Beyond the ownership question: who will till the land? The new debate on China’s agricultural production

A high-profile debate is taking place in China concerning the organization of agricultural land and production, with profound implications for China’s countryside. This debate is between those advocating for agricultural production to be taken over by large-scale agribusinesses, and those against this. Proponents regard agribusinesses as embodying modernity and progress, while those against forewarn of the channeling of profits out of peasant hands, the loss of peasants’ autonomy over labor and land, and the destruction of rural life. Recent English language publications on China’s agrarian change highlight the growing power of agribusiness and related processes of depeasantization, implying the Chinese debate on “who will till the land?” is futile. But this view obscures efforts by Chinese scholars and policymakers to promote forms of agricultural organization conducive to maintaining peasant livelihoods. By examining the Chinese debates on agribusinesses, family farms, and cooperatives, this article highlights points of contestation among policymakers and alternative possibilities, which may yet shape the course of China’s agrarian change. This article contributes to scholarship on China’s agrarian change, broader questions concerning depeasantization, and developmental possibilities under collective ownership.     

Agrarian transition in the southern Philippines: more than poverty,dispossession, and violence

ABSTRACT

On the southern Philippine island of Mindanao, scholars have documented a precarious land tenure, livelihood, and security situation for many smallholders. Agrarian political economy studies provide insightful analyses of the underlying causes of much poverty and violence on the island. Less attention has been given to cases of smallholder success. This article proposes that conditions for smallholder farming, even among ethnic minority groups, are more varied across the island than the literature suggests. In upland villages of north-central Mindanao, agrarian transition is a multi-directional process that produces different outcomes among households, kin groups, and villages. The main case study is a thriving mixed swidden and fixed field Maranao-Muslim farming village. Almost all the households in the village have successfully claimed land as their own and diversified and improved their livelihoods in recent times. To explain these positive outcomes, the article uses a relational approach and draws on anthropological literature on kinship, land tenure, and place to assess the bargaining power of smallholders in land deals. A stronger cross-fertilization of key insights in agrarian political economy and anthropological literature on kinship enriches the debate on agrarian transition in the southern Philippines.     

Conciliatory whiteness: white farmers’ accommodations and responses to land reform in Matabeleland South,Zimbabwe

ABSTRACT

This article seeks to contribute to growing academic literature on land reform and whiteness in Zimbabwe, where there have been calls for nuance in the analysis of agrarian change. The research which underpins it explores differentiated responses to land reform on the part of a sample of white farmers (as well as A1 and A2 beneficiaries), in the environs of Matobo district, Matabeleland South, Zimbabwe. It characterises a range of responses on the part of white farmers – dropping out, pushing back, accommodating and adapting – and charts the various outcomes of these strategies. I further utilise the concept of subjectivity to reflect on these diverse responses and to disaggregate essentialised or homogenised understandings of whiteness. The article focuses on the small number of white farmers who retain a connection to the land and agrarian production in the study area and argues they embody aspects of a particular subjectivity. This conciliatory subjectivity is characterised by openness to reconciliation, rapprochement and partnership-making. Specifically, it is located along the following lines: (1) in contrast to the perceived ‘islands of privilege’ of some of their peers; (2) within a challenging context where they no longer occupy a hegemonic position; (3) wherein they are inclined or required to (re)form collaborations and alliances in the new dispensation; and (4) the subjectivity of these farmers could be said to be pre-occupied less with issues of identity and belonging, than with surviving and ‘becoming’ amidst the multi-faceted challenges of contemporary Zimbabwean rural agricultural endeavours and socio-political life.     

Must lineages own land?

Abstract

In a recent study of peasant insurgency in nineteenth-century India, Ranajit Guha raises the question of “territoriality” in peasant consciousness, Peasants, he notes, and to some extent this applies to all rural people, defined their world in terms of territorial limits beyond which they had neither influence nor interests. This consciousness was rooted in their “sense of belonging to a common lineage as well as to a common habitat—an intersection of two primordial referents.” Common lineage and common habitat, or kinship and community, constitute the two essential allegiances of rural life. They may place limits on peasant mobilization, but as Guha argues, they also create whatever potentials there may be for struggle and change.     

Export Growth and Development to Poor Rural Regions: a Meso-Scale Analysis of the Upper Limari

Abstract — The aim of this article is to explore the recent social and economic evolution of a rural region that was formerly one of the poorest in Chile but has been transformed by a productive specialisation in table grapes for export markets. The region is that of the Upper Limari in Chile's semi-arid Norte Chico. The analysis focuses on changes in four interrelated variables: productive investments; land markets; labour markets; and population distribution. Rapid growth in investment, the emergence of dynamic land markets, dramatic increases in labour productivity have transformed the agricultural sector. Small-scale farming has survived poorly due to lack of capital, technical problems and lack of bargaining power with the international fruit companies. The large-scale farmers have enjoyed better conditions and a reconcentration of land has occurred. However, the emergence of new productive activities in an area where labour alternatives have been historically scarce has provided new sources of income. Population is increasing in rural settlements linked to irrigated agroexportation and quality of life indicators have improved. Rural depopulation is not a feature of the region as a whole.     

‘They do not help,only demoralize’: peasant nachalniks and the last imperial Russian reform on the Kazakh Steppe, 1902–1917

ABSTRACT

This article studies an early-twentieth-century reform in local administration on the Kazakh Steppe. It was catalyzed by the massive in-migration of peasant settlers from European Russia, which required fundamentally new administrative forms and institutional decisions from the state. In 1902 the Russian Empire extended the Temporary Regulation on Peasant Nachalniks, which was previously law only in Siberia, to the steppe oblasts of Akmola, Turgai, Semipalatinsk and Uralsk. In examining discussions surrounding the implementation of the new law, this article uncovers the complexity and ambiguities of the decisions that were made, the problems the new law faced, and the wide array of participants in enacting it. The article also compiles a socio-cultural portrait of the peasant nachalniks and the activities they undertook. Finally, it addresses how the Kazakh population perceived these new officials, and how they interacted with representatives of the Kazakh administration, which was crucial to their effectiveness.     

Rondas Campesinas in the Peruvian Civil War: Peasant Self-defence Organisations in Ayacucho

Despite the fact that the Shining Path guerrilla movement in Peru enjoyed initial peasant support, the emergence and spread of rondas campesinas or self-defence committees in the Andean highlands of Ayacucho was principally a response against coercion and violence exerted by Shining Path against the very same peasantry. This article seeks to demonstrate that the ronda phenomenon must be understood as part of the complex changes brought about by the proliferation of violence in the Peruvian Andes. The spread of rondas campesinas cannot be reduced to a mere counterinsurgent strategy imposed by the security forces on the rural communities; communal initiative and peasant 'agency' were, at certain stages, at least as important. Only with the rise to power of Fujimori were the self-defence committees formally incorporated in the state's anti-guerrilla strategy. Subsequently, with the reduction in the level of violence, self-defence committees have been seeking new roles in relation to the challenges of re-civilianisation and reconstruction.     

On Justice: Peasants,Petitions and the State in Mid-Nineteenth-Century Egypt

The historiography on peasant–state relations in agricultural societies includes the recognition of peasants as actors in their own right that did not wait passively to be acted upon by the ruling elite. Yet, most often, these discussions examine peasant–state relations within the framework of peasant mistrust of and resistance to the state. This paper focuses on peasant petitioning practices in mid-nineteenth-century Egypt and seeks to present a more nuanced interpretation of peasants’ attitude towards the state by addressing two questions: What were the major elements of state discourse on justice for the peasantry? Were the peasants cognizant of this discourse? My examination of the relevant archival evidence reveals the peasants’ propensity for peaceable engagement with the state. Indeed, peasants were familiar with state bodies and rules, and fully expected the state to deliver on its promise to ensure justice.     

Friends and enemies of the people

Abstract

Ensconced in the safely distant present, modern historians have looked back in blanket approval to peasant rebellion and banditry, searching for a new history of the people and not their rulers. The sensitive work of Eric Hobsbawm, particularly Primitive Rebels and Bandits, has pioneered a methodology to rescue outlaws from traditional ruling-class condemnation and set them in the context of specific sociohistorical processes and pressures. Many historians of China, notably Susan Naquin and Elizabeth Perry, have followed this lead with impressive effect.     

Making Space: Social Change, Identity and the Creation of Boundaries in the Central Ecuadorian Andes

Abstract— In rural Latin America, communities and their boundaries are changing due to government intervention, immigration, temporary migration and changing patterns of consumption. This article investigates the conflicts that arise from these changes and the impact they have on the creation of boundaries in a peasant community in the Ecuadorian Andes. It also discusses how the creation of community and household boundaries are linked to ethnic identification during rituals and daily life.     

Life in the Chinese hinterlands under the rural economic reforms

Abstract

Some of the poorest peasant households in one of China's inland provinces are being hurt by current government policies toward agriculture. This is the distinct impression obtained during two months of travel and research in Yunnan Province during mid-1988. As consultants to an international development project, we had an opportunity to explore the hill districts of northern Yunnan in a four-wheel drive, free to conduct interviews with grass-roots officials and peasant families. A total of thirteen villages were investigated, selected largely by ourselves.     

Agrarian conditions in Luzon prior to martial law

Abstract

One hot day in May 1970, I sat with several villagers on a dusty road in the village (barrio) of San Ricardo in Central Luzon. The peasants had been describing how arduous life was and how difficult it was to do anything politically to improve the situation. Then one peasant who was a member of the MASAKA, a local peasant union, said “You know, we in the MASAKA wouldn't be totally surprised if martial law were declared in order to wipe out groups like ours who are seeking justice for people.” This was a prophetic statment indeed—said over two years before martial law in fact was declared. In order to understand better the statement and those who believed it, one must understand some major aspects of rural conditions in Luzon since World War II.     

The Neoliberal Inheritance: Agrarian Policy and Rural Differentiation in Democratic Chile

This paper critically appraises the core philosophies of the three Concertación governments with respect to agrarian change and rural restructuring in Chile since 1990. It identifies common ideological ground in the successive administrations' perspectives on the nature and role of agriculture in the wider economy, arguing that a 'neoliberal inheritance>> has pervaded each. In drawing on primary and secondary data from the non-traditional fruit export sector the paper challenges the concept of reconversión as a panacea for rural under-development and grower failure. Given the simultaneously regionalising and globalising context which frames the Chilean transition, the paper highlights the tough choices that face policy makers at the current time. Developmental dilemmas are increasing in the sector, given the stated desire of the Concertación governments to move beyond pure, efficiency-driven, neoliberalism towards the incorporation of equity and sustainability goals. After ten years of democratic transition it is timely to ask if policy shows any signs of moving beyond reconversión .     

Private Farming in Russia: An Emerging Success?

The emergence of privately owned peasant farms in the early 1990s was one of the most important reforms in Russia's agrarian sector. Initially failing to become a significant food producer, during its second decade private farming emerged as a success in agrarian reform. This success is analyzed using two levels of analysis. At the macro-level, economic performance, government policy, and AKKOR's relationships with a range of actors are examined. The micro- or household level is examined using survey data from rural households, looking at private farmers' earned income, land holdings, and shifts in employment.     

Shifting the debate on land reform,poverty and inequality in Zimbabwe,an engagement with Zimbabwe's Land Reform: Myths and Realities 1

Zimbabwe's land reform: myths and realities 2 2. Zimbabwe's Land Reform: Myths and Realities by Ian Scoones, Nelson Marongwe, Blasio Mavedzenge, Jacob Mahenehene, Felix Murimbarimba and Crispen Sukume, Woodbridge, Suffolk, James Currey, 2010, 304 pp., ISBN 9781847010247. purports to overturn the western media and academy's ‘myths’ of agrarian failure and cronyism in Zimbabwe's fast-track land reform with a study rooted in the ‘reality’ of its outcomes in the Masvingo area. Yet the positivist picture painted by Scoones, Marongwe, Mavedzenge, Mahenehene, Murimbarimba, and Sukume is another position in portrayals of a complex process entangling many local material struggles–including those seen as successful examples of the yeomanry admired by the authors–with the equally important processes of authoritarian nationalism they side-line. ‘Myth making’ is not counter to ‘reality’, but positions particular claims within it. By concentrating on the ‘local’ and celebrating what they see as non-technocratic successes, the authors ignore the context and politics of the state–which they later invoke to develop adequate supportive policy and stability for the new farmers. Their reality ignores as much as the myths they try to challenge, and thus fails to assist to develop the policies they would like.     

Additional source materials on Philippine radical movements

Abstract

William Pomeroy's bibliographical essay is useful for future scholarship. I would, however, like to offer some supplementary information based upon my research and writing about radical peasant movements in the Philippines for the 1944-56 period. There is a wealth of information to explore, both in the Philippines and in the United States, and there is hope that radical movements in the Philippines will be given the proper recognition they deserve. In particular, the post-World War II Huk movement has been pictured for too long simply in terms of a counter-insurgency problem for the Philippine and United States governments. Using alternative sources, the Huks can be seen from the perspective of the participants themselves.     

From Family Feud to Organised Crime: The Cultural Economy of Cannabis in Northeast Brazil

Abstract — Traditional family feuding and banditry as well as envy-inspired violence associated with capitalised irrigation have been intensified by the introduction of cannabis farming and organised crime in the Sertão of Northeast Brazil to the point that today the cannabis producing zone is one of the most violent places in the world. These three interrelated forms of contemporary violence arose, respectively, in the pre-1940 frontier setting, in the 1940 to 1980 period of rapid Brazilian industrialisation which depressed peasant sectors and stimulated the rise of capitalised irrigation and in the post-1980 period of economic stagnation and social-political crisis in Brazil which depressed consumer markets and induced the State to liberalise foreign trade policy to the detriment of periphery regions like the Northeast.     

The politics of China's peasant revolution

Abstract

Efforts to explain the success of the Chinese Communist revolution have preoccupied more than a few American historians and political scientists in recent years. Most of these scholars, following the trail blazed by George Taylor's The Struggle for North China, have focused attention on the War of Resistance period (1937–1945) in search of the factors responsible for the phenomenal growth in Communist power. Chalmers Johnson, with his famous thesis of “peasant nationalism,” emphasizes the importance of the Japanese invasion for rural mobilization in China. Mark Selden, by contrast, identifies the Communist Party's positive wartime policies—the “Yenan Way”—as the key to revolutionary victory. Carl Dorris, while agreeing with much of Selden's explanation, locates the source of these successful wartime policies not in the capital of Yenan, but in the guerrilla bases of North China, especially Jin-Cha-Ji.     

Agrarian Change and the Democratic Transition in Chile: an Introduction

Abstract — The aim of this overview article is to sketch out the broad path of agrarian transformation in Chile since 1973 in order to better contextualise agrarian change and the democratic transition in Chile, the main theme that links the papers in this Special Issue. The legacy of the military government's neoliberal policies on the agricultural sector is analysed before the key themes of agrarian policy during the democratic transition are introduced. The themes of productive transformation and greater equity are focused upon and the articles in this volume put into this context.     

Negotiating Natural Resource Conflicts: A Study of State Practices,Peasant Mobilisation and Sub‐National Government in the Peruvian Andes

This article explores the dynamics of natural resource conflicts and local government in the Peruvian Andes. Recent publications have found that efficiency and democratic accountability in local government are key variables for mitigating conflict. By focusing on the ethnographies of two conflicts and as participant observers within local government, we argue that by re‐framing the analytical focus within local histories and current practices of natural resource conflicts, we can better make sense of the dynamics of current land politics. The article presents a sequential framework that explores key moments of the relations between the state and peasant communities during natural resource conflicts. Through this framework, we argue that natural resource conflicts are negotiated in a sphere of politics that transcends the state's institutional and legal limits.