Chutes & Ladders: Middle Class in Motion

In this introductory chapter, the editors dissect the growing interest in the rise of middle classes in Africa. The apparently healthier rates of economic growth that are associated with these (reputed) classes seem to be an omen of a brighter economic and political future in Africa. For the editors of this volume, the middle class in Africa is an ‘overloaded’ class, overloaded with inflated expectations and unexamined assumptions. The editors question these assumptions in three dimensions: the political, the economic, and the dimension of lifestyle, the latter focusing on urbanization, education, and demographic change. They argue that in the continent today there is not one single ‘African middle class’ but rather a plurality of ‘middle classes’. The four sections of this volume (‘Rethinking Concepts of Middle Classes in Africa’, ‘the Recurring Rise and Return of Middle Classes in Africa’, ‘The Political Consequences of the Middle Classes’, and ‘the Formation of Interconnections and Interdependencies’) are introduced, and their contributions to an improved understanding of Africa’s diverse middle classes are outlined.

Most of the developing countries in the world are facing a well-known challenging factor-like income inequality that affects the issue of balanced growth and welfare. The core goal of this paper is to investigate whether the Human Capital Index (HCI) joined with Good Governance (GG) variables have a significant impact on reducing income inequality in upper middle income (UMI) and lower middle income (LMI) countries or not. The first point is to investigate the relationship between HCI and income inequality and the second one is to find out the joint effect (HCI and GG) on income inequality (Gini Coefficient). The author divides all the countries based on income levels like UMI and LMI countries according to WB. For the UMI, HCI has no significant positive impact on reducing income inequality. However, if HCI works combined with good governance indicators like (HCI*RL), (HCI*RQ), and (HCI*GE), these interacted variables do not have significant power to reduce income inequality in UMI countries. Contrarily, for LMI countries, HCI helps to diminish income inequality significantly. When citizens achieve technical and educational qualifications, it helps them earn more money and shrinks income inequality significantly. Moreover, when HCI joints with good governing variables like PS, RQ, and RL that help to reduce income inequality significantly in LMI countries. There are some significant differences between UMI and LMI in foreign investment, job opportunities, foreign investment, and macroeconomic conditions that generate income-gap. This analysis finds that LMI countries grab influential effect in reducing income inequality in their economy compared to UMI countries.

Emerging Middle Class in Edited by Mithuli Ncube and Charles Leyeka Lufumpa. New York: Routledge, 2015. Pp. vii, 215; figures, tables, contributors, acknowledgements. $140.00 cloth, $50.95 paper.Since the turn of the century, Africa has enjoyed impressive levels of economic growth. Increasing numbers of observers have commented that consequence of this growth has been the emergence of African middle classes. In April 2011, the African Development Bank's chief economist and vice-president Mthuli Ncube, Charles Leyeka Lufumpa, director of the Statistics Department, and Steve Kayizzi-Mugerwa, director of research coauthored The Middle of the Pyramid: Dynamics of the Middle Class in Africa. This document has served as the foundation for an edited volume, Emerging Middle Class in Africa (2015). Having assembled an impressive team of international researchers, the book explores the diverse characteristics of Africa's emerging middle class.Mthuli Ncube introduces the edited volume with an operational definition of what constitutes Africa's middle class. Eight thematic chapters and conclusion follow this introduction. Ncube's introduction lays out the analytic approach that is first presented in the market brief. Like the earlier paper, the book uses an definition that includes as members of the middle those people with per capita daily consumption of $2.00 to $20.00. Ncube then disaggregates the middle classes into first the class that includes those people who consume between $2.00 and $4.00 day. Second is the lower middle class whose members spend $4.00 to $10.00 day. Finally, people in the upper middle class spend $10.00 to $20.00 day. Ncube is careful to stress that vulnerable population of 204 million people, or 63 percent of Africa's floating middle class, risk falling back into poverty. Having established the parameters for definition of what constitutes the middle class, he suggests Africa's middle reflects a robust and growing private sector (p. 3). book's eight substantive chapters employ the absolute definition to explore how the African middle classes respond to specific issues.In Chapter 1, Charles Leyeka Lufumpa, Maurice Mubila, and Mohamed Safouance Ben Aissa argue that the middle has enabled African economies to shift away from export-led growth to create dynamic domestic markets. Their essay considers how large floating middle is part of changes that might lead to sustainable socioeconomic development. In Chapter 2, Michael Lofchie provides lengthy analysis of the political economy of Africa's emerging middle class. His essay notes middle interests in political stability all the while they engage in enterprise development, comply with tax laws, accumulate savings, and make investments in the domestic economy. Lofchie's trenchant analysis describes overarching elements of the middle and its hourglass configuration; how colonial continuities shaped societies, how post-independence economic policies favored failed import-substituting industrialization policies that contributed to chronic political economic weaknesses. …

Beyond the hopes placed in Africa’s emergent middle class as an engine of economic growth, some analysts see this group as a bastion of political stability and enduring de-mocratisation across the continent. This paper’s approach differs from that of most studies, which treat the middle class as a homogeneous group, through two key contributions. First, using cluster analysis, I propose a novel way of conceptualising social class that broadly draws on the Weberian idea of shared life chances. I apply this method to South Africa and identify five social classes characterised by their members’ living standards, overall life satisfaction, and self-perceived upward mobility. Second, the empirical analysis reveals significant discrepancies in attitudes towards democracy between the downwardly and upwardly mobile strata of the middle class, which I term the “anxious” and the “climbers,” respectively. On the one hand, the “climbers” show the highest generic support for democracy as a form of government, whereas the “anxious” middle class displays feelings of resignation. On the other hand, I find indicative evidence of a status-quo bias among the “climbers.” Rather than assuming a more demanding or critical stance in politics, they allow their political priorities to be at least partly shaped by an interest in securing and expanding attained living standards; being upwardly mobile is even associated with a higher tolerance for government attempts to constrain freedom of information, opinion, or expression.

While a single survey is a snapshot of a given moment in time, a series of surveys on the same topics over the years is akin to time-lapse photography, tracing the unfurling trends of public opinion. In examining the results of surveys conducted in recent decades by EKOS Research Associates on Canadians’ views of the economy, the prospects of the middle class, immigration and foreign trade, the time-lapse images show a dispiriting pessimism, especially among younger Canadians. For example, in 2002, nearly 70 per cent of Canadians surveyed described themselves as middle class. That figure dropped precipitously to just 47 per cent in 2015. Nearly half (46 per cent) of those aged 25-44 said they were earning less in inflation-adjusted dollars last year than their fathers earned at the same age. Fewer than one in five Canadians believed their personal economic lot improved last year. Thirty-seven per cent of respondents said they had fallen behind economically in the last year and the last five years. When a society sees shared progress as an imperative, it is truly dismal that fewer than one in five Canadians thought things had improved for them last year. Just over a month and a half before the October 2015 federal election, a survey showed that restoring middle-class prosperity was the top issue for all demographic groups, standing at 35 per cent of respondents between the ages of 35 and 49 and 55 per cent among those aged 49 to 64. Accompanying this incipient uneasiness about the future of the middle class in Canada is a concomitant drawing inwards, a tendency towards parochialism about aspects of foreign trade and immigration, which may be perceived as threatening an economic future already considered to be tenuous. For example, support dropped dramatically (from 47 per cent the year before the 2008 recession to 25 per cent last year) for the notion that Canadians, Americans and Mexicans should be free to work anywhere in North America. While enthusiasm for immigration traditionally declines during times of economic angst, current trends bear watching. Ten years ago, 25 per cent of Canadians surveyed said this country had too many immigrants; by 2015, the numbers of respondents who felt this way had practically doubled. Caution is urged, however, against reading too much into this, as these latter responses were given to a machine, not a live interviewer. People may have thus felt less inhibited about their answers. Meanwhile, a majority of Canadians surveyed think that foreign investment or foreign ownership of Canadian companies threatens national sovereignty. The 2015 results show a 10-point increase in the perception of a threat to sovereignty, compared to seven and 10 years ago. While deploring the state of the economy, the Canadian public remains at least somewhat unreceptive to the potentially ameliorative force of foreign direct investment, and this attitude appears to be worsening. Anxiety over Canada’s economic future helped the Liberals attain power in the 2015 federal election. Their win has infused the heretofore gloomy economic mood with a shot of hope. There can be no quick fix. Dispelling the gloom and replacing it with optimism will depend on the integrated success of efforts to liberalize trade, redefine attitudes towards immigration and change perspectives on foreign direct investment under the new federal leadership.

Testing the Environmental Kuznets Curve hypothesis: A comparative empirical study for low, lower middle, upper middle and high income countries

Reviewed by: The New Black Middle Class in South Africa by Roger Southall Kwaku Nti Southall, Roger. The New Black Middle Class in South Africa. Suffolk: United Kingdom: James Currey, 2016. Social Scientist Roger Southall veers from contemporary tangents in The New Black Middle Class in South Africa. In his estimation, doing so constitutes a much needed new focal point from which to discuss South Africa's black middle class, correcting previous one-dimensional approaches and ensuring a complex and comprehensive picture of a powerful and significant segment of this post-Apartheid nation. Southall grounds his work in that of Leo Kuper's An African Bourgeoisie: Race, Class and Politics in South Africa, but applies an entirely different mode of analysis in viewing the drastically altered history of the nation, which, once in an overwhelmingly pathetic situation of systematic racial discrimination under an Apartheid regime, presently boasts limitless opportunities amidst power and access to resources. This discussion of the entrenched category of South African Africans within "the middle range of hierarchies of income, wealth, property ownership, and occupation" is set against a backdrop of a wider body of theories including, but not limited to, Marxist and Weberian, in order to enhance the understanding of its origins, motivations, and dynamics as well as relations with other strata in the country (p. 1). The book's nine well-written chapters are amply supported with statistical tables. [End Page 91] Southall avers that the origins of South Africa's African middle class is traceable to the very limited educational opportunities provided by the Western Christian missionaries "of a variety of nationalities and denominations which became increasingly active from the nineteenth century onwards" (p. 25). Unfortunately, its growth suffered inhibition by a predominant settler capitalism "save in so far as the white minority regime required … subaltern black allies, and from the 1970s, began to address shortage of white skilled labor by increasing the provision of black education and housing" (p. 24). Although educated Africans were left in no doubt regarding their subordinate status in the colonial social hierarchy, among their own people their education accorded them significant material rewards and social prestige. Their homogeneity as a visibly privileged social group was fostered by bonds of friendship, marriage, and formation of professional associations. The 1980s saw the emergence of a small but growing number of African managers referred to as the "new black middle class" that often suffered racial obstacles in the work place. Much as the middle class were instrumental in the formation of the SAANC or later ANC, they pushed for systematic development of a distinct African political culture with the creation of a constituency that included workers and propertied strata, and succeeded in etching that organization within the gaze and memory of Africans in South Africa. Although the ANC developed formidable relations with the black trade union movement, it was by and large the sprawling township support as well as elements of the middle class that provided the main source of strength, [End Page 92] thus establishing the latter's political hegemony as the "ANC party vanguard" (p. 40). With the fall of the Apartheid regime, the new African middle class expanded rapidly. Southall highlights the intriguing paradox of the contemporary interest in the extent and consequences of the upward bound black segment, and the simultaneous disinterest in the middle class in general across the spectrum of the South African population. Southall argues that although there are contending facts regarding size, shape, and structure against a background of diverse definitional, conceptual, and methodological frameworks, scholarly research is unanimous on the significant growth of the post-Apartheid middle class since the democratic transition, especially because the ANC carefully supervised the scrapping of the hitherto official racial barriers that inhibited black upward social mobility. Among other things, legally improved educational options, deployment, affirmative action, as well as the Black Economic Empowerment have ensured increased job opportunities for Africans at middle and managerial levels mainly within the public sector. In essence, and as everywhere in Africa, South Africa's middle class is presented as medially young, highly educated, urbanized, some self-employed, with salaried jobs, high aspirations and expectations regarding standard of living for...

The article examines the conditions for attracting foreign investment in agribusiness on the basis of ESG integration. The ambivalent relationship between the investment imbalance of agribusiness and foreign direct investment flows is substantiated, which, based on monitoring the dynamics of indicators of potentially unsafe determinants, makes it possible to quantitatively predict the consequences of their occurrence for the development of ESG-integration measures aimed at forming the investment environment of agribusiness in Ukraine. Investment imbalances in agri-business, which are existing and potential with an increase in the threat of an economic crisis, are identified. The procedure for assessing investment imbalances in the domestic and foreign economic activities of agribusiness enti-ties of the world, as well as their regional groups implementing the process of investment-oriented development, is determined. Indicators of investment imbalances of EU member states are given. The dynamics of foreign invest-ment inflows by regions of the world are analyzed. Priority sectors of agribusiness in terms of attracting foreign investment from around the world are identified. The volume of direct foreign investment from countries around the world into the agricultural sector is given and the structure of their redistribution between types of economic activity of agribusiness entities is determined. A geostrategic matrix for attracting foreign investment from countries around the world by agribusiness entities is proposed. The integral index of investment attractiveness (regulatory restrictions on foreign investment) by types of economic activity of agribusiness entities between regional groups of countries of Eastern and Western Europe, Asia, the Middle East and the Persian Gulf, Latin America and the Carib-bean, and North America has been determined. Forms and instruments of stimulating investment activity in coun-tries of the world have been proposed. The impact of investment imbalances on the volume of attracting foreign investment in agribusiness between regions of the world has been determined.

This chapter demonstrates how the formation and expansion of middle classes in Africa have taken place within particular economic and political contexts. Research has either focused on the size of African middle classes and the related implications for development (what the author calls the dimension school) or on their political role (termed the statist school), considering them as too attached to the state to criticize or oppose it. The shortcomings of both approaches, Musyoka argues, can be explained by the middle class’ entanglement in a ‘double middle’ identity. The ‘first middle’ (the vertical middle) relates to class categorizations in terms of upper, middle, and lower classes. From a neo-Marxist perspective, the author argues that the danger of sliding back into poverty creates a potential for aggressive social and political action among members of African middle classes, to avoid downward mobility. The situatedness of African middle classes between poor past generations and a future generation which requires economic support constitutes a ‘second middle’ (horizontal middle). Both the vertical and horizontal identities produce political and social actions based on visions of sustainable incomes and wealth access, which can be contradictory to prevailing theoretical approaches.

ABSTRACTAgainst the background of celebrations about the rise of a middle class in Africa and its widely posited role in promoting democracy, this paper explores the politics of the black middle class in South Africa. It does so by examining three propositions: first, that the black middle class was a positive force in the struggle for liberation and democracy; second, that post-1994 strategies of the African National Congress (ANC) government which have benefited it secure its political alignment with the ANC's ‘party-state’; and third, that its growth and increasing diversity will contribute to the consolidation of democracy. The conclusion drawn is that while the black middle class may indeed play an important role in furthering democracy, its political orientations and behaviour cannot be assumed to be inherently progressive.

SURVEYS many European countries and United States show that upward social mobility (specifically, intergenerational movement from manual to non-manual occupations) is universally accompanied by an increase political conservatism (Butler and Stokes, 1969:98; Lipset and Zetterberg, 1964:457; Lipset and Zetterberg, 1959:67; Lopreato and Hazelrigg, 1972:451). At same time data indicate that Europe upwardly mobile remain, statistically speaking, significantly 1 less conservative than those born into middle class, adopting a political stance somewhere between their classes of origin and destination. By contrast, United States, upwardly mobile sons of workers seem little influenced by their class of origin and exhibit voting patterns very similar to those of stable middle class. In fact, according to Lipset and Zetterberg, the American data . .. indicate that successfully upwardly mobile sons of workers are even more conservative party choice than those middle class individuals whose fathers held occupations comparable to their (1964: 456). Tumin echoes this claim a current textbook, asserting that in America, persons who move up into middle class are more conservative than those born into it (1967: 94) .2 However this proposition is not beyond doubt. On basis of a brief and somewhat incomplete review of literature, Thompson (1971) has concluded recently that evidence is contradictory, and his own data cast further doubt on thesis that upwardly mobile American men overconform to political norms of middle class. Most recently though, discounting Thompson's misgivings, Lopreato and Hazelrigg have reiterated established position following terms: (upwardly mobile) Europeans remain more leftist than their class of destination while their North American counterparts become even more conservative than their new class peers (1972: 452).2 Indeed Lopreato goes so far as to offer an explanation of this supposed political overconformity by upwardly mobile Americans. His theory runs as follows: America success is supreme goal to which all can and must aspire; as a result, upward mobility gives achiever enormous satisfaction and a sense of relief at having made it; this is likely to give rise to a cult of gratitude, an attitude of deep-seated appreciation towards social order for making new-found pleasures possible; ... such gratitude is then expressed through an 'over conformity' to prescribed behavior of middle class, specifically, by voting for (the Republican Party) (1967: 592). But such theorizing is premature. The data on which political overconformity thesis currently rests are not just contradictory as Thompson suggests but fact require rejection of thesis. To demonstrate this, I shall devote remainder of this paper to a systematic review of evidence.3 1 Throughout this study, statistical tests are based on .05 level of significance with direction

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the foreign direct investment status and environment in Nepal. There is significant contribution of foreign investment in economic development of developing countries like Nepal. Foreign investment attraction in a country like Nepal increases the foreign capital and technology transfer. Since 1990s inflow of foreign direct investment (FDI) has been increasing in Nepal due to the adoption of liberal economic policy by the government of Nepal. The Foreign Investment Technology Transfer Act (FITTA) has made better foreign investment environment in Nepal. This paper examines and analyses the contribution of FDI in Nepal. For the analysis, simple linear regression model has been applied to measure the impact of FDI on GDP and employment. Because FDI inflow has been recorded after 1990s, the impact of FDI has been analyzed in this paper over the period of 1990/91-2018/19. This study finds a positive impact of FDI on GDP and other macro variables.

Formulation of the problem. The post-war recovery of Ukraine requires attracting foreign investment. Attracting foreign direct investments will make it possible to ensure capital investments, annual direct contributions to the economy, new jobs, exports, acquisition of new skills and technologies, innovativeness of economic sectors. The aim of the research is to analyze modern prospects for the development of the process of foreign investment and the functioning of enterprises with foreign investments in Ukraine. The оbject of the research is theoretical and practical approaches to the attraction of foreign investments and the functioning of enterprises with foreign investments in Ukraine. The methods of the research: logical method, method of comparison, methods of induction and deduction, analysis and synthesis, system analysis, correlation analysis. The hypothesis of the research. The volume of foreign investment is directly proportional to the volume of GDP, expenditure on education and labor force and inversely proportional to the income inequality level and unemployment level. The statement of basic materials. Correlation coefficients between the volume of foreign investment and the factors affecting this volume have been determined, which will allow influencing specific key indicators that most stimulate the inflow of foreign investment. The mechanism for attracting foreign investments is presented, covering strategic, intermediate and current goals, a list of forms, methods, objects and tools of influence. The practical significance of the research. The practical implementation of the proposed measures will make it possible to intensify the attraction of foreign investments in Ukrainian enterprises. Conclusions and perspectives of further research. The problem of attracting investments into the economy of Ukraine is related to the lack of motivation to invest, insufficient accumulation of resources by the main groups of investors, a wide outflow of capital abroad, etc. Unfavorable investment climate caused by military actions, occupation of territories and destruction of infrastructure, migration of experienced specialists abroad, extremely unstable economic situation in the country, slowdown of economic reforms, high level of corporate taxation, instability of legislation, corruption, low purchasing power of the population, low predictability of junctures of commodity and raw material markets, significant price fluctuations; imperfection of ownership and shareholding relations, becomes the main obstacle in attracting investments. However, there are undoubtedly attractive factors for investing in Ukraine's economy, including the attractive geographical position determined by the country's location in the center of Europe at the crossroads of trade routes, the presence of an educated workforce, as Ukraine has a very high intellectual and professional level of manufacturers. Also, labor is cheap. Ukraine has favorable conditions for the introduction of high technologies, which is facilitated by the presence of performers with a high intellectual level. Also, relatively cheap raw materials and energy resources, which contributes to the low cost of manufactured goods. The obtained results showed a high dependence between the amount of FDI and the level of GDP in the country (correlation coefficient is 0.82), and a direct interdependence was revealed, which means that with the growth of GDP, the amount of foreign investment will increase, which is logical, because with the growth of GDP, the country is investment attractive for a foreign investor. The high correlation between the volume of foreign investment and the availability of labor in the country (correlation coefficient is 0.79) means that the availability of labor, including skilled labor, is extremely important for the investor (this is also evidenced by the interdependence between FDI and state spending on education in the country ), since the ease of hiring employees and their productivity depend on it.

In the context of globalisation, national active development is possible by attracting foreign investment and opening joint ventures with foreign partners. Emerging markets need to create a positive business climate and legislation that protects the rights of foreign investors. It is necessary to identify the positive and negative factors that influence foreign investment in the development of countries. The study aimed to address the positive and negative experiences of attracting foreign investment in emerging market economies. The main research method was an analysis of the existing experience of attracting foreign investment in China, Kosovo and Uzbekistan. The study identified positive and negative trends in the inflow and outflow of foreign direct investment (FDI). The degree of influence of the inflow of FDI on the gross domestic product (GDP) and the tendency of its change was determined. Based on the results of the Doing Business rankings, the International Institute for Management Development (IMD) World Digital Competitiveness Index, and the Global Innovation Index, positive and negative trends in attracting foreign investment in the economies of the countries studied were substantiated. The World Digital Competitiveness Ranking includes only 67 countries, including China. Factors that hinder the attraction of foreign investment in China, Kosovo and Uzbekistan were identified. The ways of changing the environment that influence the attraction of foreign investments and the peculiarities of their distribution are substantiated based on the best practices studied.

The author argues from a political science perspective that middle classes in Africa are an ‘elusive reality’, one that results largely from a debate conducted by international organizations and African political actors. The socioeconomic criteria applied in this debate make it doubtful that these middle classes exist outside of theoretical constructions. The author argues that the notion of the African middle class is attractive for a wide range of actors in politics and development organizations because this branding process transforms persons living on the positive side of the poverty line into a promising ‘middle class’ with the potential to lead economic and political development. However, even if an African middle class does not exist as a social fact, the debate surrounding its ‘rise’ does draw attention to deep structural transformations in twenty-first century African societies. This chapter follows the genesis of the debate about new African middle classes, identifies the actors involved in the debate, and presents a novel categorization of the middle classes in Africa, which goes beyond a purely quantitative description.