Campaigning firms: Crony capitalism and political funding in Mauritius

What companies are investing—in both senses of the term—in politics in fast-developing countries such as Mauritius? Through the study of the Mauritian electoral funding by private companies, this article rejects the developmental state model and the notion of autonomy in politics and highlights the crony relations between politicians and several economic sectors on the island. It argues that the establishment of alliances between the political class and specific economic elites can be explained first by the formation of state-capital relations in the long term, in the context of a “sedimented” capitalism, and second, by the need of several companies to ensure the distortion of the market by the state to secure their profit.