Elitist Domination and Its Import: Survey of Four Decades of Perpetuation of Inequities in Zimbabwe

ABSTRACT

The purpose of the paper is to interrogate the meaning of Zimbabwe’s four decades of independence after the country attained it in 1980. We argue that the creation of and continued dominance by a new class of elites in the country is the principal reason why many citizens remain entrenched in poverty. Based on a desktop study of the evidence and cases of issues surrounding dichotomies of sectors – urban versus rural, formal versus informal, low-income versus high-income – the paper engages thematic and content analysis. The findings reveal that inequality remains a staunch force that the new president must fight. The country has rich mining deposits, yet inequality remains high. Good governance and progressive distributive policies are suggested as possible measures to rescue the country from gross inequalities currently bedevilling it.

KEYWORDS:

• Elitism
• state capture
• patronage
• Zimbabwe

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No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Notes

1 The Gini Coeffient is a measure of the statistical measure of the disparity between the high and low income classes