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Mauritius: Independence and Dependence

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 November 2008

Jean Houbert
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Extract

Mauritius became independent on 12 March 1968, and was then said to be the paradigm of the small isolated, poor, dependent country, only emerging from the colonial era to fall immediately into neocolonialism – the Third World's Third World.

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Articles
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The Journal of Modern African Studies , Volume 19 , Issue 1 , March 1981 , pp. 75 - 105
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1981

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References

page 75 note 1 For information about the arrival of the Europeans, see Visdelov-Guimbeau, G., La Découverte des íles Mascareignes (Port-Louis, 1948).Google Scholar On the historical background of Mauritius in the context of the Indian Ocean, see Toussaint, A., Histoire des íles Mascareignes (Paris, 1972),Google Scholar and Histoire de l'océan Indien (Paris, 1961).Google Scholar

page 76 note 1 Mauritius is in latitude 20 ° 15 S, longitude 57 ° 35E, with an area of 1,865 sq.km, being 61 km long by 47 km, with 250 km of coast line. The island is of volcanic origin, fringed with coral reefs that create an extensive lagoon of 2,260 sq.km. A number of small islands, north and east, are parts of Mauritius, Rodrigues being the most important, 560 km to the east. The French département of Réunion is 150 km west of Mauritius, and the nearest land mass is Madagascar some 800 km to the west.

page 76 note 2 On the British conquest of Mauritius, see D'Unienville, Raymond M.Letters of Sir John Abercromby, September 1810–April 1811 (Port-Louis, 1969),Google Scholar and The London Gazette Extraordinary (London), 13 02 1811.Google Scholar

page 76 note 3 See Lamusse, Roland, ‘The Economic Development of the Mauritius Sugar Industry’, B.Litt. dissertation, University of Oxford, 1958.Google Scholar

page 76 note 4 For an analysis of developments in the economy since World War II, see Meade, J. E. et al. The Economic and Social Structure of Mauritius (London, 1961),Google Scholar and Meade, J. E., ‘Mauritius a case study in Malthusian economics’, in Economic Journal (London), LXXI, 09 1961, pp. 521–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar For a critique of Meade's position, see King, John, ‘Mauritius, Maithus and Professor Meade’, Communications Series No. 49, Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, Brighton, 1970.Google Scholar

page 77 note 1 Currently 80,000 tons of rice and 50,000 tons of wheat flour, meat, and milk are being imported. Mauritius is now producing sufficient potatoes and poultry for local consumption, but the seeds and feed have to be obtained from South Africa. Some efforts have been made to improve the home supply of fish, but meanwhile, Japanese, Taiwan, and South Korean fleets exploit the resources around the island. Financial Times (London), Special Survey on Mauritius, 6 12 1979.Google Scholar

page 77 note 2 The articulation of capitalist and pre-capitalist modes of production in Africa is discussed by Rey, Pierre-Philippe, Les Alliances de classes (Paris, 1978).Google Scholar Slavery was, at first, the most expeditious way for capitalism to secure sufficient labour power to develop this almost uninhabited island. As Marx has argued, ‘capitalism does not entirely rule out the possibility of the existence of slavery at isolated points within the bourgeois production system. But this is only possible because it does not exist at other points of the system and appears as an anomaly in opposition to the bourgeois system itself’; quoted by Howard, M. C. and King, J. C. (eds.), The Economics of Marx (London, 1976), p. 87.Google Scholar For a thorough analysis of sugar plantations and slavery, see Williams, Eric, Capitalism and Slavery (London, 1964).Google Scholar

page 79 note 1 For the division of sugar plantations into plots and their sale to Indians, see Brookfield, H. C., ‘Problems of Monoculture and Diversification in a Sugar Island: Mauritius’, in Economic Geography (Worcester, Mass.), 35, 1959, pp. 25–40.Google Scholar

page 80 note 1 A consultative committee on the revision of the constitution under the chairmanship of the Governor of Mauritius, Donald Kennedy, held several meetings in 1946 and 1947, during which questions of ethnicity were debated at length. This led to an exchange of correspondence with the Secretary of State for the Colonies, Arthur Creech-Jones, and to the extension of the suffrage. See Revision of the Constitution of Mauritius (London, 1947), Cmd. 7228.Google Scholar The text of the 1947 constitution is to be found in Napal, D., Les Constitutions del'île Maurice (Port-Louis, 1962), pp. 110–27.Google Scholar

page 80 note 2 ‘Le Retour de l'île Maurice à la France’, Documents publiés par la délégation mauricienne, Paris, 1919; also Rivière, J., L'île Maurice à la France (Paris, 1920).Google Scholar

page 81 note 1 The Chinese came to Mauritius during the late nineteenth century as labourers, but rapidly moved into retail trading where they gained a virtual monopoly. In recent years they have entered the professions, while retaining a strong position in commerce; well ‘creolised’ they now identify themselves fully with Mauritius. See M. Ly-Tio-Fane, ‘The Chinese in Mauritius’, n.d.

page 81 note 2 Cf. Emrith, Moomtaz, The Muslims in Mauritius (Port-Louis, 1967),Google Scholar and for an anthropological analysis, see Benedict, Burton, Indians in a Plural Society (London, 1961).Google Scholar

page 82 note 1 The P.M.S.D. was originally known as Le Parti mauricien, but social démocrate was later added, mainly to impress the British Labour Government, and a long document tried to establish its credentials as a social democratic party (Port-Louis, nd.). The early P.M. had the reputation of being anti-Hindu, and members of the M.L.P. later embarrassed the leaders of the P.M.S.D. by reminding them of the days when ‘Malbar nous pas oulé’ had been their slogan; Legislative Assembly Debates, 23 March 1965.

page 82 note 2 The revised Constitution of the Mauritius Labour Party (Port-Louis, 1957),Google Scholar reaffirmed the socialist principles of the party. The ten years (1957–67) of internal self-government under the M.L.P. leading to independence are reviewed in a special edition of Inforama (Port-Louis), 1967,Google Scholar ‘Dix Années de réalisations’. The positions of the P.M.S.D. and the M.L.P. on the issue of independence were brought out clearly in a debate between Duval, Gaëtan and Jagatsingh, K. in L'Express (Port-Louis), 31 12 1966.Google Scholar

page 82 note 3 The Prime Minister, Seewoosagur Ramgoolam, stated that although he himself had been prepared to advocate integration, ‘we are told there is not the slightest chance of this country being integrated with Great Britain…Great Britain has no time for us. It is painful for me to stand in this House and say so, because I am a loyal citizen of the British Empire. I owe my fidelity and loyalty to this great Empire, even if it has not discharged its duties towards the common people of this country’. Mauritius Legislative Council Debates, 13 June 1967, cols. 791–2.

page 83 note 1 The Times (London), 23 01 1968.Google Scholar Also de Saint-Jorre, J., ‘An Impoverished Independence’, in Round Table (London), 04 1968, pp. 217–19.Google Scholar

page 83 note 2 The Manchester Guardian (London), 1 02 1965.Google Scholar

page 83 note 3 A preliminary survey had been made in 1958, and in 1961 a joint report established the basis for the necessary decisions to be taken whereby the United States was to finance half of the £10 million project. Later, in 1965, when Mahe had been abandoned, three of the small island groups of the Seychelles were detached and joined to the Chagos to form B.I.O.T., the British arguing that this was the ‘price’ the Seychelles had agreed to pay for the airport. Seychelles Bulletin (Mahe), 19 03 1976.Google Scholar

page 84 note 1 The three island groups of Farquhar, Desroches, and Aldabra, amputated from the Seychelles at the same time as the Chagos were detached from Mauritius, were returned to the sovereignty of Mahe as part of an agreement designed to boost the image of Jimmy Mancham, the British-groomed President, and to make him accept independence. The United States was involved because of their military tracking station on Mahe, and because of their insistancc that these islands should not be made available to other powers for military purposes. The People (Mahe), 27 03 1974,Google Scholar and Le Monde (Paris), 25–2805 1976.Google Scholar

page 84 note 2 The Observer (London), 1 08 1965.Google Scholar

page 84 note 3 An indication of how strongly the British Government felt about setting up this base is given by the fact that it went ahead in spite of repeated objections from several Commonwealth countries. See The Hindu (New Delhi), 17 01, 27 04, 19 and 2011 1965Google Scholar for India's objections, and Dawn (Karachi), 20 03 and 29 05 1965,Google Scholar for Pakistan. Two U.N. resolutions also expressed deep concern over the project; The Times, 17 July 1965, and Le Monde, 28 November 1965.

page 84 note 4 The Times, 6 and 22 October 1965.

page 84 note 5 The Guardian, 6 and 8 October 1965.

page 84 note 6 The Times, 13 November and 7 December 1965. Answering a parliamentary question about Diego Garcia on 14 December 1965, M. G. Forget, then the second most important member of the Government, said ‘In discussions of this kind, which affect British arrangements for the defence of the region in which Mauritius is situated, there could, in the Government's view, be no question of insisting on a minimum amount of compensation’; Mauritius Legislative Assembly, col. 1774.

page 84 note 7 The Diego Garcia question has resurfaced in Mauritian and international politics from time to time. During 1980, with the help of an expert from the British Ministry of Defence, the map showing the territories forming part of Mauritius was redrawn, leaving out the Chagos archipelago. An opposition amendment in the Legislative Assembly to include the islands was rejected, the Minister for Foreign Affairs arguing that ‘Diego is legally British. There is no getting away from it. This is a fact that cannot be denied. No amount of red ink can make it become blue. In any case, I am not in a hurry to see the Americans go’. Le Mauricien, 27 June 1980.

However, with mounting pressure inside the M.L.P., as well as from the O.A.U. – where a motion by Madagascar demanding that Chagos be returned to Mauritius was carried unanimously at the Freetown Summit on 4 July 1980 – Ramgoolam went to see the British Prime Minister. But all he got from London was a vague promise that the islands would be returned to Mauritius ‘when they are no longer needed for defence purposes’. Ibid. 13 June and 8 July 1980, and L'Express, 17 July 1980.

When the Minister of Foreign Affairs returned from Freetown and London, he tried to put this ‘polite refusal’ (so described by another Minister) in as favourable a light as possible for the Government by going back on what he had said the previous month, and by offering the following interpretation: ‘Diego belongs to Mauritius; there is no disagreement about that … L'île est a l'île Maurice; l'usufruct est a la Grande-Bretagne’. Le Mauricien, 10 October 1980. But he was contradicted by the Prime Minister who, according to L'Express, 17 July 1980, stated on his return that ‘Great Britain has sovereignty on Diego’.

page 85 note 1 According to Le Mauricien, 22 July 1980, the British Government has been trying through a private lawyer to persuade the deported islanders, now well organised and politicised, but mainly unemployed in Mauritius, to drop all claims to their ‘homeland’ in exchange for a further payment of £1·2 million.

page 85 note 2 The overthrow of the Shah's régime and the Gulf war between Iran and Iraq has further enhanced the strategic importance of Diego Garcia: the eight helicopters which attempted to rescue the American hostages in Iran were based there, and more recently the stockpile of equipment and arms for the newly created United States Rapid Deployment Force. See Le Point (Paris), 12 06 1980, p. 88,Google Scholar and the Sydney Morning Herald, 21 June 1980.

page 85 note 3 The following sources have been used for the Diego Garcia question and the rôle of Mauritius: The Times, 8 and 9 November 1965, The Guardian, 10 September 1975, The New York Times, 22 September 1973, The Sunday Times, 21 September 1975, The Hindu, 20 November 1965, Le Monde, 13 March 1976, and the local press in Mauritius during this period. Also interviews at the 1965 Constitutional Conference with several of the Mauritian delegates and their Constitutional Adviser, Professor S. A. De Smith, as well as Government Ministers in Mauritius and the Seychelles.

Duval, Gaëtan, the leader of the P.M.S.D., published his version of what happened in Une Certaine idée de l'île Maurice (Port-Louis, 1976),Google Scholar and Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam gave an interview on the Diego Garcia question to Le Monde, 13 March 1976. For a wealth of information on life in the Chagos, see Scott, R., Limouria: the lesser dependencies of Mauritius (London, 1961).Google Scholar This ex-colonial Governor of Mauritius shows the weakness of the official British argument – once the Diego Garcia removals had been reported – that the islanders were only temporary resident employees of a Seychelles copra company.

page 86 note 1 Mauritius Constitutional Conference, 1965. Report by the Chairman Mr A. Greenwood (London, 1965), Cmnd. 2797, p. 77Google Scholar: ‘the main effect of the referendum would be to prolong the current uncertainty and political controversy in a way which could only harden and deepen communal divisions and rivalries…and would not be in the best interests of Mauritius’. See also The Times, 25 September 1965.

page 86 note 2 Agreement on Mutual Defence and Assistance (London, 1968). Cmnd. 3629, p. 2.Google Scholar The Agreement was to continue in force for six years, but the British decided not to renew it much to the chagrin of the Mauritian Prime Minister who had always been very keen to tie the island to British strategic development in the region. Ramgoolam had already given a guarantee back in 1961 that ‘an independent Mauritius would not follow a neutralist policy which would remove it from areas of British strategic defence’, O.F.N.S., 26 June 1961. Exchange of Letters for the Provision of Assistance or Advice in Connection with Staffing, Administration and Training of the Police Forces of Mauritius, Treaty Series No. 3 (Port-Louis, 1968).

page 86 note 3 Daily Telegraph, 26 April 1967, and Financial Times (London), 4 08 1967.Google Scholar

page 86 note 4 The report of the Electoral Commission led by G. H. Banwell was badly received by the Prime Minister, mainly because it made little allowance for ethnic representation; Legislative Assembly Debates, 7 June 1966. In fact, Ramgoolam was keeping his part of the bargain for the support he had received from C.A.M. at the Lancaster House Conference. Whereupon John Stonehouse was dispatched to Mauritius, where he supported changes that satisfied the M.L.P. and its ally, but the price paid has been to entrench communalism in the constitution of independent Mauritius. See Report of the Banwell Commission (London, 1966), Cmnd. 362,Google Scholar and The Mauritius Independence Order, 1968 (London, 1968).Google Scholar

page 87 note 1 According to The Sunday Telegraph (London), 10 03 1968,Google Scholar the British Labour Party loaned ‘a chubby bearded gentleman’ to the M.L.P. to help organise the election campaign, namely Donald Ford.

page 87 note 2 The Queen was to have been represented at the ceremony by Princess Alexandra, but her visit was cancelled for fear of further disturbances. Actually there was no violence then, although tension was high; New York Times, 13 March 1968.

page 87 note 3 Ibid. 16 March 1968. In fact it was several months before the new flag was flown widely in Mauritius, and only after a year in Rodrigues.

page 87 note 4 There had been a first wave of violence between creoles and Indians, the two main communal contestants over the independence issue in 1965, precipitated by the visit of Greenwood, A.; The Times, 12 and 14 05 1965.Google Scholar What was strange about the violence of 1968 was that it was between creoles and Muslims, the two ethnic groups which had opposed independence, that it remained localised in a suburb of the capital, and that it occurred after the elections but before independence. Whatever the cause, one of the consequences was that the Muslims withdrew their support for a time for the P.M.S.D. Ibid. 22, 25, and 26 January 1968.

page 88 note 1 After the elections, Ramgoolam had extended ‘Whole-hearted support and cooperation to the private sector… [I] trust that the rate of local and foreign investment will increase and that the private sector will make its full contribution towards a concentrated, national effort’; Legislative Assembly Debates, 22 August 1967.

page 88 note 2 In the year before independence, Ramgoolam had introduced a motion in the Legislative Assembly designed to emphasise ‘the vital necessity of protecting Mauritian sugar’ in any negotiations for British entry into the E.E.C. Mauritius, he had stressed, ‘will continue to grow as much sugar as possible. Sugar is our lifeblood…The C.S.A. is vital for us’. In the same debate the Prime Minister stated that he fully subscribed to the view of General de Gaulle that ‘France should have a responsibility towards all the French-speaking countries of French culture [sic]; indeed, stealing a leaf from the P.M.S.D., he added, ‘because here is a country to which France has contributed so much, and I do not think France can now say that all of a sudden she had absolved herself from all her responsibilities’. Legislative Assembly Debates, 13 06 1967, p. 791.Google Scholar

page 88 note 3 Le Monde, 10 August 1967.

page 89 note 1 French scholarship funds went up from 7 to 27 million francs in 1973. See Benezra, R., ‘L'île Maurice: sept ans d'indépendence’, in Afrique contemporaine (Paris), 84, 03 1976.Google Scholar

page 89 note 2 When the Association international des parlementaires de league française met in Mauritius in 1975 M Debré said: ‘Le français en tant que culture n'appartient pas à la France; elle est une responsibilité commune’. Answering questions by the press, the French leader said that although Mauritius represented economic and political stability in the region she needed friends, and France was in the front rank of her friends; L'Express, 16 and 2109 1975.Google Scholar Later that year, Mauritius was host to the 28 French-speaking members of the Agence de coopération culturelle et technique; Le Monde, 28 November 1975. Since then Ramgoolam has expressed the wish of seeing a Commonwealth à la française created; Advance (Mauritius), 26 04 1977.Google Scholar

page 89 note 3 For Mauritius, membership of O.C.A.M. was part of the strategy of getting close to France and Europe bearing in mind the forthcoming British negotiations with the E.E.C. For France the aim was to get a new member at a time when O.C.A.M. was in bad health – shortly after the meeting of this French-sponsored organisation in Mauritius in May 1973, where only the faithful Senghor, Bongo, and Bokassa turned up, Madagascar withdrew, as well as Chad and Cameroun. The adhesion of Mauritius was particularly useful for France: since Réunion is treated as a part of the metropole, a clear distinction must be maintained between Africa and the islands of the Indian Ocean. Hence the ‘M’ in O.C.A.M., for if the islands are regarded, as they are by the Organisation of African Unity, as part of the continent, then the Réunion policy of France is challenged.

page 89 note 4 L'Express, 1 June 1973.

page 90 note 1 Chasle, Raymond, L'Accord de Port-Louis: l'adhésion de Maurice à la Convention de raoundé II (Port-Louis, 1973).Google Scholar

page 90 note 2 L'Express, 26 July 1973.

page 90 note 3 Ibid. 26 October 1971, 23 February and 8 July 1973, and 24 August and 3 September 1974.

page 90 note 4 Week-End (Mauritius), 28 07 1974.Google Scholar

page 90 note 5 The price was £260 per ton during 1975; Mauritius Economic Review, 1971–1975 (Port-Louis, 1976), p. 45.Google Scholar During the financial year 1975–6, when £188 was being paid for the E.E.C. quota, the Mauritius sugar industry made a net profit of £20 million. Financial Times, 18 June 1976.

page 91 note 1 See J. E. Meade et al. op. cit. for the relevance of this model to Mauritius.

page 92 note 1 In the absence of exchange controls Mauritius was a net foreign investor throughout the 1950s; the long-term capital outflow amounted to 10 per cent of gross domestic capital formation. King, op. cit. p. 9.

page 92 note 2 Despite the grave uncertainties caused by having such an open and dependent economy, Mauritius, like many other Third-World countries, has a government department that is responsible for planning long-term social and economic developments. The target of full employment by the end of the decade was set within the Government's Development Strategy, 1971–1980 (Port-Louis),Google Scholar and the creation of more work was further emphasised during the economic boom by the Travail pour tous programme; Mauritius Economic Review, 1971–1975 (Port-Louis, 1976).Google Scholar The 1976 five-year plan for 1975–80 aimed ambitiously to provide additional employment for 76,000, mostly in manufacturing industries and tourism, but the latest two-year plan for 1980–82 projects the more realistic figure of 22,600 new jobs. Interview with M. Ghurburrum, Minister for Planning and Development, in Week-End, 10 August 1980, p. 5.

page 92 note 3 See the interesting collection of papers by scholars of the Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, edited by Villamil, J., Transnational Capitalism and Development (London, 1979).Google Scholar

page 93 note 1 Financial Times, 18 June 1976.

page 93 note 2 The number of tourists has risen by 28 per cent per annum since 1970 to reach 73,000 in 1974. The gross earnings from tourism increased more than four-fold during the same period, to reach Rs 112 million in 1974. Mauritius Economic Review, 1971–1975, pp. 90–1.

page 93 note 3 See the special number of the journal of the sugar industry, Prosi (Mauritius), 102, 07 1977.Google Scholar

page 93 note 4 Garron, R., ‘Le Particularisme des rapports entre l'île Maurice et la C.E.E.’, in Annuaire des pays de l'océan Indien, Vol. II, 1975 (Aix en Provence, 1977).Google Scholar

page 93 note 5 Industrial Investment in Mauritius (Port-Louis, 1976).Google Scholar

page 94 note 1 Financial Times, 18 July 1976.

page 94 note 2 The G.N.P. increased by 250 per cent between 1967 and 1975 at current factor costs, and when corrected for inflation this left an annual growth rate of over 11 per cent. The gross domestic fixed-capital formation increased from £13 million in 1970 to £70 million in 1974. Minister of Finance, Budget Speech, 1976.

page 94 note 3 According to the Financial Times, 18 June 1976, up to 22 per cent of the capital invested by the sugar industry has gone into tourism and manufacturing. The 1971–5 plan envisaged that some Rs400 million would be available from external sources; in fact, receipts from abroad totalled only Rs 143 million, while local sources provided Rs603 million. Budget Speech, p. 3.

page 94 note 4 Boisson, J. M., ‘Les Comptes de l'économie de Maurice’, in Annuaire des pays de l'océan Indien, Vol. I, 1974 (Aix en Provence, 1976).Google Scholar See also Financial Times, 18 June 1976.

page 95 note 1 In addition to the guaranteed base price there is a fluctuating ‘monetary compensation’ which reflects the relationship of sterling to the E.E.C. unit of account. Thus, while Mauritius received an average of £226 a tonne for its E.E.C. quota in 1978, the next year there was no premium above the basic £198·38; since the producers estimated that their 1979 costs were no less than £200 a tonne, even the most efficient could only earn ‘a derisory return on capital’, according to the Financial Times, Special Report on Mauritius, 6 December 1979. The price of sugar on the world market went up again during the 1980 harvest, but unfortunately, due to a severe cyclone, Mauritius did not gain all the expected benefits because it was unable to fulfil its E.E.C. quota.

page 95 note 2 The Times, 8 March 1978.

page 95 note 3 Financial Times, 6 December 1979. The I.M.F. loan conditions have been eased recently, and a number of western states, led by France, have formed a consortium to provide Mauritius with 2,000 million Rupees, ‘to pull us out of the hole we are in’, according to the Minister of Finance, who linked this planned rescue with the Diego Garcia base and the pro-western policy of Mauritius. Le Mauricien, 10 June 1980.

page 95 note 4 Brookfield, H. C., ‘Population Distribution in Mauritius’, in Journal of Tropical Geography (Singapore), Vol. 1959, p. 4.Google Scholar

page 96 note 1 See Titmuss, R. M. and Abel-Smith, B., Social Policies and Population Growth in Mauritius (London, 1961),Google Scholar for a thorough study of the population problems of the island. The number of inhabitants has risen as follows: 1846, 158,462; 1861, 310,050; 1901,371,023; 1944,419,185; 1952, 501,415; 1962, 681,619; 1972, 826,199; 1979, 910,000 estimated. Sources: Central Statistical Office, Bi-Annual Digest of Statistics (Port-Louis), 1969,Google ScholarFacts about Mauritius (Port-Louis), 1976,Google Scholar and Financial Times, 6 December 1979. The population rate of growth reached a peak of 3·1 per cent in 1962, but in the 1970s this dropped: to 1·94 by 1972, and to only 1·44 per cent by 1977, a low figure by Third-World standards. The Times, 8 March 1978.

page 97 note 1 Brookfield, ‘Problems of Monoculture and Diversification in a Sugar Island’, loc. cit. pp. 32–3.

page 97 note 2 Financial Times, 6 December 1979. According to Week-End, 29 June 1980, the sugar silos for bulk loading have finally been installed, and these have cut down the cost of transporting the crop to Europe since the ships are now turned around very much faster. But from the point of view of employment and the class struggle, the avant-garde of the Mauritius working class has been weakened, since large numbers of dockers, always the spearhead of the organised labour movement, have been made redundant. The financial compensation for redundancy was a small price which the bourgeoisie paid not too reluctantly for weakening this strategically located element of proletarist power. See Harbour, Port-Louis and Union, Dock Workers, Bord de la mer (Port-Louis, 1980).Google Scholar

page 97 note 3 Mauritius Economic Review, 1971–1975, p. 28.

page 97 note 4 Financial Times, 6 December 1979. The latest and more modest target – as indicated on p. 92, fn. 2, above – is to create 22,600 new jobs during 1980–2.

page 97 note 5 See the pessimistic analysis of Cohen, Robin in Manpower and Unemployment Research (Montreal), 04 1978,Google Scholar reproduced in Le Mauricien, 9 August 1978.

page 98 note 1 Nababsing, V. and Virahsawmy, R., ‘The Characteristics of the Small Planter Class in a Small Plantation Economy’, Conference at the University of Mauritius, 08 1976.Google Scholar

page 98 note 2 See Revision of the Constitution of Mauritius, 1947, Cmnd. 7228.

page 98 note 3 For political developments in Mauritius in the post-war period, see Leblanc, J. C., La Vie constitutionelle et politique de l'île Maurice de 1945 à 1958 (Madagascar, 1968)Google Scholar, Varma, M. N., The Struggle of Dr Ramgoolam (Port-Louis, 1976),Google Scholar and Le Souffle de la libération, quarante ans de travaillisme (Port-Louis, 1976).Google Scholar

page 99 note 1 The conclusions reached by Benedict, B., ‘Education without Opportunity’, in Human Relations (New York), II, 1958,Google Scholar remain valid today. If anything, the greater availability of post-secondary eduation now compounds the problem unemployed university graduates compete with schoolleavers for white-collar posts. Recently the Government has taken over the financing of the ‘Colleges’ but without changing the structure of the system, and there are signs that it will not be able to go on footing the bill after the I.M.F.-imposed restrictions.

page 99 note 2 In 1975 the ‘College’ students marched on the capital and disturbances broke out when they were confronted by the Minister of Education accompanied by the Security Adviser and the Riot Unit of the Police. See Week-End, 25 May 1975 and 1 June 1976. More recently the students at the University staged a sit-in, and kidnapped the Vice-Chancellor in protest about their bleak prospects for employment. Ibid. 15 April 1979.

page 99 note 3 M.M.M., Pour un île Maurice possible (Pourt-Louis, 1970).Google Scholar

page 99 note 4 L'Express, 19 October 1972.

page 99 note 5 Ibid. 21 September 1970. The electoral system of Mauritius, one of the most complex in the world, provides for three-member constituencies.

page 99 note 6 Ibid. 16 and 18 November 1971; also 9–10, 13, 15–16, 18, 20–22, and 26 December 1971.

page 99 note 7 Ibid. 23 December 1972 and 12 January 1973.

page 100 note 1 Ibid. 19 and 24 April 1973, and 6 May 1973.

page 100 note 2 The U.N. General Assembly declared the Indian Ocean as a Peace Zone ïn December 1971, and set up a Special Committee of 15 member-states, including Mauritius, 12 months later. According to Le Mauricien, 8 July 1980, Ramgoolam talks of Diego Garcia as a ‘fortress of peace’ in London and as a ‘threat to peace’ in New Delhi.

page 100 note 3 The 13th Summit of the O.A.U. in Mauritius in 1976 provided an opportunity for Ramgoolam to show his virtuosity in the diplomacy of Africa, notably with regard to the South African connection. L'Express, 26 June 1976, Le Militant (Mauritius), 30 06 1976,Google ScholarThe Nation (Nairobi), 3 07 1976,Google Scholar and Le Mauricien, 6 July 1976,

page 100 note 4 Le Mauricien, 5 February 1974. See Week-End, 6 September 1980, for the recent ‘successful visit’ to Mauritius by Ji Penfei, one of China's Vice-Prime Ministers.

page 100 note 5 L'Express, 15 January 1974.

page 100 note 6 Week-End, 28 July 1974, and L'Express, 28 April 1975.

page 101 note 1 L'Express, 26 and 29 November 1971, and 27 August 1972.

page 101 note 2 For the rôle of the Seva Shiveir, see ibid. 16 January 1976. For communal and caste considerations, see ibid. 5 September 1976. Bhuckory, S., Profile of the Hindu Community (Port-Louis, 1972),Google Scholar and Ramsurrun, P., Anya Samaj Brings Independence (Port-Louis, 1970),Google Scholar give interesting insights and supplement Benedict, op. cit. on the rôle of the Hindu religion in Mauritius.

page 102 note 1 Under the Mauritian constitution, with the communal considerations introduced by the amended Banwell electoral system, eight ‘corrective’ seats are allocated after the election results are known: this time four seats went to the M.L.P. and four to the M.M.M. opposition. It was thus possible for the Government to reintroduce some of the defeated Ministers back into the House. For a short background to this system, see De Smith, S. A., Mauritius: constitulionalism in a plural society, reprinted from the Modern Law Review (London), 11 1968.Google Scholar

page 102 note 2 One of the P.M.S.D. deputies for Rodrigues made a formal request to the British Government that the island should be allowed to secede after 1967, but this was turned down in London with little delay. The Times, 13 January 1968.

page 102 note 3 Week-End, 24 August 1980.

page 102 note 4 The middle-class Mauritians who work in Port-Louis commute every day to the residential towns inland and higher up the plateau, leaving proletarian workers and small shop-keepers as the electorate of the capital.

page 103 note 1 A measure of the new balance of forces in the country may be gained from the following developments: when an M.M.M.-supported strike paralysed the port and transport in 1979, the Government chose to negotiate (rather than call out the troops as in 1971), and when several M.M.M.-affiliated trade unionists went on a hunger strike in 1980, the Government was persuaded to agree with their demands. See Week-End, 19 and 26 August 1979, and 28 September 1980.

page 103 note 2 The Programme gouvernemental du MMM (Port-Louis, 1973)Google Scholar included the nationalisation of only 3 (out of 21) of the sugar factories with their land, to be run by an autonomous authority comprising representatives of management, the workers, and the government; the nationalisation of the docks, insurance, and transport; greater stress on co-operatives and diversification of the economy. Since then the programme has been revised to take into account even more the ‘realities’ of Mauritius.

page 103 note 3 Le Monde diplomalique, July 1977. The ‘moderate’ leadership of the M.M.M. aims to win power through the ballot box by making a strong bid to win over the middle classes, and to reassure both the local plantocracy and the western powers. The kind of socialism the M.M.M. leaders want to create is pluralistic, autogestionaire, and democratic. They go beyond ‘social democracy’ in their search for more direct participation at the grass roots in local politics, as well as in the firms and factories, but make a complete break with totalitarian socialism of the Soviet type. If nationalisation has to be imposed from the top, argues Paul Béranger, then there will be none. Frequently quoting Michel Rocard, another ‘veteran’ of May 1968, and a would-be socialist candidate for the French Presidency, the leader of the M.M.M. calls for the ‘utmost rigour in confronting economic realities which unfortunately cannot bend to the wishes and the dreams of revolutionaries’. Le Nouveau militant (Port-Louis), 30 July 1980.Google Scholar

page 103 note 4 The weak parliamentary position of the Government is made the more unstable by continued infighting over the succession to Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam who was born at the turn of the century. The two most likely candidates are Sir Satcan Bolell, Minister of Agriculture, a high-caste Hindu of the majority ‘Calcutta’ group – reputed, for the time being, to be acceptable to the P.M.S.D. and sugar interests – and Sir Veerasamy Ringadoo, Minister of Finance, a Hindu of the minority ‘Madras’ group, albeit reputed to be ‘too soft’ towards the M.M.M. The M.L.P.'s problems have been compounded by the dismissal of two Ministers for alleged corruption, and the defection of two or three backbenchers who have formed a new party.

One way out for Ramgoolam personally would be to make Mauritius a Republic with himself as President, and the necessary constitutional changes have been talked about on and off – see, for example, Week-End, 13 and 29, July 12 August, and 25 November 1979. But since the consensus within and between the parties in Mauritius would be for the figure-head Indian-type of President, the power struggle inside the M.L.P. for the all-important post of Prime Minister would not thereby be resolved. In any case, Ramgoolam has recently said that he will stay on ‘till my last breath’; Le Mauricien, 25 April 1980. And the M.M.M. has expressed the wish to see Ramgoolam remaining in power until the next general election; Week-End, 22 June 1980.

page 105 note 1 In a recent interview Paul Béranger, the leader of the M.M.M., said: ‘There can be no doubt that Great Britain, France, the United States, will try to help the present régime…we are not going to bear a grudge for that, but we must ask them to know where to draw the line…in their meddling in Mauritius internal politics’. Le Mauricien, 29 July 1980.