“Samora’s children” – the celebration of (post-) socialist citizenship in Mozambique

ABSTRACT

This paper interrogates the creation and afterlife of socialist beliefs and practices in the biographies of a cohort of people educated to become homens novos, conceived of as new socialist citizens. Its empirical part is based on a case study of the School of Friendship (SdF), an education project between Mozambique and East Germany. The paper demonstrates that the SdF was successful in creating a cohort of people for whom socialist solidarity was a key component of their identity. At the same time, they interpreted what a socialist citizen should be in their own way, thus using their education as what Bourdieu calls a strategy-generating institution. This enabled protagonists to navigate the post-socialist political order, not simply regarding socialism as the nostalgic reminder of a golden past. But the majority live and celebrate socialist citizenship among themselves, and hardly engage with political contestation in present-day Mozambique.

RÉSUMÉ

Cet article examine la création et la vie après la mort des croyances et des pratiques socialistes dans les biographies d’une cohorte de personnes éduquées pour devenir des homens novos, conçus comme de nouveaux citoyens socialistes. Sa partie empirique est basée sur une étude de cas de l’École de l’Amitié (SdF), un projet éducatif entre le Mozambique et l’Allemagne de l’Est. L’article démontre que la SdF a réussi à créer une cohorte de personnes pour lesquelles la solidarité socialiste était une composante-clé de leur identité. En même temps, ces personnes ont interprété à leur manière ce que doit être un citoyen socialiste, utilisant ainsi leur éducation comme ce que Bourdieu appelle une institution génératrice de stratégie. Cela a permis aux protagonistes d’évoluer dans l’ordre politique postsocialiste, pas simplement en considérant le socialisme comme un rappel nostalgique du passé doré. Mais la majorité vivent et célèbrent entre eux la citoyenneté socialiste, et ne s’engagent guère dans la contestation politique du Mozambique d’aujourd’hui.

KEYWORDS:

• Post-socialism
• citizenship
• Samora Machel
• Mozambique
• solidarity

MOTS-CLÉS:

• Post-socialisme
• citoyenneté
• Samora Machel
• Mozambique
• solidarité

Acknowledgements

I gratefully acknowledge funding from the Nuffield Foundation (Grant No: SGS/35446) that made this project possible. I also acknowledge the funding from the German embassy in Mozambqiue that made my trip in November 2014 possible.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. It should be noted here that the concept of the “new man” had relevance beyond the socialist context, encompassing a plethora of theoretical concepts and social norms and aspirations linked to “modernity” in a broad sense, and emerging in different geographical settings. It goes beyond the focus of this paper to discuss this in more detail, but see for example Bromber and Krais (2019).

2. Archival material at the BArch is, I believe, as complete as can be. In addition to material from the various GDR ministries and the GDR secret service, the Stasi, it has copies of most documents produced by the Mozambican side and in Maputo in the Portuguese original. A mainly archive-based study conducted in 2006 by two German academics, who also consulted the archives in Maputo, confirms this: The authors describe how little additional relevant material was found within Mozambique (and what was found they discuss in their study), and that, more generally, many documents relating to that time and to the SdF in particular were rotting away on a balcony in Maputo (see Reuter and Scheunpflug 2006).

3. Between 1979 and 1989, a total of 22,161 Mozambicans worked in the former GDR under that scheme, the third largest group by nationality. The largest group, 68,826 workers, came from Vietnam, followed by 25,360 workers from Cuba. Workers from Algeria (8060), Angola (1656), China, North Korea and Mongolia (less than 1000 each from the latter three countries) made up the rest of the programme (Zwengel 2011; Van der Heyden, Semmler, and Straßburg 2014).

4. As no complex existed that was big enough to host a cohort of 900 students, a new boarding facility was built in Staßfurt, a small town near Magdeburg, complete with Mozambican artwork in the dining hall, where students lived and studied together and spent, as least in the initial years, much of their free time (for an in-depth description of the facilities and daily routines see Müller 2014; Reuter and Scheunpflug 2006).

5. One of the first documents here is a memorandum from the Ministry of Education and Culture of the People’s Republic of Mozambique, under Graça Machel, from 1 September 1980, to consider the creation of special technical secondary schools in the GDR. At that time, two schools with 1000 students each or four schools with 500 students each were envisaged (BArch DR/2/50686). This was later scaled down to one cohort of 900 as it was otherwise deemed too expensive. A second agreement was signed on 26 May 1989 that envisaged a staged subsequent cohort to follow from 1990 onwards, with 100 new students each being admitted over three consecutive years (BArch DR/2/13992), but these plans fell victim to German reunification.

6. All names have been changed for reasons of confidentiality.

7. Anna, interview 3 June 2008 in Maputo.

8. While the SdF had a German director and most pedagogic staff was German (there were a few Mozambican teachers teaching Portuguese language and Mozambican history and culture), a FRELIMO representative was a quasi co-director and had power over certain issues, mainly in relation to behaviour and discipline (BArch DR/2/28972; see also Müller 2014). As SdF students grew older and mingled more with local youth and the local population more generally, they experienced some of the racism in GDR society as well as the solidarity of standing up to such racism. It is beyond the scope of this paper to discuss this in more detail, but see Müller (2014, 86–90).

9. Conversation with Anna, 5 November 2014 in Maputo.

10. Alfonso, interview 31 May 2008 in Maputo.

11. Conversation with Alfonso, 5 November 2014 in Maputo.

12. Mano, interview 12 June 2008 in Beira.

13. Paulino, interview 14 June 2008 in Beira.

14. German pedagogic staff at the SdF even went so far as drawing up a concrete list of employment opportunities in GDR joint ventures in Mozambique for each SdF graduate, and sent this list to the Mozambican partner with a request to comment by 18 August 1987, so there would be enough time to alter arrangements that were not deemed feasible. The Mozambican side never returned any concrete comments or alternative suggestions (BArch DR/2/50625). This list is still available in the German National Archive and it caused great amusement when I told some of my research participants where they might have worked.

15. The original agreements between the GDR and the People’s Republic of Mozambique clearly stipulate that the SdF leaving certificates are of the same value as a secondary school certificate obtained in Mozambique (BArch DR/2/13992). But after secondary school reform within Mozambique this was no longer the case, a fact not communicated to SdF students or their German teachers, and which came as a shock to SdF graduates when they returned. For a detailed discussion of these dynamics and their consequences, see Müller (2014).

16. Mateus, interview 17 June 2008 in Nampula.

17. Hipolito, interview 18 June 2008 in Nampula.

18. Sousa, interview 8 June 2008 in Chimoio.

19. Paulino, interview 14 June 2008 in Beira.

20. Lourenco, interview 18 June 2008 in Nampula.

21. Alex, interview 3 June 2008 in Maputo.

22. Interestingly, various efforts I made to get my book on the SdF translated into Mozambican Portuguese, in cooperation with Mozambican research institutes, have failed. At the same time I am told that copies of my book have been widely read, including by people who had active roles in the wider education infrastructure at the time, some of whom have contacted me. Some members of the SdF cohort have been encouraged to consider writing about their experiences themselves, something I hope will happen in the future (various email exchanges, 2017).

23. Mia, interview 9 June 2008 in Chimoio.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Nuffield Foundation [Grant No: SGS/35446].

Notes on contributors

Tanja R. Müller

Tanja R. Müller is Professor of Political Sociology at the Global Development Institute, University of Manchester. She has worked for more than twenty years on post-revolutionary and post-socialist states, with a particular geographical focus on Eritrea and Mozambique.