of its members people, about half of them from Maputo. Most of that they inhabit a kind of social middle space, the improdutivos were flown to Niassa on aircraft "subject to ... the whims of a 'they' who occupy the belonging to LAM, the national airline; the expul‐ summit of society and the roiling discontent of a sion of even five thousand deportees needed as 'them' below."[15] This is, quite deliberately, a long many as twenty-six flights, along a 1,500-kilometer way from class analysis in the classical sense.[16] route to Lichinga, where there was almost no pre‐ Sumich has remarked elsewhere that he is "an an‐ paration to receive them. Nonetheless, in folk thropologist rather than a historian" and that his memory, "thousands and thousands" of people text focuses on the "projects of transformation were forcibly shipped off, and the actual number is that were the most salient for my interlocutors ... probably less important than the symbolizing of due to the fact that they had occurred within living the unjustness of the process.[13] memory."[17] At the risk of criticizing the author There are multiple examples of minor historic‐ for a book that he has not written rather than for al infelicities that arise from an anthropological the one he has, let me conclude by saying that reliance on popular memory. Sumich takes "tradi‐ Sumich's text suffers principally from his reticence tional leadership" as a given rather than a hotly on the methodological and epistemological mat‐ contested term, and even quotes "a woman from a ters indicated above. Its virtues lie in what it tells party-connected family" without comment as say‐ us about contemporary urban Mozambicans' atti‐ ing that "we broke the tribal system most people tudes toward society and history rather than in lived in" (pp. 80, 82, 103, emphasis added). On page any claim to present a historical narrative per se. 49 he states that large numbers of Africans who Notes fought in the colonial army were "considered trait‐ [1]. Sumich has published articles on this and ors by Frelimo," when in fact it was the volunteer related topics. See, among others, with Morten members of such units as PIDE's Flechas, and the Nielsen,"The Political Aesthetics of Middle-Class army's Grupos Especiais and Grupos Especiais Housing in (Not So) Neoliberal Mozambique," Anti‐ Páraquedistas who were greatly mistrusted, and pode 52, no. 4 (2012): 1216-34; "The Party and the not the many draftees. The unnuanced claim that State?: The Ambiguities of Power in Mozambique," the Portuguese colonial state "made few provisions in Negotiating Statehood: Dynamics of Power and for African education" makes no allowance for the Domination in Africa, ed. Tobias Hagmann and fact that the 1940 Concordat and the 1941 Mission‐

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Didier Péclard (London: Wiley-Blackwell, 2011), [7]. The quotations from Sumich's informants 134-53; "Tenuous Belonging: Citizenship, Demo‐ are un-contextualized: Are they translations from cracy and Power in Mozambique," Social Analysis Portuguese? Were they recorded or reconstructed 57, no. 2 (2013): 99-116; "The Uncertainty of from notes or from memory? Prosperity: Dependence and the Politics of Middle [8]. The three reviewers were Nkululeko Class Privilege in Maputo," Ethnos 1 (2015): 1-21; Mabandla, Leela Fernandes, and Carola Lentz. See "Politics after the Time of Hunger in Mozambique: reviews of The Middle Class in Mozambique by A Critique of Neo-Patrimonial Interpretations of Jason Sumich, Africa (IAI) 90, no. 3 (May 2020): Elites," Journal of Southern African Studies 34, no. 598-603, including Jason Sumich's comments to re‐ 1 (2008): 111-25; and "Just Another African Coun‐ views, Africa (IAI) 90, no. 3 (May 2020): 602-3. try: Socialism, Capitalism and Temporality in [9]. See John Saul, "The African Hero in Mozambique," Third World Quarterly (July 2020): Mozambican History: On Assassinations and Exe‐ 1-17. cutions. Part II," Review of African Political Eco‐ [2]. Nkululeko Mabandla, review of The Middle nomy 47, no. 164 (2020): 340. Class in Mozambique, Africa (IAI) 90, no. 3 (May [10]. Toward the end of the conflict with Ren‐ 2020): 599; and Carola Lentz, review of The Middle amo, in March 1991, the Mozambican News Class in Mozambique, Africa (IAI) 90, no. 3 (May Agency (AIM) admitted that much news went un‐ 2020): 601. reported, attributing this to problems of the com‐ [3]. João Paulo Borges Coelho, "Politics and munications infrastructure (MozambiqueFile, Contemporary History in Mozambique: A Set of March 1991, p. 23). But this was an excuse: Epistemological Notes," Kronos no. 39 (2013): 21. Mozambicans often had "to switch to foreign radio [4]. On the question of the parallel militariza‐ stations to find out what [was] happening in their tion of the Portuguese state and the liberation country." Carlos Cardoso, quoted in Paul Fauvet movement in the late 1960s, see my co-authored and Marcelo Mosse, Carlos Cardoso: Telling the work, Colin Darch and David Hedges, "Não temos a Truth in Mozambique (Cape Town: Double Storey, possibilidade de herdar nada de Portugal: As raízes 2003), 224. do exclusivismo político em Moçambique, [11]. See, for example, articles in Notícias: "De‐ 1969-1977," in Territórios da língua portuguesa: nunciemos os boateiros," Notícias (April 26, 1984); Culturas, sociedades, políticas, ed. Glaucia Villas "Alguém diz que viu?" Notícias (April 27, 1984); and Bôas (Rio de Janeiro: IFCS/UFRJ, 1999), 135-49. A "Instrumento dos bandidos: Cerrar fileiras tam‐ volume of delegate speeches from the fourth con‐ bém contra boatos, posição assumida pelos mor‐ gress was published later. See Intervenções dos del‐ adores dos DU's 5 e 8," Notícias (October 15, 1984). egados ao 4º Congresso (Maputo: Frelimo, 1985). [12]. See, for example, the comments of Joa‐ [5]. See, for example, the survey by Pierre Jac‐ quim Chissano in the weekly Savana, November 19, quemot, "Africa's 'Middle Class': Realities, Issues, 2004; and Lina Magaia, in O País [Maputo], August and Perspectives," Afrique Contemporaine 244, no. 3, 2007. 4 (2012): 17-31. [13]. For a detailed study of Operação [6]. Jason Sumich, "The Middle Class of Produção, based on interviews and documentary Mozambique and the Politics of the Blank Slate," in research, see Carlos Quembo, Poder do poder: Op‐ The Rise of Africa's Middle Class: Myths, Realities eração Produção e a invenção dos improdutivos and Critical Engagements, ed. Henning Melber urbanos no Moçambique, 1983-1988 (Maputo: Al‐ (London: Zed Books, 2017), 159-69. cance, 2017).

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[14]. Luís de Brito, Egídio Chaimite, Crescêncio Pereira, Lúcio Posse, Michael Sambo, and Alex Shankland, Revoltas da fome: Protestos populares em Moçambique, 2008-2012 (Maputo: IESE, 2015); and Luís de Brito, ed., Agora eles têm medo de nós: Uma colectânea de textos sobre as revoltas pop‐ ulares em Moçambique, 2008-2012 (Maputo: IESE, 2017). [15]. Sumich, comments to reviews, Africa. [16]. In an earlier publication, Sumich argued that the concept of the middle class is "fundament‐ ally political" and "ideologically potent," while re‐ cognizing that what he terms the "rhetoric of class" is currently "out of fashion." Sumich, "The Uncer‐ tainty of Prosperity," 823, 827, 825. [17]. Sumich, comments to review, Africa.

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Citation: Colin Darch. Review of Sumich, Jason. The Middle Class in Mozambique: The State and the Politics of Transformation in Southern Africa. H-Luso-Africa, H-Net Reviews. November, 2020.

URL: https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=55879

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