IMPERIALISM, THE NATIONAL QUESTION AND THE POLITICS OF "CLASS FORMATION" IN UGANDA. (A critical review of M. Mamdani's: POLITICS AND CLASS FOR- MATION IN UGANDa.4y D.W. Nabuderet 1. INTRODUCTION In our Critique of Issa Shivji's Class Struggles in T anzania,“ we indicated that Mamdani's treatment of classes and state was not different from the manner in which Shivji analysed them in Tanzania, and gave notice that we intended to deal with this aspect of the matter at a later date. Equally in our Reply® to Mamdani and Harko, we felt unable to accept their criticism of Shivji's book on the ground that Mamdani's treatment of the Uganda situation was basi- cally the same. In any case wefelt also that the criticism was "ina- dequate and in our view came too late", and added: "For Mahmood to repudiate Issa therefore he must first repudiate himself", We still hold this view and now that Mamdani's book is out for all to see and judge, we feel it is timely to put our criticisms of his thesis on Uganda across, with the hope that lessons can be drawn from it in. our theoret- ical search for reliable knowledge of our societies in order that changes may be brought about to further advance our people's democratic strug- gles against imperialism. The debate that ensued over our Critique of Shivji has shown that these theoretical positions held by Issa Shivji and Mahmood Mamdani are well entrenched in them as could be seen from Hirji's wretched defence of Shivji's book; as well as Mamdani's article on the Makerere Students carnage published in Maji Maji No. 29. In-our 81-page rebuttal of Hirji it became clear that the two positions held by them and us were irreconcilable and had in fact become antagonistic, which was proof that our bringing the differences in the open was wholly justified since this helped demarcate the two lines. Although recourse was taken to vulgar language and efforts made to divert attention from the real issues in the debate by dragging in the question *Associate Professor in Law, University of Dar es Salaa m. 141 of "social imperialism", which had nothing to do with the issues at stake, on the whole the debate has been beneficial and has visibly enabled many people to face seriously the fundamental questions involved in the debate- At a certain stage it was alleged that referring to Shivji's book, and to the same extent also to Mamdani's as "neo-Marxist/neo-Trotsky- ist, eclectic, unscientific, and petty-bourgeois", was belittling and in- deed "abusive'! These reactions are reminiscent of similar accusations made against Lenin and we refer here to Lenin's rejection of his opponents accusations when he said: "Our opponents display remarkable short - sightedness in regarding the terms reactionary and petty- bourgeois as polemical abuse, when they have perfectly definite historico- philosophical meaning" .5 Elsewhere he refers to the word "reactionary" in the same vein and points out that the term is employed in its historico-philosophical sense, describing only the error of the theoreticians who take modes for their theories "from obsolete forms of society". It does not apply at all to the personal qualities of the theoreticians, or to their programmes. "Everybody knows that neither Sismondi nor Proudhon were react- ionaries in the ordinary sense of the term". 6 We no where use the word "ceactionary", but we concur with Lenin on this interpretation for the words "petty~ bourgeois", "eclectic", etc, etc, which we used in reference to our friends' writings. The other terms like Neo-Marxist and Neo-Trotskyist refer to trends in the international working class movement. Indeed Mamdani's friends who see his thesis in very favour- able light use the same description of his work. In the Spring' 76 brochure issued by Monthly Review Press, the publishers of Mamdani'‘s book, while announcing new titles, appended the following preview against his book; "For description and assessment of Mamdani's important study, we offer excerpts from the report of specialist in African affairs who was asked to report on the manuscript before the decision was made to undertake publication: It is in my view very nearly a perfect piece of work, as a work of art as well as a work of scholarship. It is without question an uncommonly fine specimen of the neo-Marxist “underdevelopment” school - indeed, probably its best fruit to date in African studies.--- In fact, he provides a most imaginative and subtle analysis of the highly intricate politics of class, race, and tribe in modern Uganda, and is particul- 142 arly skillful in his exposition of the manifold class contradic- tions and conflicts of Uganda society, as for example between British, Asian, and African interests'", (Emphasis added). In the main we fully agree with the above assessment, although we note that in the edited version of thisassessment which appears on the back- cover of the English and African edition of his book, / the whole sente- nce about "neo-Marxism" is conveniently left out and the work is refer- red to as "a pioneering Marxist analysis"! And this after the debate started. Call it what you will, the fact remains that Mamdani's treat- ment of his subject matter is clearly neo-Marxist, of the "underdevelop- ment school" of Gundar Frank, clearly a "work of art" and his analysis of "class contradictions" on the basis of race, (British, Asian and African) and tribe as we shall see, highly "imaginative and subtle". We would add that the work is unscientific, eclectic and petty-bourgeois, and to Mamdani's analysis we now revert. 2. IMPERIALISM AND THE NATIONAL QUESTION. In any analysis of an oppressed and dominated country under modern imperialism, the starting point must be a clear knowledge of the main movement - namely imperialism - which historically brought those countries under domination; and here Marx and Lenin are the light to go by. Their theoretical work enables us to grasp the tools of analysis in handling complex social phenomena. In emphazing the need to start with Marx we defy those who decry "Marxist Orthodoxy" and prefer a neo-Marxist approach which superficially looks at social phenomena without grappling with the fundamental laws of the movement in a scientific manner. In emphasing that social relations must be examined from production and not exchange Marx underscores the scientific method. The movement has to be seen as a historical process. The laws of capitalist production he propounds are based on this historical approach. Thus in analysing politics and classes in Uganda we must, examine the process of production as determined historically by first pointing to this fundamental movement. (a) Imperialism: The key to all this is Marx's analysis of capitalism and its unfolding on world scale. He points out that as capitalism develops it concentrates into fewer hands. "One capitalist always kills many"® Marx further emphasises that this process of "ote capitalist killing many" 143 is assisted by the credit system, so that increasingly the owners of productive capital while becoming fewer have at their disposal vast sums of money capital owned by other strata and classes in a society, the latter becoming mere earners of interest and upon this arrangement arises the "entanglement of all peoples in the net of the world-market, and with (it), the international character of the capitalist regime". “Along with the constantly diminishing number of the magnates of capital, who usurp and monopolise all advantages of this process of transformation, grows the mass of'misery, oppression, slavery, degradation, exploitations; but with this too grows the revolt of the working class, a class always increasing in numbers, and disciplined, united, organised by the very mechanism of the process of capitalist production itself".10 This process can only be understood when viewed in its totality on world scale. Lenin's work on imperialism further enriches this analysis of Marx. His contribution lies in his pointing out that the tendency towards concentration and centralisation in the era of monopolies had led to a "coalescence and merger" of production mono- polies with the banks creating a financial oligarchy on the basis of export of finance capital, which then divided the whole world among themselves: "Concentration has reached the point at which it is possible to make an approximate estimate of all sources of raw materials of a country and even, as we shall see, of several countries, or of the whole world".11 This was so because "under capitalism the home market is inevitably bound up with the foreign market". 12 (b) The National Question: In this world-wide exploitation capitalism creates contradictions between classes, nations and countries. The fundamental contradiction that runs throughout the whole world under the rule of finance capital is the one between labour and capital; between the bourgeoisie and the working class. But in the same world-wide operation, imperialism oppresses and dominates weaker nations and colonial countries and peoples including the bourgeoisie and petty-bourgeoisie of these countries. This contradiction is a principal contradiction in those count - ries still oppressed and constitutes the national question, and is resol- ved with the success and comsummation of the new democratic revolution. 144 Therefore in studying and analysing any of the development in Uganda we have to grasp these two contradictions. Imperialism as that force which exploits and dominates Uganda has to be the strong point of any correct understanding of other contradictions within Uganda, and it is here that Mamdani's analysis gets into great difficulties. Mamdani begins by pointing to the need to "understand the social formation. nl3 on the basis of "class relations". (p. 11): "But if class relations are contradictory relations and the class struggle a political struggle, what explains the cohesion of a social formation, the fact that the class struggle does not tear it apart at the seams? To understand the relative stability of a social formation, we must direct our attention at the role and the natureof the state" .(p. 11). In our view while the state is an apparatus of a ruling class, the relative stability of an oppressed country will be determined ultimately by the relations of production, which themselves are class relations. Hence the need to understand the mechanisms of these relations and the role of state within a wider nexus of imperialism. But what is Mamdani's understanding of these relations of production in this wider nexus of imperialism? Adopting a Gundar Frank approach to the question, whom he quotes approvingly, he finds himself increasingly adopting on eclectic position. Referring to the period of colonialism as the “phase of underdevelopment", he states: "In terms of the economy, underdevelopment is a process that subordinates production in the territorial economy to the accumulation needs of metropolitan capital".(p. 6). This was accomplished, according to Mamdani, "not as much in how production is carried out as in what is produced: the production of single cash crops for export -- to the metropolitan market" (p. 6). While clearly both questions were important, it is no accident that Mamdani does not think the "how" was important. This is reflected in his use of the general term "metropolitan capital". In the case of Ugandaits underdevelopment subordinated production to the accumu- lation needs of British capital" (p. 12) although later on we are told that "the emergence of cotton and coffee as the principal crops in Uganda signified the subservience of production in Ugandato the accumulation needs of the British economy" (p. 48). Later still we 145 are told that the "extracting of surplus-labour"...(was) for the "metropolitan economy" (p. 52), and that the state served the interests of the "metropolitan bourgeoisie" (p. 58). Here Mamdaniutilises concepts such as "British capital", "metropolitan capital", "British economy", "metropolitan bourgeoisie" interchangeably. The import of these concepts become clear when we realise that Mamdani is at pains to comprehend the dialectical mechanisms of imper-. ialism, the rule of finance capital. Here we are told that it is under- development not the export of finance capital which "subordinates production" in the territorial economy to the needs of metropolitan capital. He does not see that "metropolitan capital" and "metropolitan bourgeoisie" as concepts are too general for analysis of imperialism. This eclecticism becomes even clearer when he treats us to an analysis of what he calls the "crisis of accumulation": "The Ugandan economy was an underdeveloped economy, integrated into the world capitalist market as a dependent economy. The crisis of underdevelopment manifested itself as the crisis of accumulation" (p. 264). But what is the nature of this "crisis of accumulation?" Mamdani answers in relation to Uganda that it was balance of payments crisis, that is a crisis created by the adverse terms of trade. This explains, according to Mamdani, the dependence of the ruling class in the under- developed capitalism and its fragmentation to the extent that "it cannot establish effective control over the nationally generated surplus" (p. 288). Thus we understand from Mamdani here that the colony is exploited by the financial oligarchy not at the level of production but at the level of the market. It is not the exploitation of labour and the extraction of surplus-value from the worker and poor peasant in the colony, but the crisis of the balance of payments, brought about the weakness of the "ruling class of underdeveloped capitalism", which happens because of the "unequal exchange" between their products and those of the "metropolitan bourgeoisie". His concept of "unequal exchange" comes out clearly when he explains the causes of this crisis in Uganda for the period 1961-1966 and the "glaring shortcomings" | thereof because of the belief that economic development should be based on expansion of export production and foreign capital transfers, he states": 146 "But reality did not conform. Instead of an inflow of capital, each year witnessed an increased outflow to the advanced capitalist economies, resulting in a balance- of-payments crisis. The monetary outflow took two forms: an indirect transfer of values through unequal exchange in international trade, and direct money transfers. While the production of coffee doubled and that of cotton increased by half between 1962 to 1969, the international prices for both declines and, these being the principal export commodities, the terms of trade for the economy as a whole worsened" (p. 264). It is for this reason, he continues that the 1969 crisis "mani- _ fested itself at both the level of the economy and policy, as a result of factors national as well as international" (p. 265). Thus although Mamdani warns us against "dualism" within the Ugandan economy (p. 52), he adopts dualism when it comes to analysing the relations between Uganda and the metropole. This reflects the eclectic nature of the analysis throughout the work. The concept of "underdeveloped capitalism" and "metropolitan economy" is built in the analysis. Imperialism is not seen as an "integrated" system although we are told it is, when he states in the quotation that the Ugandan economy was "integrated into the world capitalist economy"! This is also confirmed by his concept of two modes of production -representing dual economies of the "communal form of production "which is internal and "the capitalist mode of production" which is external: "Because communal production coexisted with the capitalist mode of production, labour power was paid drastically below its value: the communal form, even when producing for use, was subordinated to and subsidized the cost of production of the capitalist mode. Just as the petty production (sic!) supplied cheap raw materials to the capitalist mode internationally, the communal form provided cheap labour to the capitalist mode nationally" (p. 140). (c) Dual Economy-Dual Analysis: This multiplication of modes shows that Mamdani does not see imperialism as integrated whole. It cannot be comprehended how labour-power can be paid "below its value" if it is not part of the capitalist mode. Clearly the law of value in that case would not apply and what we would have is plunder of the type Marx discusses in relation to merchant's capital of the feudal period, i.e. "unequal exchange of unequal values". This is really what Mamdani has in mind. Moreover it is extremely difficult to comprehend how the 147 "international capitalist mode" can be differentiated from the “national capitalist mode" (whatever this may mean). Furthermore he establishes a dualism between labour for "petty production"(1) for the world market, and cheap labour for the "capitalist mode nationally", when no such distinction exists in actual life. Thus whereas within Uganda Mamdani imploresus not to look at the "tra- ditional" economy in isolation of the "modern", because otherwise reality would not be understood, "unless their relation is grasped both in terms of historical development and contemporary functioning, and unless both are analysed in relation to the metropolitan economy"; (pp. 52-53), here when it comes to the Uganda economy as a whole and the metropolitan economy a dualism is established! Why? On the basis of unequal exchange arising out of "unequal" wages. This however confirms Mamdani's thesis that it is "merchant capital" which dominates "the underdeveloped capitalism", and further under- scores Mamdani's assertion, in their joint comment on our Manuscript that: "The peasant doesn't sell his labour-power, he sells his product and his exploitation is the result of the undervaluation of his product. "Unequal exchange’ explains the exploitation of the petty commodity producer in the neo-colony ---"(p. 8). Here Mamdani clearly has no understanding that it is precisely when labour-power is paid for at its equivalent that the capitalist exploits labour. This does not mean to say that in certain cases and even country there may be more or less payment of labour-power below value within exchange of equivalents. But this fact cannot be the basis for analysing exploitation and domination under the era of finance capital. Indeed Mamdani gives us four "general" characteristics of underdeveloped capitalism there-by underlining its "historical specificity": G@ With colonialism, the penetration of metropolitan capital which subordinates the "structure of the underdeveloped economy" to itS accumulation needs. Gi) Circulating (unproductive) capital (Mamdani here must have meant to refer to "capital of circulation") dominates production. This is the "primacy of commercial capital" based on import - export trade. Giii) Commercial capital possesses a monopoly base which is not the result of class struggle "between different sections 148 of capital" (sic.). It is not the result of competition but of political action, which secures by legislation (Note that!) a monopoly base for the "territorially-based" capital, which itself is an "expression of the monopoly base of metropolitan capital to which it is tied in a dependent relation" (sic!). The case in point is the Indian commercial bourgeoisie. Gv) The surplus that is retained internally takes "dominantly the form of merchant's profits". Agricultural surplus are "siphoned off into commerce", leading to pauperi- sation of the producer, which "dictates the very process of class formation in underdeveloped capitalism". (pp. 144/45). Thus the dualism is complete. "Underdevelopment" is blamed on merchant commercial capital, although its "primacy" is seen also as the "primacy" of metropolitan capital to which it is "tied in a depen- dent relation". This "historical specificity of underdeveloped capital- ism", manifested itself specifically in Uganda, according to Mamdani, with two consequences at the "level of class formation": "One result of this process was that, of the class physically located within the colony, the one that emerged dominant by the time of World War II was the Indian bourgeoisie. Unlike the bourgeoisie in spite of the fact that its most important investments were in the processing industries, cotton ginning, and coffee curing. Processing, however, is not really an industry. It is an adjunct of commerce and its purpose in Uganda wasto facilitate the export of the produce involved. The Indian bourgeoisie was thus an intermediate class; its interests were in harmony with, and subservient to, those of the metro- politan bourgeoisie, which dominated the entire colonial system and was the prime beneficiary of the export-import economy. As it expanded its operations it depended on British finance capital, principally the National Bank of India Ltd., as its chief source of credit. In this sense the Indian bourgeoisie was a dependent class" (p. 108). Up to this stage it can be seen that Mamdani does not understand imperialism. He.explains events about colonialism as if Marx and Lenin did not exist. Indeed he writes as ifhe is anticipating them! 149 He clearly had not read them, otherwise things which bother and’ confuse him would not arise. Sunk in "neo-Marxist" jargonery, he cannot comprehend the laws of motion of capitalism at its highest stage. Having no concept of finance capital he has dual vision about the "territorial economy" otherwise he would not be telling us about merchants and traders in the colony - a "commercial bourgeoisie" (1) dominating production at the level of the "territorial economy!" He greatly underestimates and excludes the position of huge trading firms in Uganda, 14 like Unilever and its subsidiaries in Uganda, etc. He reduces the financial oligarchy into a meek creature allowing its colony to be dominated by "Indian bourgeoisie" - commercial at that! While at one point Mamdani told us that in "underdeveloped capitalism" the dependence of the "ruling class" and its fragmentation make it impossible to "establish effective control over the nationally generated surplus" (p. 288), we are here now being made to believe that in the Ugandan colonial "territorial economy" a class, which is not even "rulingclass", established economic dominance there. Moreover this analysis suggests that the "Indian bourgeoisie" was "subservient" and "dependent" on the metropolitan bourgeoisie "for credit" on the basis of an exchange relationship for it is in "this sense that the Indian bourgeoisie was a dependent class". Itis "Indian commercial capital" which exploits the peasant, since the "agricultural surplus" is "siphoned off into commerce". The "metropolitan bourgeoisie" becomes the overall beneficiary only of the import-export economy, in which they controlled the terms of exchange. This also explains why the crisis of accumulation mani- fests itself as a balance of payments crisis due to worsening terms of trade since the metropolitan bourgeoisie are beneficiaries at the level of trade, and not production. The fact that accumulation could never under imperialism take place in the colony in the interest of the colonial "national economy" in the first place is completely lost sight of by Mamdani! It follows too that there is no production relation be- tween the financial oligarchy with the colonial worker and peasant. Therefore the Indian commercial bourgeoisie is the beneficiary at the production level of the cheap labour "nationally!" If this is not eclec- ticism - what is it? (d) Genesis of the colonial economy in Uganda: Be that as it may, this inability to approach his material historically and dialectically compounds his problems when Mamdani begins to tackle the actual production relations in Uganda. This comes out clearly in chapter 3 of the book. Equipped with no concept of finance capital which alone can explain the production relations in the colony he presents to us a wholly petty- bourgeois analysis of the Ugandan situation, which he does when he explains these relations in racial terms: reflecting the approach out- lined above. "From the outset, the thrust of colonial policy was to keep Africans in the agricultural economy and out of the marketplace - thus keeping them away from activities (such as commerce) that would give them the skill, the vision, and the opportunity to organise the colonial masses while allocating the trading function, through administrative encouragement, to an alien community that could easily be segregated from the mass of the colonised and thus renderedpolitically safe. The petty- bourgeoisie in the colony had for political reasons to be an ethnically alien petty-bourgeoisie" (p. 70/71). Here we are given the picture of a contrived almost conspirator- ial colonial policy: keep natives down by the use of an "alien com- munity". He quotes Lugard to substantiate him, but Lugard says some- thing quite the opposite! Yet the same Mamdani a few pages before had told us something quite different. He had told us that of 39,771 indentured. labourers from India, 17,278 (18.3%) stayed behind who "took to petty-trades". The rest either died or returned. In our view these indentured labourers (coolies) from a colonised and oppressed country who worked almost on slave terms, were- brought to Uganda not for the purpose of blocking the progress of the native peoples, but for being exploited by British finance capital themselves. The reason was because no native labour was available for constructing the railway. Mamdani here provides a scientific explanation but then immediately forgets it. He states: "When the late-nineteenth-century 'Scramble for Africa’ began, Britain's primary and most populous colony was India. At the same time, the peoples Britain conquered in this period all had pre-capitalist economies: labour was not yet a commodity. Those who practised agriculture had access to land, while those who manufactured owned their own tools. Colonial administrators time and again recorded the unresponsiveness of the East African peasantry to wage incentives" (p. 67). 151 Mamdani then gives us a quotation from the colonial office report to the effect that every possible meanS were tried "to induce the natives to labour (i.e. on the railway) but without avail; even under the pres- sure of famine in 1898-99 nothing would persuade him to work continu-~ ously or systematically" (p. 67). Mamdani adds; "For this Britain turned to its most populous colony, India" @. 67). Lugard is also quoted to say: "From the overcrowded provinces of India ~--. We could draw labourers, both artisan and coolies, while they might also afford a recruiting ground for soldiers and police" (p. 68). Mamdani then concludes: "Thus official slavery was replaced by its disguised form. In East Africa, the need for labour to build the Uganda Railway began the flow of Indian immigrants into the region" (p. 68). As we have seen from Mamdani himself, it is 18.3% of these "disguised slaves" who remained behind to engage in "petty-trade". He also states: "Along with the railway workers came soldiers, who were used to quell mutinies within the ranks of the Sudanese troops that had been employed for the initial colonization of East Africa. As the railway advanced, there gradually developed a demand for artisans, not only for the railway itself but also for the newly established mission and govern- ment stations. Clerks, carpenters, bricklayers, black- smiths, and gardeners-they all came from India" (p. 69) Indeed this contract recruitment continued until 1922. This historical background is important in enabling us to comprehend in a scientific manner British colonial exploitation in Uganda. Populist claptrap that Mamdani engages in does not help us. An underdeveloped "exchange economy" would have been created without this "alien minority". But this racial treatment of relations of production by Mamdani (as with Shivji) has its reason, for the entire analysis is built on racial and even tribal "class" categories. "While state policy kept the African out of the market place, (sic!) the Asian was made the link in the export- import exchange economy. All necessary relations (7?) between the exploiters and the exploited were mediated through this class. In return for its services, the Indian petit-bourgeoisie, without being members of the ruling class, became beneficiaries of the colony's inequalities »o+-"(pp. 71/72). © 152 Thus we have a peculiar situation in which the "Indian commercial bourgeoisie" not being "members of the ruling class" are given the full benefits of a ruling class of "dominating" the colonial "national economy" through the colonial state. We shall have more to say on this in the next section but suffice to note here that Mamdani's notion of a "ruling class" is seen in racial terms. We are then treated to a long analysis of the "contradictions" between the colonial state and the Indian petty- bourgeoisie (the dukawallah) wherein we are madeto believe that because the Indian petty-bourgeoisie were not members of the ruling class, they "could not expect long-term protection from the colonial state" when evidence adduced by him clearly shows the protection. Indeed how could traders in a colony do so without such protection in the long run. His only ground for sympathy for this down- trodden class was that they were required to purchase trading licences under the 1901 trading law, and the cotton marketing rules increasingly limited the area of their competition in favour of large operators! Thus upto this point it can be seen that Mamdani's analysis as regards the production relation which was established by the export of finance capital in the colony is utterly lacking. This is because Mamdanitreats the state at the level of politics and law - in the super- structure only. He does not see that in the era of monopoly the state intervenes in production and exchange to advance the interest of the financial oligarchy. Here in Uganda the colonial state, by appropriat- ing part of the surplus-value produced in the colony as taxes, was able to erect a transportation and communication system; build structures to research in and protect seed, soil, forests and animals; advance agricultural production; supervise its collection and transportation to the imperialists country. All these were productive activities engaged in by the state on behalf of the oligarchy, and constituted the technical pre-conditions ofproduction which no single monopoly could provide. lt went further .It set up administrative structures - which assisted this process, set up hospitals to repair damaged labour, set up police Stations, sthools, and churches-all necessary social preconditions for production. To enable production and exchange it helped to estab- lish banks and a credit system as well as provide a monetarypolicy for the colony consistent with the interests of the financial oligarchy. It nationalised all the lands and turned them into crown lands, save few tracts 153 given to the compradore Ingleza faction in Buganda and els ewhere. Here the peasant was then put to work, paid a price which was deducted bythe state in form of taxes and reduced to a bare wage. Having no land in actuality, earning no rent from it, being given subsidized seed and hoe from taxes - a minute "capital" for his employment - where was the product that Mamdani calls "his " that he exchanged?! Mamdani takes the consciousness and illusion of the poor peasant to be a sub- stitute for scientific analysis! He cannot see that the financial oligar- chy through the agency of state capital, itself a portion of finance capital, established a production domination over the colony by linking itself in this way to the peasant and not through credit chains as such. Here the Indian featured not only as a trader but also as a dominated and exploited by the financial oligarchy also. Mamdani confirms this in the quote to we have referred when he pointed out that the Indians came net only as soldiers but as workers on the railway, and as the railway developed more workers were required from India in artisan, clerical, carpentry, bricklaying, blacksmith and gardening jobs, not only for the railways but also "for the newly established missions and government". Nowhere does Mamdani suggest that all these workers became traders. The fact is that many Asians continued as workers up to the 1972 ex- pulsions. (e) Contradiction between British and Indian capital! Mamdani in his next treatment of the "Indian commercial bour- geoisie" gives us a profound picture of antagonisms. Although them- selves also "not members of the ruling class" these bourgeoisie are protected and in the end by 1938 they had secured control of the whole- sale trade and ginning industry. We will leave the question of class for the next section and concentrate here with what Mamdani calls "contradiction between British and Indian capital". According to Mamdani this contradiction arose following the "entry of British capital" in the period 1906-1916 and that of "Indian Capital" with the arrival in Uganda of Narandas Rajaram & Co. Ltd., "a well-known Indian firm with vast capital resources and considerable experience in the cotton industry" (p. 87). It is here that Mamdani's understand- ing of imperialism becomes clearly deficient. 154 The period 1918-1928 a period of organisation of cotton ginning by the colonial state is examined by Mamdani in this eclectic manner. According to Mamdani, when handginning proved a technical set~back against the middlemen - who alone, on the basis of continued metro- politan demand, "guaranteed a free market and relatively high price to the grower", (p. 76) the colonial state as a result of the enactment of the Uganda Cotton Rules of 1913 both limited their area of operation and their numbers. The stage was set - for "monopolistic tendencies" to be consolidated. Thus the entry of "British Capital" increasingly became necessary. Although Mamdani has a tinge of "sympathy" for the middlemen and the peasant, yet he does bring out the compelling reasons for this development. This was because the need to keep costs down and the need to maintain a high quality cotton required the location of ginneries near to areas of cultivation. Thus by 1914 seven "metropolitan-based firms" - five British, one French and one German and another Uganda company "entered the field". At this point "Indian Capital" also made its entry at first through "contributions of many corroborators": "By this time a new figure had appeared on the scene... Allidina Visram established the first Indian-owned ginnery in partmership with a number of less substantial merchants" (p. 86). This opportunity for the Indian ginner came at the beginning of the war "and the consequent break in shipping between Uganda and Liverpool" (p. 86). As a result: "A number of Indian traders came forward, bought the seed at low prices, and shipped it to Bombay and tec Japan" (p. 86) In Bombay the cotton found "immediate favour" as the industry there was shifting from the production of coarse cloth to fine counts, and thus in search of long staple fine cotton, which Uganda provided: "The immediate result was two-fold: capital flowed into Uganda from Bombay textile interest and, in conjunction with a multitude of local cash subscribers various Indians who in the past had been employees of, or com-- missioned buyers for, European ginning firms in Uganda supported a second Indian ginnery" (p. 86/7). But the British Cotton Growing Association (B.C.G.A.) formed by certain monopolies in Lancashire, "anxious to prevent the Uganda crop being diverted away from Lancashire", decided to buy the entire 155 crop from ginners, "thereby guaranteeing them a profitable and secure market" (p. 87), The entry of Narandas Rajaram & Co. Ltd., "at one stroke" ended the domination of British capital and thereby forged a "strorig link between Uganda and Bombay market" (p. 88). Thus begins the great "contradiction between British and Indian Capital" which Mamdani describes at length (pp. 88-92): "The contradiction between British and Indian capital was in substance between better-established capital that was striv- ing to restrict entry into the market and new capital that was attempting to break into that same market. One was striving for monopoly, the other for free trade. In the decade after the war, this contradiction appeared as a racial zonflict between the British and Indian ginners" (p. 88). It is clear from the above quote that what Mamdani is analysing under this section is nothing but capitalist competition between different factions of British capital. Since he cannot comprehend a dialectical totality due to his dualistic outlook Mamdani finds a basis for establi- shing a contradiction between the same finance capital and on the basis of it a racial conflict. The result of this so-called racial conflict, and in spite of the fact that the era of "free trade" was long gone, and in spite of the further fact that the colonial state was a state of the “metropolitan bourgeoisie" - a "not neutral referee", and despite the fact that the "Indian commercial bourgeoisie" was not part of the "ruling class", Indian "big capital" coming from India, had by 1926 broken the monopoly of "British Capital", and by 1938 had established a clear hegemony over the "territorially based economy". And what was the secret of this victory: it was costs of ginning which "Indian capital" through exploitation of family and caste labour were able to maintain 100% lower than "British capital". "The argument now focused on the question of the destination of Uganda cotton, and how important it was that it reached Lancashire" (p. 95). We will ignore this "important question" for the time being for it should have been clear at the outset that it was irrelevant nor did it really arise in actual life. However for Mamdani it is important because it helps him get out of difficulties which he created for himself. This difficulty is created by Mamdani when he erects, as we have noted, a "contradiction" out of the blue between "British" and what he calls "Indian capital", wpon which he then builds a "racial 156 conflict". Had Mamdani had a concept of finance capital he would have known that what he calls "Indian capital" and "British capital" were one and the same thing, But with Mamdani's dualism, such a concept, would be a crude instrument not susceptible to an "artistic" analysis of the material. This enables him to establish a barrier between British Banks and Lancashire as well as Bombay and London - all bases of British finance capital at this point of time. Mamdani however soon wakes up to this point. He remembers that the National Bank of India, despite its name was "British Bank whose operations were based on Indian trade". It is this same bank which gave "all-out support" to Narandas Rajaram whom, we were told by Mamdani, had "at one stroke" struck a blow to the domination of the industry by "British capital!" At this point too Mamdani's question becomes important. "How important was it that this cotton reached Lancashire?" Mamdani answers this question himself: "Since the shipping crisis during the World War 1, Bombay had been an important destination for Uganda cotton, and from consuming less than 1% of Uganda's export in 1914-15, it became, by 1921 the market for over half" Cp. 95) This does not quite answer the question, but it is bringing us nearer. He continues: "In addition, even (yes indeed!) cotton destined for Lancashire often went through Bombay” (p. 95). But why was it necessary to ship to Bombay cotton destined for Lancashire? Mamdani answers the question himself: "As the 1923 Governor's Inquiry into the cotton Industry discovered, it was more expeditious to ship via Bombay because of more regular steamship service over both sea routes. Further more, freight from Kilindini in Kenya tc Liverpool cost shs. 96/= per ton dead weight, while from Bombay to Liverpool. it only cost shs. 50/80; the difference of 45/20 provided considerable margin to pay the Kilindini- Bombay freight cost. Also, during the ten-day transit it was possible to effect a more satisfactory sale: if the Liverpool market were better then, the cotton could be sent onward, if not, it could be offloaded at Bombay. The figures quoted in the accompanying table therefore exaggerate the position of India as the ultimate destination of the cotton exported since they are based on the desti- nation of cotton given at the time of loading on the Kenya docks" (95/6). 157 This solves Mamdani's riddle arrived at through circuitous route of Kilindini- Bombay, Bombay-Kilindini, and Kilindini-Liverpool (for Lancashire), the cotton route, which for the sake of analysis could have been avoided if he hada concept of finance capital. If the Governor of Uganda did not know by 1923 that it was chea- per to produce with "Indian Capital" than with "British" as to warrant an enquiry, the British financial oligarchy knew this fact very well otherwise the National Bank of India would have never given "“all- out support" to Narandas Rajaram. With a 100% reduction on ginning «costs and an almost 25% reduction on shipping, Lancashire soon abandoned the B.C.G.