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Merchants and a Bankrupt State: Reflections on Contextual Imperatives and the Genesis of Predicament in Kordofan

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 May 2014

Dawood H. Sultan
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Extract

In Sudan the postindependence era witnessed a succession of attempts by the state to intervene in the country's agricultural markets with the purpose of achieving an effective control over both the physical and financial forms of the agricultural output. The impetus underlying the state's efforts at control originates in an increasing incapacity to finance annual and long-term public expenditure and investment. Given the fact that the Sudan economy is predominantly agriculture-based, effective control over the bulk of the country's agricultural resources was considered instrumental for the resolution of the persistent fiscal problems. However, the state's efforts at controlling the agricultural economy were systematically undermined by a powerful commercial bourgeoisie. Over the three decades following political independence in 1956, the Sudanese peasants, who constitute three-quarters of the total population and produce a considerable portion of the aggregate agricultural output, seem to have been the only losers in a long-drawn scenario involving the state and the commercial bourgeoisie.

Those who follow the debate on the conditions of the Sudanese economy and society are aware of the powerful influence the country's merchant bourgeoisie exerted over the workings of the agricultural economy and the extent of the documentation of this influence. When compared to the recent contributions to the study of the economic crisis in Sudan and the role of the commercial bourgeoisie in the dictation of national policies (Barnett 1988; Elhassan 1985; Mahmoud 1984), the following analysis could be differentiated in terms of its emphasis on the link between merchant control over the state and the economic crisis, and the overall effect of the crisis on the state's attitude towards the agricultural economy.

Type
Articles
Information
African Studies Review , Volume 36 , Issue 3 , December 1993 , pp. 75 - 94
Copyright
Copyright © African Studies Association 1993

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