57 © Te Author(s) 2018 L. Kroeker et al. (eds.), Middle Classes in Africa, Frontiers of Globalization, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-62148-7_3 3 The Narrative of ‘the African Middle Class’ and Its Conceptual Limitations Dieter Neubert and Florian Stoll Abstract Te core of the ‘middle class narrative’ points to the purchasing power of the growing ‘middle class’ and its stimulating efect on the African economy. Promoted by the media and consultancies, the term appears to relate to a growing, homogeneous, fnancially fuid, and politi- cally outspoken section of society. Against this background, the main aim of this chapter is to discuss critically the conceptual limitations of this term—the ‘African middle class’. To date, social structure analyses relat- ing to the Global South have analysed socio-economic ‘strata’, or ‘class’ in a (neo-)Marxist or Weberian sense, or ‘class’ without specifc parameters. Te existence of a middle socio-economic stratum, however, does not imply the presence of a socio-culturally homogeneous ‘class’ in Marxian or Weberian terms. To analyse socio-cultural diferentiation we propose two concepts developed in German sociology: ‘socio-cultural milieus’ and ‘small lifeworlds’. D. Neubert (*) • F. Stoll Bayreuth University, Bayreuth, Germany