replace expatriate officialdom with local people. The overdeveloped state
seemed to fit the Alavi model.
Elsewhere, however, overdevelopment was a temporary feature of the
immediate post-independence period, quickly giving way to control by a
dominant class. In Kenya, for example, the dominant class following inde-
pendence was the metropolitan bourgeoisie. This was the interest that the
post-colonial state articulated. The state in such a peripheral economy sup-
ported metropolitan capital against its main rival, a newly emerging property-
owning middle class. The struggle did not have to be mediated. It had been
won by metropolitan capital. The state performed municipal functions on its
behalf. Domination of the mass of the population by foreign capital required
the existence of domestic class interests, in this case the petty-bourgeoisie,
allied to foreign capital and ‘which uphold their joint interests in economic
policy and enforce their dominance politically’. State power was not rela-
tively autonomous but rather was ‘asserted’ by the ‘currently dominant com-
bination of classes’ in the form of policies to protect the petty-bourgeoisie and
subdue the unions and by means of clientelism, ideological domination and
official repression (Leys, 1975).
In India too the overdeveloped state was a temporary phenomenon. As
society became more complex and the private sector grew stronger and
more diversified so the political institutions representing classes in society
became stronger and the bureaucracy took on a more subservient role.
A significant bourgeoisie emerged which, despite the presence of foreign
capital, captured control of the state (Wood, 1977).
Bureaucratic control over economy and civil society was extensive every-
where following independence. Some countries, such as Tanzania, had
single party regimes. In addition to the state bureaucracy there was a party
bureaucracy, adding to the overdevelopment of the state apparatus. The
party’s own hierarchy of officials corresponded to the hierarchies of state
officials in the structure of administration. However, this system was some-
what paradoxical. Appointed state officials were powerful. But a party
bureaucracy could constitute a counter-balance to the state bureaucracy and
its colonial inheritance in terms of structures, processes of decision-making,
status and prestige. Party bureaucracies, arguably representing a democratic
check on state bureaucracy, complicate the picture of the relationship
between bureaucracy and other political institutions. To the extent that the
two bureaucracies are highly integrated, however, especially when civil
servants are appointed on the basis of partisan criteria, the distinction
between the two organizations can become completely blurred. If a provin-
cial commissioner (a civil servant) only occupies that office because the
120 Understanding Third World Politics