This working paper explores how the legacies of slavery inform the social and political landscape of contemporary Madagascar. In particular, it investigates how impoverished people of noble descent have invested statutory distinctions with new political values linked to the colonial and postcolonial political trajectories of the country. I will argue that, far from being a simple reproduction of the pre-colonial past, the contemporary use of statutory distinctions can only be fully understood if we take into account the role they have played historically in the local and national political struggle.