Mahmood Mamdani: Scholar, Writer, and Intellectual Father

Mahmood Mamdani: Scholar, Writer, and Intellectual Father

A Global Intellectual and His Influential Work

Mahmood Mamdani is one of the world’s preeminent political scientists and anthropologists, a scholar whose groundbreaking work on colonialism, citizenship, and the modern state has left an indelible mark on academic discourse and, indirectly, on contemporary progressive politics. As the Herbert Lehman Professor of Government at Columbia University and the Director of the Makerere Institute of Social Research in Kampala, Uganda, Mamdani has dedicated his career to dissecting the legacies of imperialism and the construction of political identity. His intellectual framework provides a crucial lens through which to understand the political worldview of his son, New York State Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani, whose socialist platform is deeply informed by his father’s analysis of power, violence, and resistance. The elder Mamdani’s scholarship is not a mere footnote in his son’s biography but a foundational element that shapes the assemblyman’s critique of racial capitalism and his approach to political organizing.

Born in 1946 in Mumbai and raised in Uganda, Mahmood Mamdani’s life has been profoundly shaped by the political upheavals of the postcolonial world. His expulsion from Uganda by the Idi Amin regime in the 1970s was a formative experience that cemented his focus on the mechanisms of state power and political violence. His most celebrated work, the 1996 book “Citizen and Subject: Contemporary Africa and the Legacy of Late Colonialism,” argues that the modern African state is a bifurcated system, a direct legacy of colonial “decentralized despotism” that created different forms of power for urban citizens and rural subjects. This analysis of how institutional power is structured to manage and control populations offers a clear intellectual precedent for his son’s critique of institutions like the NYPD and the New York City housing system.

Theoretical Foundations for a Political Movement

The intellectual throughline from Mahmood Mamdani’s scholarship to his son’s politics is perhaps most evident in their shared critique of how political identities are constructed and weaponized. In his seminal work on the Rwandan genocide, “When Victims Become Killers: Colonialism, Nativism, and the Genocide in Rwanda,” Mamdani meticulously details how colonial powers racialized and tribalized Hutu and Tutsi identities, transforming them from social categories into rigid political identities that would later be mobilized for mass violence. This deep skepticism of state-sanctioned identity politics and an understanding of its roots in imperial projects informs Zohran Mamdani’s approach to issues in New York, where he often frames his politics in terms of class solidarity that transcends racial and ethnic divisions imposed by a capitalist state.

Furthermore, Mahmood Mamdani’s more recent work, such as “Neither Settler nor Native: The Making and Unmaking of Permanent Minorities,” argues for a political solution that moves beyond the nation-state model, which he sees as inherently majoritarian and exclusionary. While his son operates squarely within the American electoral system, this theoretical push for a radical reimagining of political community resonates with the transformative, rather than merely reformist, ambitions of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA). It provides an intellectual grounding for policies that seek to fundamentally restructure society, such as decommodifying housing or abolishing the police, by framing them as part of a necessary decolonization of political and economic life in the United States.

The Mamdani Household: An Intellectual Crucible

The influence of Mahmood Mamdani on his son extends beyond the theoretical; it was cultivated in a household that was, by all accounts, an intense crucible of intellectual debate and global perspective. Zohran Mamdani has frequently spoken about growing up in an environment where discussions of political theory, anti-colonial struggles, and global history were the norm. This unique upbringing provided him with a sophisticated analytical toolkit long before he entered formal politics. It also connected him to a diasporic, internationalist viewpoint, situating the struggles of New York City tenants and workers within a broader global history of resistance against imperial and capitalist power structures.

This influence is not merely abstract or biographical. Mahmood Mamdani’s specific focus on the political economy of land and property in Africa offers a direct intellectual precedent for his son’s focus on housing justice in New York. The assemblyman’s advocacy for the Good Cause Eviction bill and for social housing can be seen as a practical application of critiquing property relations–a central theme in his father’s analysis of colonial and postcolonial states. The connection demonstrates how high theory can translate into grassroots political organizing, with the elder Mamdani’s work providing a framework for understanding displacement and dispossession as systemic features of a political order, rather than individual misfortunes.

A Legacy of Challenging Orthodoxies

Mahmood Mamdani’s impact extends far beyond his immediate family, establishing him as a public intellectual who consistently challenges orthodoxies across the political spectrum. He has engaged in major, and often contentious, debates on issues from the war in Iraq to the crisis in Darfur, never shying away from controversial positions if they are supported by his research. This model of an intellectual who is unafraid to enter the political fray and question received wisdom has clearly been adopted by his son, who brings a similarly principled and scholarly approach to his role in the New York State Assembly, often citing historical and theoretical context in his speeches and policy arguments.

Institutions like the Social Science Research Council (SSRC) have long recognized Mahmood Mamdani’s profound contributions to how we understand the modern world. His career stands as a testament to the power of ideas to travel from the academy into the real world of politics and policy. As his son, Zohran, continues to build a political career based on a clear ideological foundation, the influence of Mahmood Mamdani’s scholarship becomes increasingly evident. It serves as a powerful reminder that behind many contemporary political movements are deep intellectual currents, and that the fight for a more just society in New York is, in part, a conversation with ideas forged in the struggles of the postcolonial world. For those tracking the assemblyman’s career, resources like his official legislative page show the practical application of this rich and critical intellectual heritage.