Garvey's Ghost: Black Talk

Nia

Today we study "Purpose." To this end I offer the words of Franz Fanon:

Since the Middle Class has neither sufficient material nor intellectual resources (by intellectual resources we mean engineers and technicians), it limits its claims to the taking over of business offices and commercial houses formerly occupied by the settlers. The national bourgeoisie steps into the shoes of the former European settlement: doctors, barristers, traders, commercial travelers, general agents, and transport agents. It considers that the dignity of the country and it's own welfare require that it should occupy these posts. From now on it will insist that al the big foreign companies should pass through it's hands, whether these companies wish to keep their connections with the country, or to open it up. The national middle class discovers it's historic mission: that of intermediary.

Seen through its eyes, its mission has nothing to do with trasforming the nation; it consists , prosaically, of being the transmission line between the nation and a capitalism, rampant though camouflaged, which today puts on the mask of neo-colonialism. The national bourgeoisie will be quiite content with the role of the Western bourgeoisie's business agent, and it will play it's part without any complexes in a most dignified manner. But this same lucrative role, this cheap-Jack's function, this meanness of outlook and this absence of all ambition symbolize the incapability of the national middle class to fullfil its historic role of bourgeoisie. Here, the dynamic, pioneer aspect, the characteristics if the inventor and of the discoverer of new worlds which are found in all national bourgeoisie; are lamentably absent. In the colonial countries, the spirit of indulgence is dominant at the core of the bourgeoisie; and this is because the national bourgeoisie identifies itself with the Western bourgeoisie, from which it has learned its lessons.

Franz Fanon
The Pitfalls of National Consciousness