ABSTRACT
The balance between change and continuity in Zimbabwe is problematic and controversial because of public and academic declarations and debates. Perhaps the primary preoccupation of the African regime at independence was to ensure continuity rather than change at the level of production: “reconciliation” and “growth with equity.” Zimbabwe has neither privatized nor reformed to the extent preferred by the Bank and Fund neither has it extended or restructured the considerable state control of the settler regime dramatically, as anticipated by the “left” in both nationalist parties. Idealistic notions of rapid transition towards socialism thus fail appreciate the characters of either the nationalist struggles or the inherited political economy. Symptomatic of the transitional character of the first decade of independence was the proliferation and then reintegration of the three farmers’ associations, representing large and small farmers. The range of possible futures for Zimbabwe is a function of its history and political economy as well as of its ideology and global environment.
