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Forgetting from Above and Memory from Below: Strategies of Legitimation and Struggle in Postsocialist Mozambique

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 March 2011

M. Anne Pitcher
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Abstract

This article examines two opposing strategies – one used by government officials and businesses, the other expressed by urban workers – that have emerged in postsocialist Mozambique. On the one hand, government officials and businesses have pursued a deliberate strategy of what several writers in other contexts have called ‘organized forgetting', whereby they seek to airbrush the socialist past from history. They have revised the country's ideological orientation, built new coalitions of support among domestic and internal investors, and remade the ruling party's legitimacy following the abandonment of socialism and the transition to a free‐market democracy. On the other hand, some urban workers have revived and repackaged the language of socialism to protest against the effects of neo‐liberalism. Relying on collective and individual memories of socialism, they denounce ‘exploitation', ‘recolonization', ‘injustice’ and ‘inequality’ as they struggle to understand, resist or modify the impact of structural adjustment and privatization. I argue that, although the end of socialism has allowed a plurality of voices to surface in Mozambique, such discursive pluralism is characterized by increasing power inequities. The consolidation of capital and the ideological pronouncements that accompany it may ultimately silence the now dissident language of the socialist past.

Résumé

Cet article examine deux stratégies opposées, l'une utilisée par les fonctionnaires et les entreprises, l'autre exprimée par les travailleurs urbains, qui sont apparues dans le Mozambique postsocialiste. D'un côté, les fonctionnaires et les entreprises ont poursuit une stratégie délibérée de ce que plusieurs auteurs dans d'autres contextes ont appelé l'«oubli organisé», dans laquelle ils cherchent à effacer de l'histoire le passé socialiste. Ils ont révisé l'orientation idéologique du pays, formé de nouvelles coalitions de soutien parmi les investisseurs domestiques et internes, et refait la légitimité du parti au pouvoir après l'abandon du socialisme et la transition vers une démocratie de marché. De l'autre côté, certains travailleurs urbains ont relancé et mis à jour le langage du socialisme pour protester contre les effets du néolibéralisme. S'appuyant sur les mémoires collectives et individuelles du socialisme, ils dénoncent Sexploitation», la «recolonisation», l'«injustice» et l'«inégalité», alors qu'ils s'évertuent à comprendre ou à modifier l'impact de l'ajustement structurel et de la privatisation, ou à y résister. L'article soutient que, bien que la fin du socialisme ait permis l'émergence d'une pluralité de la parole au Mozambique, ce pluralisme discursif se caractérise par un accroissement des inégalités de pouvoir. La consolidation du capital et les déclarations idéologiques qui l'accompagnent risquent à terme de réduire au silence le langage aujourd'hui dissident du passé socialiste.

Type
Research Article
Information
Africa , Volume 76 , Special Issue 1: African Socialisms and Postsocialisms , February 2006 , pp. 88 - 112
Copyright
Copyright © International African Institute 2006

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