Gravitas Call for Articles: Electoral Contestations in Zimbabwe: ‘New’ Social Classes and Search for Transformation

Electoral Contestations in Zimbabwe: ‘New’ Social Classes and Search for Transformation

Zimbabwe’s current political contestations have been largely shaped by the conflict lines between a liberation movement that has turned authoritarian and an opposition movement which has advanced ‘social democracy’ as an alternative.  On one hand the ruling elites marshalled state power to effect a fast track track land reform while closing down on democratic space and those outside the ‘party-state’ coalesced around the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU), the National Constitutional Assembly (NCA) and finally the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) in September 1999. At the formation of the NCA and MDC, Zimbabwe’s economy was highly formalised and most of the labour force unionised meaning there was a considerable ‘labour class power’ . 

The economic structural adjustment of the 1990s  and the Fast Track Land Reform led to the decimation of unionised labour.  In its stead this has been replaced by ‘New Farmers’,  a pervasive informal sector, cross border traders, small scale mining  and petty trading.  Professor Brian Raftopoulos pointed that Zimbabwe is now characterised by a ‘reconfigured political economy’ (See the article titled ‘Zimbabwean Politics in the Post-2013 Election Period’,  in the journal Africa Spectrum number 49 Vol 2, 91- 103).  This question has attracted research interest from scholars but the political effect of that has not been interpreted into the political practices of the broadly defined ‘pro-democracy movement’. The nature of this reconfiguration has meant the erosion of the power of the social forces that had been instrumental to social and political influence of  the NCA,  the  ZCTU and formed the power base of the ‘democratic movement’.  Our interest is to explore the character of this ‘reconfigured political economy’ and ask questions about what this means for  contemporary and future electoral politics, political change, economic transformation and active citizenship.

Gravitas therefore calls for opinion editorial pieces of between 1300-1500 words that seek to unpack, expand and deepen the debate on the reconfigured political economy and draw lessons or insights on what this may mean for the pro-democracy movement in the 2018 elections.

Articles may focus on, but not limited to the following:

·         Social classes, power and elections

·         Political parties’ manifestos, ideologies and key national questions

·         Civil society, elections and social change

·         Gender contestations, women empowerment and elections

·         Commodification of elections and electoral accountability

Articles, subject to editing and reviewing, are to be emailed to the following addresses by 1300hrs, Thursday 27^th of April 2017: gravitas@ipazim.com.