A class analysis of the bureaucratic process in Mali
Mefflassoux, Claude; Mefflassoux, Claude; Chargé de Recherche au Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
Журнал:
Journal of Development Studies
Дата:
1970
Аннотация:
SummaryThe impact of colonization had different results according to the native social structures which it met and according to the degree of economic transformation which it brought about. In this process, the African countries were an appendage of the Western capitalist economies, and the social forces which were stirred up in Africa were thus the dependent and terminal part of European society. Such an incomplete and dependent process of social development was bound to give aberrant results in terms of class analysis. Mali is a case in point.A native aristocratic and slave society was developing when this process was halted by the French conquest. The lack of industrial development which followed did not permit the emergence of capitalist classes, while administrative growth gave rise to a comparatively large bureaucracy. African trade remained in the hands of a Moslem and illiterate native bourgeoisie. The colonial crisis abruptly brought these forces into a competition for power in which the outcome was a victory for the bureaucracy. The question raised here is whether this success is indicative of the development of a new ruling class in Mali or, if not, to what extent the process remains susceptible of class analysis. The occurrence was not the result of a domestic class struggle, but depended on external factors which initiated a rapid movement towards independence. This combination of circumstances acted upon a society where class development was still limited both in the traditional and the colonial context. Hence it gave to an otherwise dependent body the opportunity to assume dominant political functions. The concept of social class is a valid instrument of analysis, given, firstly, that the social evolution of dependent countries is considered as part of the broader social system constituted by the economic and political sphere of influence of the dominant foreign power, and, secondly, that a distinction is made between classes proper and other dependent social elements which are the outgrowths of classes.
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