$Unique_ID{COW02282} $Pretitle{354D} $Title{Madagascar Chapter 2C. New Classes and Social Elites} $Subtitle{} $Author{Frederica M. Bunge} $Affiliation{HQ, Department of the Army} $Subject{education percent educational secondary malagasy schools level school madagascar antananarivo} $Date{19} $Log{} Country: Madagascar Book: Indian Ocean Countries, An Area Study: Madagascar Author: Frederica M. Bunge Affiliation: HQ, Department of the Army Date: 19 Chapter 2C. New Classes and Social Elites In the villages the social structure has apparently continued to be defined in terms of unequal and hierarchically arranged kinship groups, although migration has attenuated the links between individuals and their tanindrazana in many cases. Peasant youth have become increasingly alienated from traditional institutions, including the fokonolona. In the cities a class structure based on the division of labor in a technically more developed society with links to the outside world has grown up. This reportedly included in the 1970s an upper middle-class elite (haute bourgeoisie) of high government officials; the directors of large economic and financial enterprises; professionals such as lawyers, doctors, and university professors; and the ministers of the largest Protestant churches (these latter having been an elite, particularly in the Central Highlands, since the nineteenth century). A lower middle class (petite bourgeoisie), including lower level government officials, schoolteachers, shopkeepers, and white-collar workers, lacked the economic resources, social status, and political power of the elite. It distinguished itself nonetheless from the urban lower class in terms of education, knowledge of European manners and customs, ability to converse in French, and a puritanical devotion, according to some observers, to hard work in contrast to the more worldly upper middle class. The lack of an industrial base, even in the urban areas, has apparently retarded the growth of a genuine working class. A marginal population of the unemployed or underemployed, however, many of them young emigrants from the rural areas lacking adequate education or skills, has been a prominent feature in urban life. In 1972 unemployed youth calling themselves the Young Cowboys of Madagascar (Zale/Zatova Western Anivonny Madagasikara-ZWAM), distinguished for the wearing of cowboy hats, burst upon the scene. Supported by Power for the Little People (Mpitolona ho amin'ny Fanjakan'ny Madinika-MFM), the ZWAM became politically active as the Party of the Unemployed Youth of Madagascar (Zatovo Orinasa Anivonny Madagasikara-ZOAM). Its members served as "shock troops" for the radical left wing during the 1972-75 period (see Political Development, this ch.). Although the Central Highlands has traditionally been the most developed region of the country, a modern economic and professional elite has appeared among the coastal peoples. It dominated the political process during the presidency of Tsiranana, himself a Tsimihety, and in 1982 continued to play an important role in national affairs. Although women in traditional Malagasy society were seen as inferior to men in terms of social role, some, principally those from urban upper middle-class families, have obtained professional positions after receiving a university education. It is reported, however, that even in the cities, social expectations are such that women are obliged to defer to men in the expression of opinions or other aspects of daily life, even if the latter are less well educated. Religion in Contemporary Madagascar Although exact figures on religious affiliations cannot be given, it is estimated that in 1982 some 57 percent of the total population adhered to traditional beliefs; 40 percent were Christian, about evenly divided between Roman Catholics and Protestants. In August 1968, on the one hundred fiftieth anniversary of the arrival of the London Missionary Society, three Protestant churches united: the Church of Christ in Madagascar, the Malagasy Friends Church, and the Evangelical Church of Madagascar. This new united church, having a Presbyterian synodal constitution, claimed over 800,000 members in the early 1970s and forms, with the 300,000 members of the Malagasy Lutheran Church, the Protestant Federation of Madagascar. The Protestant churches have long had Malagasy pastors. As of the early 1970s, however, five missionary societies, having a total of 167 missionaries, were still represented in the country: the American Lutheran, the Franco-Swiss Mission de Paris, the Norwegian Lutheran, and two English societies. The Roman Catholic Church, claiming some 1.5 million members, had archdioceses in Antsiranana, Antananarivo, and Fianarantsoa. In the early 1970s about one-third of the priests were Malagasy, including the archbishop of Antananarivo. About a dozen Roman Catholic missionary societies were active, including the Jesuits, the Fathers of the Holy Ghost, and the Lazarists. Because it was first espoused by Merina freemen, Protestantism has been historically the denomination of the upper classes; Catholicism, that of slaves and the cotiers. These divisions, however, were no longer clear-cut in 1982. The nineteenth century witnessed a confrontation between Christianity and traditional religious beliefs, as Queen Ranavalona I (1828-61) expelled foreign missionaries and persecuted Christians, putting many of them to death. The tide reversed at her death, and at the beginning of the reign of Ranavalona II, the old sampy-idols or talismans supposedly endowed with supernatural powers to protect the kingdom-were destroyed, and Protestantism became the religion of the royal family. Yet opposition has given way in many cases to a kind of mutual assimilation. Christian missionaries were able to build on the Malagasy concept of a supreme God by using the term Andriamanitra to refer to the biblical God and choosing one of the traditional terms for soul, fanahy, to define the Christian concept of the soul. Although the supremacy of Christianity in the Central Highlands led to the demise of idol worship, Malagasy pastors have not challenged the strength of traditional beliefs in the power and authority of the razana. Christians have their dead blessed at a church before burying them according to the old ceremonies. They may invite the pastor to attend a famadihana and place a cross on top of the tomb. Christian belief in the power of a transcendent and somewhat distant God has been blended with older beliefs in the closeness and intimacy of the dead as spiritual beings. Some Malagasy Christians will even say that the dead have become Christians themselves and continue to be the arbiters of right and wrong. Followers of Islam, both Sunni and Shiite, constitute around 1 to 3 percent of the total population. Most are Comorians or Indo-Pakistanis; a small number are Islamicized Malagasy. The majority are located in Mahajanga Province. A small minority of the Indian community practices Hinduism. Education In traditional Madagascar, education was not seen as separate from the other spheres of life. It emphasized the importance of maintaining one's place in a hierarchical society, trained people in the proper observation of ritual and innumerable fady prohibitions and, above all, taught respect for ancestors. Formal education in the modern sense first appeared with the establishment of a school in Antananarivo by the missionary David Jones of the London Missionary Society in 1820. It was sponsored by the king, Radama I, and Jones' first students were children of the royal family. The building of more schools in Imerina by the missionaries caused literacy to spread; in 1835 an estimated 15,000 persons knew how to read and write the new Malagasy written language. Despite reverses during the reign of Queen Ranavalona I, the missionary school system, including both Protestant and Roman Catholic institutions, continued to grow. The Code of 305 Articles of March 29, 1881, established a Ministry of National Education and decreed that education would be compulsory for all children between the ages of eight and sixteen. This ambitious goal, however, was not attained and in early 1982 had yet to be attained. The operation of educational institutions remained largely in the hands of the missionaries. State and church saw the aims of education somewhat differently: for the former, the schools were a means of providing a cadre of trained administrators and technicians to assist in development and modernization, while for the latter they were the main instruments through which the Christian faith could be brought to the people. During the colonial period the French established a system of public schools that was divided into two parts: elite schools, modeled on those of the metropole, reserved for the children of French citizens, a status few Malagasy enjoyed; and indigenous schools for the Malagasy, which offered practical and vocational education but were not designed to train them for positions of leadership or responsibility. Middle-grade Malagasy civil servants and functionaries were trained at the ecoles regionales, the most important of these being the Ecole Myre de Villiers in Antananarivo. Reforms of the public school system designed to give the Malagasy more educational opportunities were initiated after World War II. At independence in 1960 the country had a system of primary, secondary, and tertiary education almost identical to that of France. The University of Madagascar, established as an Institute for Advanced Studies in 1955 in Antananarivo but renamed in 1961, awarded degrees equivalent to those given in France. After independence, enrollments increased at the primary level from 450,000 to 1 million in the 1960-72 period, at the secondary level from 26,720 in 1960-61 to 108,000 in 1971-72, and at the tertiary level from 1,130 in 1960-61 to more than 9,000 in 1973-74. Yet the school system suffered from serious limitations, the principal one being the great inequality in the distribution of educational resources between the different regions of the country. Because of their long history of formal education, beginning in the early nineteenth century, the Central Highlands had more schools and higher educational standards than the coastal regions, and this disparity continued to be a major divisive factor in national life in the years following independence. The Merina and the Betsileo peoples, having better access to schools, tended to be overrepresented in administration and the professions both under the French and after 1960. Even in Antananarivo, however, the province with the best school facilities, a second issue was the lack of educational opportunities for the poorest people. The riots in the capital, which led to the fall of the Tsiranana government in May 1972, were initiated by students protesting the education and language policies of the authorities, including a decision to revoke the newly established competitive examination system that would have allowed access to public secondary schools on the basis of merit rather than the ability to pay. Educational credentials provide the only road to secure employment in a country with a limited private sector, and the distribution of educational resources has continued to be an issue with explosive ramifications. In May 1978 students in the capital again rioted, this time against the decision of the Ratsiraka government to make standards for the baccalaureat (higher secondary school diploma) lower in the provinces than in the capital, a preferential treatment policy that inflamed Merina sensibilities. Literacy Statistics on literacy reflect broad inequalities in the distribution of educational resources in the different regions of the country. Officially published figures reveal that in 1966, literacy among adults fifteen years or older was 66 percent in Antananarivo Province, 34 percent in Fianarantsoa, 32 percent in Toamasina, 29 percent in Mahajanga, 20 percent in Toliary, and 35 percent in Antsiranana, with an overall rate of 39 percent. In the mid-1970s, however, the literacy rate was estimated to have been about 50 percent, well above the average for the African and Indian Ocean regions. Educational Reforms after 1972 After the fall of the Tsiranana government in May 1972, the new authorities turned their attention immediately to the question of educational policy. Ties with France were severed, and the French Director General of Academic Services and other expatriate educational planners were dismissed from their positions. A number of bodies were established to redesign the system, principally the Directorate for the Planning and Orientation of Education and the Curriculum Review Office. A number of reforms of the primary and secondary system initiated in 1973 included the dismissal of foreign instructors, the establishment of a uniform entrance examination for lower secondary school, and the increase in the number of places at the secondary school level. In the Charter of the Malagasy Socialist Revolution, Ratsiraka defined the country's educational goals. The first was democratization, defined primarily as equality of opportunity for all children, the government committing itself further to rapid expansion of facilities and enrollments on all levels. Another was decentralization, seen as most important in view of the great inequality in regional distribution. A third was Malagasization. Large numbers of senior middle school graduates have been sent into the countryside to teach in the villages as a form of national service (see Madagascar, ch. 6). Public funds have been channeled into the development of the educational infrastructure, the largest project being the construction of regional centers of the University of Madagascar in Antsiranana, Fianarantsoa, Mahajanga, and Toamasina. The university centers at Antananarivo and Toliary, which had been established previously, were expanded. In mid-1982 educational policies were the responsibility of two cabinet-level ministries, the Ministry of Secondary Education and Basic Education and the Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research. In 1980 the expenditure on education, including capital expenditure on the educational infrastructure, was approximately 25 percent of the national budget. The school system provides primary schooling for five years, from ages six to eleven. Figures provided by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization show that 88 percent of children in the relevant age-group were attending primary school in 1970; in 1975 this had increased to 94 percent; and in 1978, reached 100 percent, fulfilling in part the goal of the educational planners of the Malagasy kingdom some ninety-seven years before. In the early 1980s secondary education lasted for seven years and was divided into two parts: a junior secondary level of four years from ages twelve to fifteen, and a senior secondary level of three years from ages sixteen to eighteen. At the end of the junior level, graduates receive a certificate and upon graduating from the senior level receive the baccalaureat. In 1970 only about 11 percent of the children in the relevant age-group were receiving secondary education; this figure increased to 12 percent in 1975. Yet between 1975 and 1978 general secondary enrollments increased from 131,000 to 181,571. There was a vocational secondary school system, the college professionelle, which was the equivalent of the junior secondary level; the college technique, the equivalent of the senior level, awarded the baccalaureat technique. Enrollment in these technical high schools increased gradually between 1972 and 1979, from 8,400 to 10,698. Private, church-related schools continued to play an important role in the educational system in early 1982, though more so on the secondary than on the primary levels: in 1978 only 176,346 primary school students were in private institutions out of a total of 1,398,396, but 63,761 secondary school students were in private academic high schools out of a total of 181,571. Statistics show that overall student-instructor ratios have dropped in the primary level from sixty-eight to one in 1972 to forty-four to one in 1978, although they increased on the secondary level from twenty-one to one in 1972 to twenty-six to one in 1975. Women tend to be less well represented on all levels of the educational system than men, but not significantly so. In 1975, for example, 14 percent of the boys in the relevant age-group were in secondary schools, but only 10 percent of the girls. In line with decentralization policies, control and management of schools have been transferred to the lower levels. The building of primary schools is the responsibility of each local-level fokonolona. Although there is a national curriculum, localities are expected to modify it to local conditions. Enrollments on the tertiary level had increased most spectacularly during the 1970s. In 1972 there were only 5,500 college and university students. This increased to 9,874 in 1975, to 19,684 in 1978, and to an almost unbelievable 29,000 in 1979. The University of Madagascar, with its six outlying university centers at Antananarivo, Antsiranana, Fianarantsoa, Toamasina, Toliary, and Mahajanga, is the main institute of higher education. In the early 1980s it had three faculties-law and economics, sciences, and letters and human sciences-and six schools, specializing in public administration, management, medicine, social welfare, public works, and agronomy. The baccalaureat was required for admission to the university. There were also teacher-training colleges. Public Health and Nutrition Life expectancy at birth in the 1975-80 period was 44.4 years for men and 47.6 years for women, up from 34.5 years for men and 37.5 years for women in 1955-60. It was about average for Sub-Saharan Africa. Malaria remained the most serious tropical disease, although eradication campaigns waged since 1948 have resulted in spectacular declines in incidence and a dramatic decrease in the island's mortality rate. In some regions, especially the Central Highlands, these campaigns have been almost completely successful, but malaria continued to be prevalent in the coastal regions, especially the East Coast. In early 1982 other serious diseases included schistosomiasis, a parasitic ailment that spreads primarily through the passing of human wastes into ponds, irrigation canals, and slow-moving streams-a reflection of the lack of adequate sewage facilities, especially in the rural areas. The World Bank estimates that in the 1976-79 period, only 16 percent of the rural population had access to safe water. Tuberculosis and leprosy have also been problems, and there are occasional outbreaks of bubonic plague. Yet Madagascar has been spared many of the diseases common in tropical countries, such as trypanosomiasis-the scourge of tropical Africa-cholera, brucellosis, and yellow fever. Cases of smallpox have not been observed in almost half a century. The government has committed itself to the idea that good health is a right of each Malagasy citizen. As Ratsiraka acknowledges, however, this remains a distant goal, particularly in the rural areas and outside the capital region. Ratsiraka reported in 1975 that there was one physician for every 6,000 inhabitants in Antananarivo Province but only one for every 16,000 inhabitants in Mahajanga Province and one for every 22,000 in Fianarantsoa Province. The population per hospital bed was reported by the World Bank to be 443 in Antananarivo Province, but 755 in Fianarantsoa Province and as high as 993 in Toamasina Province in 1978. A number of new hospitals and medical centers have been built throughout the country, but there has also been an emphasis, as in many developing countries, on preventive medicine and health education for the populace. For those unable to obtain modern medical treatment, traditional medicine-the use of herbs or the "exorcism" of malicious spirits-remains popular. Rice is the most prominent element in the diet, average individual daily consumption being as much as 500 grams (weight as uncooked rice). Although caloric intake is adequate except in the lean winter months, many persons suffer from a shortage of proteins and vitamins. Regional dietary differences are great. The Antemoro people subsist almost entirely on rice, supplemented by a little fish. The Betsileo, who are skilled farmers living on fairly fertile land, consume on the average over 3,000 calories daily. The Betsimisaraka who live on the eastern coast have a more varied diet by adding fish and vegetables to their rice, but they use the polished, less nutritious variety. The inland Betsimisaraka hull the rice by crude methods and thus retain more of its nutrients. The Sakalava in the west eat very little rice, subsisting on a meager diet of maize, cassava, and taro, supplemented on rare occasions by meat. Consumption of meat is generally limited to occasions of sacrifices at traditional ceremonies, especially funerals. Otherwise an animal is killed occasionally in honor of a guest or if the animal is injured, sick, or old. Meat must be consumed at once because the surplus cannot be stored or sold, though the Sakalava often smoke their meat and then cut it up in small strips. People in the cities, especially in Antananarivo, have more varied diets. They complement the traditional rice dish with bread, fresh vegetables, meat, a little fresh or condensed milk, and fruit. Bananas are often boiled, or they are dried, pounded with a pestle, mixed with rice, and fried in peanut oil. Sociocultural factors influence the diet, especially dietary taboos, of which there are a great variety among the different peoples.