Deep Sea
Lister
A masterpiece analysis as put forward by Ephraim Njega
Every time we sink to a new low, people always wonder why we can't have a revolution. I will address some of the reason why our middle class cannot cause a revolution.
I will begin by breaking your heart. Our middle class is too small to trigger a revolution. Most economic based revolutions are triggered by the middle class. We are a poor country. Poverty is a normal thing in Kenya hence more poverty just generates more adaptation.
For as long as poverty is normalised, there will be no resistance. No one fights normal things. The tiny middle class is too small to start anything. A revolution requires numbers. When the middle class falls back to poverty no one notices because the numbers are too small. Imagine that less than 3 million Kenyans have formal jobs in a country of 50 million people.
To make matters worse, most of our middle class is made up of people who lived through the economic hardships of the 90s. These people are battle hardened by hardcore poverty. When they fall behind financially, survival instincts kick in immediately. By constantly adapting to hardships, the will to resist is non-existent. People will tighten belts till their waists break in to two parts.
Since our middle class is made up mostly of the new rich, it is plagued by risk aversion. Most of our middle class are first generation money owners. They are the first in their families to have escaped the poverty trap. These people live in mortal fear of falling back into poverty. Taking part in a revolution means risking their livelihoods. The risk is too much to take.
Flowing from the above, is the high level of dependency. One middle class person probably supports another 5 to 10 people. These dependants are somehow shielded from the full impact of the economic hardship. This blunts the blow of the economic mess and reduces the numbers of those who can take part in the revolution. Meanwhile, the dependency burdened middle class is too busy to think about revolutions. Besides, how do they risk all those livelihoods?
The other issue is the fragility of our middle class. Ours is not a real middle class but work in progress. Most of our middle class is just a few months salary away from poverty. Without financial freedom taking risks in revolutionary activities is not an option.
Then there is lack of solidarity with the poor. We have adopted a Western style extreme kind of capitalism full of individualism and selfishness. For as long as something isn't impacting us directly, we feel no obligation to bother with it. Unfortunately this is shortsighted posturing. If your neighbour's house is burning, it is in your interest to help put out the fire. When a plane goes down it never matters whether you are seated first class or economy class. The middle class will understand this when it is too late.
The most disabling factor however is sectarianism. We are too divided to act in our collective interest. Even when we are starving, we will still be defending those responsible for our starvation because they belong to our tribe or political formation. You see even Kenyans living in well managed countries abroad defending their local tribal thugs. Even education counts for nothing. Tribe comes first. Too understand how sectarianism can cripple a people, refer to the Lebanon economic crisis.
Then there is something I would call Jubilee middle class deception. In the sense that the middle class we have developed in the last nine years has been as a result of public sector spending. This spending has been driven by loans. As we all know, you can't live on loans forever. Soon we will be unable to borrow to sustain this deception.
The fakeness of our middle class is also a troubling factor. Most of the people living the so called middle class life can't afford it. They are living beyond their means. This makes such people to be always busy hustling. They are so self absorbed even to perceive the economic fire burning around us. How can they oppose what they can't see?
In a nut shell, a revolution will happen in Kenyan once we hit the rock-bottom. We are angry enough but not hungry enough. When the government can no longer pay salaries or suppliers, we will begin waking up but it will be too late. This scenario is in the very near horizon.
Unfortunately, a middle class can achieve a peaceful revolution through the streets or the ballot but poor masses can only achieve a revolution through violent means. When you toy with the idea of a revolution always remember that in our case it would be a violent mess.
Every time we sink to a new low, people always wonder why we can't have a revolution. I will address some of the reason why our middle class cannot cause a revolution.
I will begin by breaking your heart. Our middle class is too small to trigger a revolution. Most economic based revolutions are triggered by the middle class. We are a poor country. Poverty is a normal thing in Kenya hence more poverty just generates more adaptation.
For as long as poverty is normalised, there will be no resistance. No one fights normal things. The tiny middle class is too small to start anything. A revolution requires numbers. When the middle class falls back to poverty no one notices because the numbers are too small. Imagine that less than 3 million Kenyans have formal jobs in a country of 50 million people.
To make matters worse, most of our middle class is made up of people who lived through the economic hardships of the 90s. These people are battle hardened by hardcore poverty. When they fall behind financially, survival instincts kick in immediately. By constantly adapting to hardships, the will to resist is non-existent. People will tighten belts till their waists break in to two parts.
Since our middle class is made up mostly of the new rich, it is plagued by risk aversion. Most of our middle class are first generation money owners. They are the first in their families to have escaped the poverty trap. These people live in mortal fear of falling back into poverty. Taking part in a revolution means risking their livelihoods. The risk is too much to take.
Flowing from the above, is the high level of dependency. One middle class person probably supports another 5 to 10 people. These dependants are somehow shielded from the full impact of the economic hardship. This blunts the blow of the economic mess and reduces the numbers of those who can take part in the revolution. Meanwhile, the dependency burdened middle class is too busy to think about revolutions. Besides, how do they risk all those livelihoods?
The other issue is the fragility of our middle class. Ours is not a real middle class but work in progress. Most of our middle class is just a few months salary away from poverty. Without financial freedom taking risks in revolutionary activities is not an option.
Then there is lack of solidarity with the poor. We have adopted a Western style extreme kind of capitalism full of individualism and selfishness. For as long as something isn't impacting us directly, we feel no obligation to bother with it. Unfortunately this is shortsighted posturing. If your neighbour's house is burning, it is in your interest to help put out the fire. When a plane goes down it never matters whether you are seated first class or economy class. The middle class will understand this when it is too late.
The most disabling factor however is sectarianism. We are too divided to act in our collective interest. Even when we are starving, we will still be defending those responsible for our starvation because they belong to our tribe or political formation. You see even Kenyans living in well managed countries abroad defending their local tribal thugs. Even education counts for nothing. Tribe comes first. Too understand how sectarianism can cripple a people, refer to the Lebanon economic crisis.
Then there is something I would call Jubilee middle class deception. In the sense that the middle class we have developed in the last nine years has been as a result of public sector spending. This spending has been driven by loans. As we all know, you can't live on loans forever. Soon we will be unable to borrow to sustain this deception.
The fakeness of our middle class is also a troubling factor. Most of the people living the so called middle class life can't afford it. They are living beyond their means. This makes such people to be always busy hustling. They are so self absorbed even to perceive the economic fire burning around us. How can they oppose what they can't see?
In a nut shell, a revolution will happen in Kenyan once we hit the rock-bottom. We are angry enough but not hungry enough. When the government can no longer pay salaries or suppliers, we will begin waking up but it will be too late. This scenario is in the very near horizon.
Unfortunately, a middle class can achieve a peaceful revolution through the streets or the ballot but poor masses can only achieve a revolution through violent means. When you toy with the idea of a revolution always remember that in our case it would be a violent mess.
