This article develops the concept of ‘mediating bureaucrats’ by exploring their role during liberal reforms that led to rehabilitation of the sugar industry in Mozambique. By focusing on how relations between the state, government and business are mediated by a group of cadres who have occupied positions in different social domains, the article argues that these ‘mediating bureaucrats’ cannot easily be identified in one-dimensional terms as belonging to either the public or private sector, the state or the market. It is argued that as ‘socially embedded actors’, the group of ‘mediating bureaucrats’ are in a position to translate and mediate between diverse and sometimes conflicting interests and aspirations of the state, the government and business. We use the rehabilitation of the sugar industry in Mozambique to show how mediating bureaucrats adopted two practices – muddling through and translation – in order to straddle conflicting interests during different reform initiatives in post-independence Mozambique.

中文翻译：

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调解官僚：莫桑比克制糖业的内在经济行动

本文通过探讨他们在导致莫桑比克糖业复兴的自由改革中的作用，发展了“调解官僚”的概念。通过关注国家、政府和企业之间的关系如何由一群在不同社会领域担任职务的干部进行调解，文章认为这些“调解官僚”不能轻易地在一维方面被认定为属于任何一方公共或私营部门、国家或市场。有人认为，作为“嵌入社会的行动者”，“调解官僚”群体能够在国家、政府和企业的不同甚至有时相互冲突的利益和愿望之间进行翻译和调解。