Corporatisme et colonialisme: approche du cas mozambicain, 1933-1979

Corporatism and colonialism: an approach of Moçambique's case, 1933-1979. I. A troublesome genesis for a skeletal movement.- The first part of this study (to be continued in the next issue) raises the general problem of the specific particulars of Portuguese colonialism, and more precisely of the possible effect on colonial society of a corporativist, fascist metropolitan State. Insofar as Portugal itself is England's "semi-colony" while Moçambique is fully integrated within South Africa's economic system, are peculiar characteristics of the colony to be explained by fascism in its metropolis? A tentative answer is here based upon an analysis of the official, legal birth of "colonial corporatism" (1937) and, later on (1942-1960), of the first "national trade-unions" and grémios. A study of the actual working of these structures and of their socio-economic role leads one to consider them as operating quite outside the colonial economy and almost completely lacking any social basis for their existence. The same analysis applied to the fascist political structures (single party, youth organization) reveals the regime's failure in its attempts to set up a real movement among the colonial petty bourgeoisie and the White working-class aristocracy.