Middle Classes in Africa

Lena Kroeker is Research Fellow at the Bayreuth Academy of Advanced African Studies, University of Bayreuth, GermanyDavid O’Kane is an Associate of the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology, Halle/Saale, GermanyTabea Scharrer is Research Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology, Halle/Saale, Germany

• 1. Introduction: Africa’s Middle Classes in Critical Perspective; Tabea Scharrer, David O’Kane and Lena Kroeker .- Section 1: Rethinking Concepts of Middle Classes in Africa.- 2. Turning the Poor into Something More Inspiring: The Creation of the African Middle Class Controversy; Dominique Darbon .- 3. The Narrative of ‘the African Middle Class’ and its Conceptual Limitations; Dieter Neubert and Florian Stoll.- 4. Anthropology and Class in Africa: Challenges of the Past and Present.- Section 2: The Recurring Rise and Return of Middle Classes in Africa; David O’Kane and Tabea Scharrer.- 5. The Ghanaian Middle Class, Social Stratification, and Long-Term Dynamics of Upward and Downward Mobility of Lawyers and Teachers; Jan Budniok and Andrea Noll .- 6. The Nubians of Kibera ‘Revisited’: Detribalized Natives, Slum Dwellers, Middle class?; Johanna Sarre .- 7. Saving and Serving the Nation: HIV Politics and the Emergence of New Professional Classes in Botswana; Astrid Bochow .- Section 3:The Political Consequences of the Middle Classes.-8. Propertied Citizenship in a Township and Suburb in Johannesburg; Barbara Heer .- 9. Thinking Sierra Leone and Building a New Middle Class: Political Expression and Political Values at the University of Makeni; David O’Kane .- 10. African Middle Classes: Formation and Destabilizing Effects.- Section 4: Formation of Social Interconnections and Interdependencies; Jason Musyoka .- 11. Pathways into the Middle: Rites of Passage and Emerging Middle Classes in Namibia; Julia Pauli .- 12. Middle Class Approaches to Social Security in Kenya; Lena Kroeker .- 13. Middle Classes and ‘Moderate Prosperity’ in Rural Madagascar; Tsiry Andrianampiarivo .- 14. Afterword. The (Idea of) African Middle Classes: Theorizing from Africa; Rachel Spronk.

“The volume is well structured, offers nuanced questions, and engages with relevant challenges relating to current trends in social formations of African societies.” (Henning Melber, Africa Spectrum, Vol. 53 (1), 2018)