DIVISION OF THE HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES

CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY

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SOME CONVENTIONAL ORTHODOXIES IN THE STUDY OF AGRARIAN CHANGE

Robert H. Bates ,\'\c,1\lUTfOf: �� ,.�c. � � 0 � t".'. _, 0 < Cl l..J . -<. � t:; � � � ,.....;;;, �): ,..., It SlfALL �pi.\1-.� This is an early version of a paper which will appear in an overly edited form in World Politics in early 1984. I wish to thank Eleanor Searle and Philip Hoffman for their contributions to this manuscript. SOCIAL SCIENCE WORKING PAPER 458

December J 982

Revised December 1983 SOME CONVENTIONAL ORTHOOOXIES IN THE STUDY OF AGRAR IAN CHANGE ABSTRACT

Robert H. Bates The purpose of this paper is critically to review two -ujor California Institute of Technology approaches to the analysis of agrarian societies and to do so in light

of evidence taken from Africa. Sweet sm il ing village, loveliest of the lawn, Thy sport s are tled, and all thy charms withdrawn; The first app roach posits the existence of "natural" societies ; Am idst thy bowers the tyrant's hand is seen, And desolation saddens all thy green : the second, "p easant" societies. Both approaches attribute One only master grabs the whole domain, And half a village st ints thy smiling plain. psychological and institutional characteristics to these societies. * * * Far, far away thy children leav e the land. When subject to the exogenous shock s of intrusive political and Ill fares the land, to hastening ill a prey , Where wealth accumulate s, and men decay : econom ic forces, these attributes then generate characteristic patterns Princes and lords may flourish, or may fade; A breath can make them, as a breath has made : of change. The existence of such "p re-cap it alist" societies is thus But a bold peasantry, their country's pride, When once de stroyed, can never be supp lied. often invoked to account for patterns of change in contemporary rural * * * But now the sounds of population fail. societies. No cheerful murmurs fluctuate in the gale, No busy steps the grass-grown foot-way tread, On the basis of African materials, the paper argues that these For all the bloomy flush of life is fled. All but yon widowed, solitary thing, approaches are ov erly cultural. They are ov erly economist, under- * That feebly bends beside the plashy spring. valuing the importance of the state. Many of the so-called pre- * Oliver Goldsmith, ,.l'he Deserted Vil lage" in Selected Work s of Oliver Goldsmith (London : Ma cMillan and Co. , 1920) , pp . 358-360 capitalist features of these societies are them selves arguably products Permit me to inscribe this Poem to you. of their encounter with agents of capitalism. Moreover, many result How far you may be pleased with the versification and mere mechanical parts of this attempt , I do not pretend to from the effort s of states to secure domination and control ov er rural inquire; but I know you will object (and indeed several of our best and wisest friends concur in this op inion) that the populations. depop ulation it deplore s is no where to be seen, and the disorders it laments are only to be found in the poet's own imagination. To this I can scarcely mak e any ther answer than that I sincerely * i believe what I hav e writt en.

** Oliver Goldsmith, "To Sir Joshua Reynolds, " letter transmitting "The Deserted Village" to Sir Joshua Reynolds , in Selected Work s of Oliver Goldsmith, p. 355 . 3 2

subjectivi st, value-based account s of these institution s are therefore INTRODUCTION false. The purpose of thi s paper is criti cally to review two major 3. A third criti ci sm is that the prevailing theories are approaches to the analysi s of agrarian societies and to do so in light ov erly economist. In parti cular, they ten d to un der-value the of evidence taken from Africa. The African data provoke considerable importance of the state. Many of the di stinctive institutions of skeptici sm con cerning the validity of these cont emp orary orthodoxies agrarian societies, I argue, result from the efforts of the state to and support three major counter argument s: secure dominati on an d control over rural populations; and many of the 1. The reigning orthodoxies posit the existence of two forms of behaviors attributed to the preferences of rural dw ellers result from agrarian societi es. In some cases, these societies are classified as strategi c interactions with public agencies which seek to extract goods "natural" societies; in others, they are classified as "p easant". In an d services from them. In sofar as the in stitution s and behaviors both cases, they are held to be pre-capitalist. A major thesis of this exhibited by agrarian societies define a peasantry, in short, states essay is that this last contention is false. For the very traits that create peasants. lead these societies to be classified as pre-capitalist - e.g. the exi stence of common land rights; the avoidan ce of market exchanges; the INTRODUCING THE DOMINANT ORTHODOX IES turning to subsistence production, reciprocity and such social Amon g the most prominent of the current approa ches, two stan d institution s as the family system for economi c support - are them selves out : the "n atural" and "p easant" economy models of rural society. arguably product s of the encounter of agrarian societies with agents of These models contain both stati c and dynami c elements. The first capitalism. 1 provide the initial condition s and the defining instit utional and 2. A second argument is that the current orthodoxies are behavi oral characteristics; when linked, these static elements generate ov erly cultural. The orthodox position s tend to account for agrarian characteri sti c pattern s of change and signi ficant implications for institutions in terms of the values of rural dwellers, e.g. their public policy. desire to secure subsi sten ce or to gain social stan din g. This essay in stead argue s that key agrarian in stituti ons represent compromises and adaptations; equally as often, they represent impo sition s from above by more powerful external agent s. In either case, agrarian in stitution s cannot represent institutionalized expression s of agrarian value s and 4 5

The Myt h of the Natural Economy TABLE 1

The critical elem ents of the model of the natural economy are Schematic Presentation of the Model of a Natural Economy present ed in table 1. In this section, I elaborate upon this schematic suDDllari zation . Initial Conditions: The origins of this model lie widely scatter ed. The model i. Agrarian economy. derives as much from Polanyi as from Marx and Engels ; 2 its roots stem ii. Production for use rather than exchange. as well from Tonnies notion of societies based upon the principles of iii . Insignificance of markets . gem einschaft, and from Maine's notion of societies based upon status . 3 Institutional Characteristics: In more recent times, the model has been advanced by Dalton, Wolf, i. "Connnunal" land rights; Migdal, and Scott, writers whose works have been grouped by their a. Use rights accorded to producers if and only if principal critic, Samuel Popkin, into the "moral economy" school of producer a member of the coDD11unity . 4 social analysis . b. Rights to land revert to community when use rights no longer exercised . Initial Conditions: Accor ding to the model of the natural ii . Importance of the primary community and, in particular, economy, "primitive" agrarian societies produce not for exchange but the village . for use; as a consequence Behavioral Characteristics:

i. The desire for sel f-su fficiency.

market exchanges are usually peripheral, in the sense that most ii . The importance of status .

sellers do not acquire the bulk of their livelihood, and buyers iii . The importance of equality.

the bulk of their daily used goods and services, via Patterns of Change:

market-place sales and purchases •• • labor and land do not i. Initial opposition to "commoditization."

enter the market and basic livelihood is acquir ed in non-market ii . Social disintegration in the face of markets .

spheres • • • all important output and factor flows are carried on iii . Radicalization un der the impact of capitalism .

via reciprocity and redistribution . 5 Corollaries:

The preference of agrarian societies for communal forms of economic organization . 6 7

In the absence of market s, resources are not allocated in accord with in his discussion of the Germanic form of pre-capitalist society - a

their value in exchange; rather, the patterns of allocation are discussion which is far more app licable to the analysis of African

determined by social relationships. As Dalton states, societies than is his more widely cited discussion of the Asiatic form

- "property therefore means belonging to a tribe.... 11 9

Specifically, these primitive social econom ies are so organized Critical too is the imp ortance of face-to-face communities,

that the allocation of labour and land, work organization within and, in particular, the village. Along with kin-based organizations,

productive processes, and the disposition of goods and services - villages are viewed as the central social institution of agrarian

in short, production and distribution - are expressions of societies. The importance of the village is perhap s best suggested by

underlying kinship obligation, tribal affiliation, and religious Scott :

and moral duty. There is no separate economic system to be 6 analyzed independent ly of social organization. In almost every case [in Sout heast Asia] the village has

constituted something more than merely a physical aggregation of

Institut ional Characteristics : Nowhere is the determining households. Ritually, it has been set ap art by local guardian

influence of social organization over the allocation of econom ic spirit s and religious shrines; economically, it has represented

resources more clearly seen than in the area of property right s. In the unit of labor exchange ; socially, it has formed the unit of

pre-capitalist societies, according to Marx, status, of reciprocity, and of social insurance; politically, it

has generally been a unit of dispute settlement, as well as of

in all these form s, ••• landed property and agriculture are the administration and taxation.lo

ba sis of the econom ic order and •••the econom ic objective is

•••the product ion of use-values, i. e. the reproduct ion of the The village is central to all aspects of rural life. 7 individual Communal restrictions on landed property and the pervasive

signif icance of villages: both underscore the impact of social

Under such circumstances, "an isolated indiv idual could no more own relations on economic life. In the literature on the natural economy 8 land than he could speak.11 The acquisition of property is thus a and in the literature on the peasant economy as well - the two themes

social act; it requires membership in a community. As Marx concludes are often fused; they combine in the discussion of the corporate 8 9

village. In the words of Wolf, such villages Polanyi claims on the ba sis of historical and anthropological

evidence that • practices ••• in traditional society •

maintain a measure of communal jurisdiction over land ••• served to mark it off from the modern economy. He concluded,

restrict their membership , maintain a religious system, enforce "It is the absence of threat of individual starvation which

mechanisms which insure the redistribut ion or destruction of makes primitive society, in a sense, more humane than market 14 surplus wealth, and up hold barriers against the ••• outside economy, and at the same time less economic.11 11

Transition Arguments: The model of the natural economy thus

And while the initial writings of Wolf make it clear that the corporate posits dist inctive institut ional and subjective features for agrarian village is but one of many forms of rural settlement, the analysis of societies. It posits as well a notion of change. The initial these villages dominates much of the subsequent literature on agrarian condition of the natural economy is the absence of markets. But, 12 society. according to this model, markets inevitably penetrate into even the

Social Values: The social institutions of rural society, this most isolated communities ; and this alteration in the initial literature contends, facilitate the attainment of key cultural values. conditions generates characteristic patterns of change.

One such value is a sense of membership. As Dalton states, "In One response is to resist the market ; in the words of Redfield, 15 primitive communities, the individual as an economic factor is these societies attempt to keep the market "at arm's lengtb.11 With personalized, not anonymous. He tends to hold his economic position in the inevitable triumph of the market, however, there arises a second 13 virtue of his social position.11 Another is a stress on equality. A response: social disintegration. In the words of Wolf, "cap italism cut third is an out growth of the first two: the value placed on guarantees through the integument of custom, severing people from their accustomed of subsistence. Each member of society possesses an equal right to social mat rix in order to transform them into econom ic actors, 16 sufficient income to guarantee their survival. Thus Scott , in his independent of prior social commitments to kin and neighbors.11 "This discussion of agrarian institutions, cites Polanyi and states : liberation from accustomed social ties and the separation which it

entailed constituted the historical experience which Karl Marx would

describe in terms of 'alienation',11 17 The third response is rural

radicalism. Agrarian protest is radical, it is held, in the sense that 10 11

it assert s the entitl ement of all people to subsistence, the validity Policy Correlates: The ethi cal properties of the natural

of communal property as a means of securing thi s entitlem ent, and the economy, it is held, render rural dwellers revolutionary not only in

rejection of the private market. As Wolf states in hi s analysi s of their political but also in their economic behavior. An important

rural revolutions, corollary of thi s theory is that rural dwellers will subscribe to

collective form s of economi c organization, ones which reject private

In a sense all our ••• cases can be seen as the outcome of property and thereby forestall the emergence of economic inequality and

defensive rea ctions, coupled with a search for a new and more exploitation. As noted by Hyden, the promotion of cooperative 18 humane social order. societi es in Afri ca derives in part from the convi cti on that African

rural society is by preference communitarian:

And as Scott states,

Like Russian populists in the nineteenth century Afri can leaders

As the gr owth of commerce and markets ••• broke the hold of have idealized the ''p ure" features of peasant society. "Africa is

local custom, the ut opian vision of the peasantry increasingly essentially 'communaucrati c', writes Sekou Toura 'We had already

anti cipated a society in whi ch, as in ear lier times, ·�uying and realized sociali sm before the coming of the Europeans,' says 19 selling" would di sappear. Leopold Senghor. 21

The result is rural radicalism : In response to these convictions, political leader s such as Toure,

Senghor, Kaunda, Nyerere and others proceeded to form cooperative

it is precisely the fact that peasants and arti sans hav e one foot societies and channeled their program s of agricultural development

in the pre-capitalist economy that explains why they have provi de d through the cooperative movement.22

the mass impetus for so many "forward looking" movements. Their

opposition to capitalism, based as it is on a ut opian image of an The Peasant Economy :

earlier era, is as tenacious, if not more so, as the opp ositi on of A second model of agrari an soci ety is frequently app lied to 20 a proletariat which has both feet in the new society. rural Afri ca : the model of the peasant society. It s di stinctive

features are summarized in table 2. 12 13

Initial Conditions : Peasant societies are held to be pre-

capitalist in the sense that in peasant societies labor is not

TABLE 2 separated from the means of production. Nonetheless, it is contended,

peasant societies represent a more "a dvanced" form of agrarian society

Schematic Presentation of the Model of a Peasant Society than do natural economies. Peasant societies do not stand isolated and

Initial Conditions : self-sufficient ; rather, they reside within state systems and within

i. Post-agrarian economy; the importance of urban industry and economies which contain cities, industry and manufacturing. And they manufacturing. are linked to these other social sectors through relations of political ii. Fully elaborated markets both for products and factors of production. domination and economic exchange.

iii. Production for exchange as well as use. Institutional Characteristics: Nearly all di scussions of

Institutional Characteristics : peasant societie s thus emphasize that peasant societies are "p art-

i. Private rights in land. societies. " As Kroeber's classic definition states,

ii. Prevalence of inequality :

a. The importance of state coercion. Peasants are definitely rural - yet live in relation to market

b. The importance of class forma tion. towns; they form a class segment of a larger population which

iii. Limited participation in the markets for products and usually contains urban centers, some times metropolitan capitals. labor. They constitute part-societies with part-cultures.23 Behavioral Assumptions :

i. Subsistence ethic. In the cultural sphere, peasants are bearers of the "l ittle" tradition; ii. Rejection of pure profit maximization. they del:ine their rituals in response to the "great" tradition of the Patterns of Change : ritual centers of the larger society.24 In the pol itical sphere, they i. The creation of the peasant mode : the impact of capitalism on the na tural economy . are part of but not governor s of the political system; as Shanin

ii. Conflict s between peasant mode and capitalism. states, 14 15

Peasants, as a rule, have been kept at arm's length from the Behavioral Characteristics: Further defining peasant society

sources of power. Th eir political subjection interlink s with are behav ioral and psychological characteristics. Chayanov, for 25 cultural subordination and with their exploitation. ••• examp le argues that the economics of the peasant household differ from

that of a profit maximizing firm , for peasants are driven by the need

Not only are peasants politically subordinate to the st ate, but also to secure sufficient su bsistence to guarantee their survival and their they are politically dom inated by other classes; often these are rural reproduction. Peasants will therefore incur cost s up to the point classes, for in the context of a market economy and with the help of where the consumpt ion needs of the domestic economy are satisfied. As state power certain fragments of the rural society are able to a consequence, peasants will, if necessary, engage in "internal accumulate large-scale private landholdings. So important is the exploitation" of family labor to cover the requirements of domestic pattern of inequality that Welch is driven to ask: "W ithout landlords, consumpt ion. Driven by the imperative of supporting the domestic unit, 26 could there be peasants?11 peasants will work longer hours, cultivate more intensively the lands

In the econom ic sphere, peasants are "p art-" societies in the they hold or surrender greater revenues for lands they wish to buy than sense that they participate in markets and are reliant upon them to purely commercial considerations would justify.29 fulfill their subsistence needs, but they are only partially so. As Because th eir households are more than a pure production unit,

Wolf states, "We may •••draw a line between the peasant and anoth er then, peasants are motivated by principles other than those of prof it agricultural type whom we call the 'farmer.' The farmer view s maxim ization. Joining Chayanov in this argument are oth ers who extend agriculture as a bu siness enterprise•••• Th e aim of the peasant is the range of relevant motivat ions to include social goals. According 27 subsistence.11 And as Fallers comment s, "In econom ic term s, a peasant to this position, th e peasant expends the fruits of production to bu ild is •••a man who produces •••ma inly for his own househ old's close and support ive ties with his fellow rural dw ellers. Th is is consumpt ion, but who also produces someth ing to exchange in a market wise, it is argued, because the market is risky and uncertain; the for other goods and services. Th is is the economic aspect of the support of others is required as a form of social insurance. As Wolf 28 peasant community's sem i-autonomy.11 The limited participation in the states, ''To insure continuity upon the land and sustenance form his market is seen both in the tendency to consume large proportions of household, the peasant most often keeps the market at arm's length, for one's own produ ct ion and also to rely primarily upon family, as opposed unl imited involvement in the market threatens his hold on his source of to hired, labor. livelihood. He thus cleaves to traditional arrangements which 16 17

JO guarantee his access to land and to the labor of kin and neighbors.', Patterns of Change : The origins of peasant society, it is

Moreover, expenditures up on social involvements are inherently held, lie in the impact of market forces up on the natural economy. enjoyable and rewarding ; for the culture of the peasantry simp ly places Under the stimulation of the market , property rights become a higher priority on social status than on material wealth. Th ese individualistic; households no longer are self-sufficient but become themes are captured by Routh, who is quoted with approval by Goran dependent on the market ; and "self-sufficient communities founded

Hyden; according to Routh, the peasant largely up on kinship ties are 'turned outwards,' as it were, and made 32 dependent ••• up on external structures and forces.•, In the th ird

eat s well, he has a bed to sleep on, a ch air to sit on. For world, the primary agency for th is expansion of the market is the

recreation, he has his evenings of conversation round the pombe imp erial state; as Post contends

(beer) pot. There is no figure in the economic textbooks which is

•••• more misunderstood than he To suggest that he is The colonial powers •••greatly extended the market principle,

"underemployed" and imagine that one is bestowing a favour on him to the point where the impersonal forces of the world market

by providing more work, is ludicrous. It is his aim to be as dominated the lives of millions, and imposed a State where none

underemployed as possible, and to allow himself to be disturbed had been before, or to supersede indigenous ones•••• It would 31 from this aim only by the need to meet his austere objectives. appear, then, that many of the conditions for the existence of a

peasantry were suddenly created, but from the outside.33

The static component s of the model of a peasant economy thus contain a set of initial conditions (an advanced market economy), The intrusion of capitalist society, championed by the powers of institutional trait s (rural class formation, political subordination, imp erial expansion, thus lead to the alterations of the conditions and partial involvement in markets), and behavioral characteristics (an supportive of the natural economy and promoted the formation of a overriding concern with subsistence and with the primary community). peasant society, in which pre-capitalist forms (workers in control of

The dynamic components consist of patterns of ch ange, patterns which their own means of production) continue d to op erate, but within a fully include both the origins and the de struction of the peasant economy. cap italist exchange economy. 18 19

Th e dynam ic elements of the model posit as well the existence peasant societies th us leads to the transfer of resources to the non­

of a second set of changes: patterns of tension and conflict between agrarian sector of society and to the self-destruction of the peasantry the peasant mode of production and capitalism, as a class. Driven by their own imp overishment, they become workers in

For some, such as Hyden, the contradictory relations between cities or on the holdings of more efficient , large-scale farms, For the cap italist and pre-capitalist modes of production is suggested by others, such as Wolf and Migdal, the struggle is short-lived; for the apparent convict ion that the existence of the peasantry retards the accompany ing the dynam ics posited by William s are the pressures of

growth of capitalism. For according to Hyden, the peasant's capacity accelerated population growth and ecological stress - pressures which 36 to revert back to subsistence allows th e peasantry to prevent th e lead to the imm iseration and defeat of the rural society. extraction of surplus from an agrarian economy. As Hyden writes:

THE MODELS CRITIQUE D IN LIGHT OF THE AFRICAN EXPERIENCE it is not an exaggeration to claim that the principal structural In outline form, then, th ese are two of the dom inant models of constraint to development are the barriers raised , • , by the rural society. What is devastating is how poorly these models perform peasant mode of production. , In order to appropriate the when app lied to the African data, surplus product from the peasant more effectively there is no

oth er way available but to raise peasant productivity and make him Th e Initial Conditions : 34 produce more than for his own domestic needs. To an Africanist, one of the most striking deficiencies in

th ese theories is th eir initial conditions: a world of subsistence

For others, such as William s, the tension between the peasantry and production in which there are no markets, no buying, no trading, Th is cap italism also exists, but will nonetheless inevitably be resolved; assumption, it sh ould be stressed, is not benign; it cannot be for the peasants are viewed as an inherent ly "t ransitional class, wh ich dism issed as a mere romantic overtone in the argument. Rath er, it will inevitably be displaced by the technical superiority of capitalist provide s an essential underp inning, Th e initial conditions motivate production. They are able to sustain their existences in the face of the dynam ics of both the models. Movements away from these conditions

, • , competition only by overworking and impoverishing them selves. precipitate a change from a subsistence oriented, egalitarian, and

In this way, they serve th e interests of cap ital by selling commodities isolate d agrarian society to a market dependent, class driven, peasant 35 ch eap ly.11 The very capacity for internal exploitation inherent in society, inextricably tied to centers of wealth and power, And the 20 21

further intensification of relations with cap italism yields a sustained Periplus of the Erythrean Sea, to the trade along the coast. Long pattern of conflict between the cap italist and peasant economies. The before the Europeans arr ived there were trade routes from initial conditions also help to account for the growth and behavior of Madagascar up to th e East Afr ican coast, through the Red Sea and revolutionary forces: outrage at the loss of a "state of virtue" into the Mediterranean, along the Per sian Gulf to India, Southeast provides the demand for revolution and the moral values which are Asia, and Indonesia. By the time the Portuguese had reached East threatened through the spread of cap italism pr ovide it s ideology. Africa, the Ch inese had already been active there; before the

Without the assumptions concerning the initial conditions, then several development of the gun-carrying sailing ship on the At lantic major predictions - concerning the rise of class based, peasant seaboard, the maritime commer ce of the Indian Ocean made western societies from subsistence economies ; the intensification of struggle Europe seem an underdeveloped area. Indeed, the trade between between peasants and the advanced capitalist sectors of society; and Ethiopia, th e Mediterranean, and the Indian Ocean had much to do the outbreak and nat ur e of peasant revolts - simp ly would not follow. with the developments in the Ar abian peninsula, including the rise

The initial conditions of the model of the natural economy are of Muhamme� therefore critical to the prevailing orthodoxies concerning the dynam ics of agrarian change. Were th ese conditions to hold anywhere, In West Africa the medieval emp ires of the Niger bend one would expect them to hold in Africa. And yet, time and time again, were built up on the trade which br ought salt, cloth, and beads historical resear ch reaffirms that in pre-colonial Africa there was south from the Sahara across to West Africa and took gold and trade, there was commer ce, and there was th e widespread use of money in ivory and slaves back to the Barbary coast and from there int o exchange economies. It is Jack Goody who best summarizes these medieval Europe. 37 findings, and he is worth quoting at length : From the point of view of the mercantile economy, parts

of Africa were similar to Western Europe of the same period.

The concept of non-monetary economics is hardly app licable to pre­ Metal coinage was in use on th e East African coast. In the west,

colonial Africa, except possibly for certain hunting group s of currencies consisted of gold, br ass, and salt, but more especially

minimal importance. Africa was involved in a vast network of cowrie shells, which, coming as they did from the Maldive Islands

wide-ranging trade long before the Portuguese came on the scene. off the south of Ceylon, filled most of the necessary attributes 38 For East Africa we have a late first century sailor's guide, the of money. 22 23

Isolation, subsisten ce, lack of involvement in an exchan ge In light of the expectations generated by these arguments, it economy: these are not to be found in the "primitive" economies of is therefore disconcerting to find that in Africa the roles of the

Africa. Alternatively, these traits characterize so small an d supposed combatants are sometimes the reverse of what this model would in significant a gr oup of African societies that it would be nonsen sical expect. It is sometimes the agen cies of cap italism - the colonial to base a general theory of social change up on them. Given the state - who take the lead in resisting commoditization and in promoting validity of these cr iticisms on the basis of African materials, the communal in stitutions. The advocates for the rapid expansion of the implications for the use of these models elsewhere is far more market an d of private property, on the other han d, are sometimes dr awn damaging. For elsewhere the pervasiveness of the money economy has from the members of the indigenous agrarian society. surely been gr eater an d of even lon ger duration. "Buying an d Selling" : Despite myths to the con trary,

throughout much of Africa, in digenous peoples turned quickly,

Transition Arguments vigorously, an d skillfully to production for colonial markets. The

The reigning orthodoxies in the study of agrarian econom ies are rapid an d astonishing gr owth of the cocoa industry in West Africa has defined not only in terms of their in itial con dition s; they ar e also been told by Hill an d Barry; within a generation, Ghana became the defined in terms of their dynamics, i.e. their assertions concerning world's leading producer of cocoa and did so on the in itiative of characteristic pattern s of change. indigenous agrarian interests.39 Hogen dorn has shown how in Northern

For the first of these models, the dynamics derive from the Nigeria indigenous entrepreneurs organized the large-scale production pre-capitalist nature of rural society. Agrarian societies ar e of groun dnuts for export to colonial market.40 Similar histories exist portrayed as locked in conflict with a powerful alternative economy: for palm oil production in Nigeria and groundnut production in 41 the capitalist economy, where there exists private property, where Senegal. Similarly, Ar righi wrote for the Rhodesias: everything can be bought and sold, an d where people are driven to maximize profits by the impera tive of market competition. In the face It is possible that in the 1890s the African peoples showed some of the encroachmen t of the money economy, rural dwellers are held to "unfam iliarity" with [market] opportunities, but by the turn of attempt to "keep the market at arm's length" an d to ''resist the century this was no longer the case, Pr ior to 1904 European commoditization ." farming in Rhodesia was in significant an d the Afr ican peasantry

supp lied the bulk of the foodstuffs required by the mines. In 24 25

1903, for example, it was estimated that the annual amount Property Rights: In fact, change went even deeper : it

received by Africans for sale of gr ains, other produce, and stock extended as well to the definition of property rights. In light of the

was on the or der of 1>350,000, and there is much evidence that expectations formed by the orthodox treatment of agrarian change, the

trade with the African population was at the time the most , if not stunning irony of the matter is that it was often the government s of

the only, profitable activity carried out by the Europeans. the colonial powers - the primary agents of capitalism - who advocated

Further, when the development of European mixed farming and "communal" property right s whereas the members of the indigenous

ranching created a demand for African-owned catt le, Africans were agrarian societ ies often champ ioned the cause of private ownership.

ready to sell them in large numbers. Though mainly limited to the As no subject engenders gr eater confusion than that of property

sale of what may be called "t raditional} produce (grain, catt le, rights, let me quick ly recall the definition outlined in table 1. By

and beer), African participation in the produce market also took communal land rights, I mean a system wherein

other forms: the production for the market of green vegetables, 1. Use right s ar e accorded a producer if and only if that

potatoes, wheat, gr oundnut s, and tobacco, for example, was either producer is a member of a community. In other words,

introduced or expanded, and the practice developed in the mining a) Community membership is a sufficient condition for

areas of draw ing a regular income from hiring out bullocks to the rights to land; no member of the community can go 42 mines for purposes of transport. without land. And

b) Community membership is a ne cessary condition for

Arrighi goes on to note that change was not limited to the sphere of right s to land; land cannot be alienated outside of

exchange but also was introduced in the methods of production: the community.

"Africans were equally prompt in investing and innovating in response 2. The community holds revisionary rights in land. That is, 43 to market opportunities.11 They acquired wagons, cart s, maize mills, when use is no longer being made of land, right s to the pumps, ox-drawn ploughs and other equipment, and they invested in land revert to the community. The land can then be re­ higher grade cattle and the fencing and dip s required for their allocated for use. 44 surviva1. Under a system of private property right s, condition 1 does not hold.

Member ship of the community is no longer sufficient to guarantee access

to land; nor is it a ne cessary condition, and land can be alienated to 26 27

persons outside the community. Moreover, land which is not in use does So definite and so common a practi ce was the sale of land ••• by

not revert to the community; it can be held for purposes of the end of the ni neteenth century that Griffith (whose association

speculation, transferred to other private individuals, or bequeathed to with the Colony dated back to his father, Sir William Brandford

persons of the owner's own choosing. A clear implication of thi s Griffith, Governor 1886-1895) could say that he 'never had

system, of course, is that even in the presence of abundant land, occasion to consider the question."46 people can starve for want of access to it; a primary attraction of the communal system is that under similar ci rcumstances such dea ths would And, as noted in an 1895 petition from "chi efs, na tives and 'other not occur. inhabitants' of the Cape Coast, " the government's policy was unjust,

Conflict s between capitalist government s, committed to communal for "now, when private enterpri se had proved the value of their lands, 47 right s, and spokesmen for agrarian societies, committed to private land [the Government] was to deprive them of their property.11 The rights, broke out in both West and East Africa. In 1912, the British organizers of this petition formed the first indi genous political party colonial government appointed the West African Lands Committee to in West Africa - a party organized in large part in opposition to the investigate land laws in British West Africa. The Committee's report government's restrictions on private rights to land. called for the reinforcement of "pure native tenure." It stressed that In West Afri ca, then, we face an ironic situation in which the

"legislation should have as its aim the checking of the progress of putative agency of capitalist expansion - the government of the indivi dual tenure and the strengthening of native custom, " which, it colonial power - actively promoted communal ri ghts, whilst members of held, "did not recogni ze the concept of individual tenure and forbade the agrarian societies demanded the unrestricted right to purchase and 45 the ••• sale of ••• community land.11 In these recommendations, to alienate land. In East Africa we face a similar ''reversal." the Committee was vigorously oppo sed by local interests. One expert on Speaking in opposition to the penetration of private market forces into local practi ces, Sir Brandford Griffith, noted that in opposing private the rural sector, for example, was the post-war governor of Kenya, Sir ownership and a free market in land, the government was in fact flying Phi lip Mi tchell. Mi tchell argued that soi l degradation, environmental in the face of "local custom"; as Grier comments, spoilage, and avari cious exploitation of land inevitably followed the

creation of private property. What was needed, then, was "the proper

control of the community. Each Native Land Unit, or a portion of a

uni t, was to be regarded as an 'estate of the communi ty' ; each occupi er 28 29

49 of land was to be a 'tenant of the tribe'.11 I am not prepared to argue that it was everywhere the case th at

The government of Kenya was opposed in its !and policy by th e Africans advanced demands for private property, nor that the colonial

indigenous people, and in particular, by the Kikuyu. As long ago as government s always advanced the case of communal property. Yet the

1912 a Kenya District Officer had investigated local tenurial practices fact that th is pattern occurred at all serves to deflect our attention

an had found that land was held by families who occupied it from the economist orthodoxies in th is field and to factors other than

unconditionally, that is, not at the pleasure of any higher authority. the level of capitalist development as a determinant of agrarian

He had al so found that many of these family estates had been purchased. change. In particular, I would argue, this discordant set of facts 49 Land was in fact bought and sold both within and between tribes. It suggests that governments may act in ways that differ from what one

is therefore unsurprising that the Kikuyu opposed government policy and would expect, given their societies' "stage of development"; th at

demanded individual registration of land holdings and the enforcement governments may confront an independent set of political imperatives;

of private rights to land. The urgency with which they pressed their and that the imperatives shaping political action may lead governments

demands was of course intensified by the insecurity th ey felt in the to lay in place characteristic institutions of agrarian society.

face of the uncompensated seizure of lands by the colonialists. Ideology : Th e African data suggest that at least three major

Characteristic of the transition arguments of the orthodox imperatives helped to shape the government' s role in agrarian change. models of agrarian change is the assumption that rural dw ellers are One was ideology. In the case of the British, there existed a genuine assaulted by capitalism. The communal attributes of these societies conviction that pre- capitalist societies were communitarian; that are counterpoised against the force s of capital ism that promote private Western man, in the personage of the imperialist, was introdu cing interests. Allowance is made for some members of rural society to forces that promoted self-interested behavior; and that because demand private property rights: rural elites, for example, would seek indigenou s institutions were scarce and inherently valuable, they a regime of private property rights in order to defend their econom ic should th erefore be protected by government. As noted by Sorrenson in privileges. But it could never be the case under these theories that his discussion of Norman Humphrey, an influential figu re in the post­ agents of capitalism would seek communal rights while the members of war development of Kenyan land policy : agrarian society seek private ones. And yet, as we have seen, there ex ists in the African literature at least two ca ses in which th is occurs. 30 31

Humphrey - and indeed a good many other officials - doubted the In the British case, the pol icy of governing through

moral right of Europeans to impose •••a system [of econom ic "t raditional rulers" was known as "indirect rule." C. K. Meek clearly

individualism] on Africans, thus destroying the supposed communal articulates the link between indirect rule and the formation of

sp irit of tribal tradition. Humphrey wanted to establish a series property rights; as he states at the beginning of his semi-official

of locational, divisional, and district councils to manage land treatise, Land Law and Custom in the Colonies :

along communal lines •••and he hoped this would lead to a re-

awakening of [the individual's] sense of duty to his fellows and The authority of chiefs, sub-chiefs and heads of clans and

his land and the instilling of of a de sire to abandon those false families is bound up with the land. The grant, therefore, to

values that have been a major product of his sudden contact with individuals of absolute rights of ownership would tend to disrupt 50 our civilization. the nat ive policy, and so, too, would the indiscriminate sale of

tribal lands by chiefs. The control of alienation of land has in

In registering these sentiments, Humphrey was, of course, echoing the consequence been one of the main planks of the British system of 52 sentiments of far more powerful figures in the British colonial regime: 'Indirect Rule'. 51 Lugard, Cameron, Perham and Hailey, to mention but a few.

Empowerment: More imp ortant than the ideological motivations So compelling is this thesis that Meek returns to it toward the end of of government, however, were strategic calculations made in the course hi s work, contending that "there is a political danger in allowing of securing politi cal dom ination in Africa. The colonial government s individuals to become owners of 'freeholds' without owing any sought, and needed, political allies through whom to secure control allegiance to the local Native Authorities."53 "If 'indirect rule' is over Africa's largely agrarian population. A key reason for insisting to continue to be a cardinal principal of British policy," he on communal land right s, it would appear, was that a system s of concludes, then "it would appear to be essential that the local Native communal right s emp owered locally ba sed confederates: it gave control Authorities should remain the ultimate 'owners' of as much land as 54 over the allocation of the key resources in an agrarian economy to possible•• 11 those who would govern the agrarian population on behalf of the The best system, from Meek' s point of view, was one in which colonial ist powers - the tribal chiefs. political loyalty to an agent of the colonial power served as a

prerequisite for access to land. Tignor, among others, exam ine d the 32 33

operation of this system and found it to operate roughly as one would As a corollary to this approach, we should expect that the expect. Fr iends and relatives of the chief secured land ; indeed, the institutions which were adopted in any particular situation would chiefly families became the richest land owners in the districts represent the outcome of political bargaining. Viewed from this light, studied by Tignor . Political enemies of th e chiefs lost rights to there is no particular reason to expect one or another form of agrar ian land . And as adjud icators of land cases, chiefs became rich: "they institution to emerge as a consequence of soc ial change . The outcome were among the first to bu ild European-style homes. They had large would depend on the conf igurat ion of power. property in land , wives and stock - all traditional signs of wealth, This inference is supported by the African ma terials. In some

55 much of which was acquired through illegal uses of their power . 11 And areas in Africa both the colonial powers and the na tive chief s were even more interesting, Ti gnor found that the more valuable th e control notably weak . Th is was true in Zamb ia, where the occupy ing forces were over land - i.e. the scarcer the land in relation to the population - small and chiefly powers had been based largely upon warfare and slave the greater the power which the British policy of customary land rights raiding , both of which were abandoned following the imperial conferred to the chiefs. The Ibo and Kikuyu chiefs, for examp le, who occupation. It was also true in places like Kenya ; not only were the ruled in densely populated agricultural areas , proved far more British small in number bu t also acephalous societies were the rule and effective as "modernizing agents" of the British than did the chiefs of the institution of chieftancy nonexistent . From the po int of view of the Kamba or Ma sai, who lived in areas where populat ion wa s far less the colonial adminis tration, the result in bo th places was a need for dense and land therefore relatively more abundant . power . In the case of Kenya, the response was the virtual creat ion of

Counter-factual observa tions - ones in wh ich rural dwe llers chiefs and tribal authorities by the British and the assignment to favor pr ivate property right s while capitalist governments favor these native authorities of the power to regulate the allocation of corrnnunal property - has thus dr iven us to depart from orthodox theories "native" lands . In the case of Zambia, the British forbade any of rural change . We have moved instead to an approach in wh ich key registering of individual titles of land ownership and created tribal rural institutions - in this case, property law - are interpreted as right s in land , with land allocation becoming the respons ibility of the polit ical outcomes. In the case at hand , the adoption of common chiefs. As Gluckman states , "the government pol icy wa s virtually the property represents an effort to augment the power of the promotion of tribal ism: 'tr ibalism' [is] a who le system of political administrat ive agents of the state, and thereby secure its more certain and domestic relations . Government po licy has supported the chiefs

domination of an agrarian population . • •• [M]ember ship of the tribe and al legiance to the chief give a man 34 35

a right in land•••• land is held in [this] system through to exercise uninhibited control over their property. In Uganda, by

subor dinate political gr oups, and ultimately through a place in kinship contrast, the rural elite was not commer cial ized; land was not 56 relations.11 exploited to secure pecuniary profits from agriculture. Rather, the

Wher e there was a need to cr eate rural power, then, the elite was almost purely political and consisted of the chiefs and their

colonial state promoted the cr eation of communal property right s as administrators. In securing allies within the rural sector, then, the part of it s effort to elaborate system s of rural political control over imperialists had, perforce, to accommodate to this structur e of power.

an agrarian population. Where the colonial authority possessed The result was yet another form of property settlement : the virtual

decisive power and was not reliant up on the creation of rural elites, "J unker izat ion" of landed relations. In return for their collabor ation then of course the situation was different. In essence, the situation with the British occupying powers, the chiefs were given freehold

was no longer purely political; commer cial considerations coul d be rights on the best lands in Uganda and the peasants virtually rendered

decisive. Where a labor for ce was needed, for example, the agrarian serfs. Cash crop production was then begun with the chiefs reaping

society could be "p roletarianized", as in some regions of Sout hern vast econom ic benefits through the appropriation of labor dues and

Africa. Or, where food crop s or export crop s were needed, the rural other "feudal" services. 57 population could be left in place as a free peasantry and agrarian It is wrong, then, to argue that African indigenous societies

society left to run as a collection of small holder, working virtually em bodied collective property right s and that it was the influence of

within a regime of private property. the West that led to the formation of private rights in land. In some

In other regions, however, rural elites did exist; and the ca ses, rather, the agents of the West sought to create communal right s

outcome of the bar gaining between the colonial power and the indigenous and members of the indigenous community struggled for legal recognition agrarian society reflected their composition and preferences. In some of pr ivate property. In any case, the form of property law adopted was

cases, such as in Ghana, indigenous commer cial elites profited from the shaped by the desire of the colonial state for political domination of

use of land. Export s of rubber, timber , and palm oil had long an agrarian population and by the nature of the political

flourished in the territory, and the political leaders were themselves accommodations it had to make in or der to secure it s hegemony.

deeply involved in commer ce and trade. In secur ing the term s of the Without attempting to overstate the case, it may be useful to political settlement by which to govern the territory, then, the note that in other places and in other eras rural land law was recast

colonial power ha d perforce to concede the right s of these rural elites as part of a political strategy of empowering sub-elites in an effort 36 37

to build structures of political dominat ion. I refer to Marx and government's tax base.

Engels' discussion of the emergence of feudalism among the Franks. As copper prices rose, both the government and the mining

Their analysis is political, not economist; it places at it s center the companies prospered. As copper prices fell, both suffered. But the

attempt s by the crown to organize capabilities for warfare and it s costs imposed by lower prices were borne uneq ually; for while both the

efforts to secure a reliable network of subordinates and allies. As government and the firms experienced decreasing revenues, the efforts

Engels clearly argues in his work , the technique adopted by the crown of the firm s to lower their costs in the face of declining revenues

was one of rural emp owerment : the divestiture to political allies of imposed increased costs upon the government.

control over land right s and the creation thereby of subordinates with The mines were capitalist enterprises. In the face of lower the capacity to dominate and govern an agrarian population and to product prices, they maximized their profits (or, equivalently, SS extract needed resources from them. minimized their losses) by curtailing their use of the variable factor

Finances: States are thus driven by the need for dom ination of production: labor. While it was cost minimizing on the part of and they develop land right s in efforts to create rural centers of companies to release labor at times of lower prices, unemployed labor power. Their behavior is also influenced by the need for finances. threatened to add to the cost s of government. These costs could take

The African materials clearly show the significance of financial the form of the state provision of food and shelter; or they could take

imperatives in shap ing government s' policies toward rural property ; and the form of higher costs of police protection in the face of threat s they do so once again in a way that casts suspicion on any belief in posed by masses of unemployed. While both the government and the the unilinear development of agrarian inst itut ions - in particular, mining companies derived their revenues from mining, then, the

land rights - in the face of cap italism. One of the best illustrations government's need for revenues increased just when these revenues

of the influence of fiscal considerations comes from Zambia. became most scarce.

As is well known, Zambia depends on the production of copper. This fiscal dilemma was, in a sense, created by cap italism.

First located early in the twent ieth century , the copper deposits of The state did not own the means of production; these were in private

Zambia gave birth to one of the world's leading copper industries; by hands and production de cisions were made solely with a view to their

1930, the mine s of Zambia employed 30,000 people. By far the largest private, as oppo sed to social, con sequences. Moreover, the state's industry in this small territory, and by a vast measure the mo st revenues were subject to cyclical shocks originating from the profitable, the copper industry constituted the major element in the capitalist economies. As stated by it s Chief Secretary at the time of 38 39

62 the most cataclysm ic of such shocks - the depression of the 1930s - the rural governmen ts into the ur ban areas. An d the government

dilemma was clear : facilitated as well the maintenan ce of social ties with rural kin by

restricting the length of ur ban labor con tracts and by helping to pay 63 The wealth of the country is in the minerals which it does not own the costs of tran sport back to the rural ar eas. In these and other

••• an d direct revenue from this source is at presen t ways, the state sought to retard the "detribal ization" of the African

negligible•••• The fact •••that the companies are not labor force.

earning taxable profits does not diminish the services which the The reasons for this behavior were clear : at times of fiscal 59 Government is compelled to supply to the mining areas. stress, the governmen t wanted to be able to avoid the costs of large­ 64 scale un employment. It wanted the disbanded urban labor force to be

In fact, as we have seen, the result was likely to be the opposite; at able to quickly an d peacefully rein corporate itself into the rural

times of shortfalls in revenues, the deman d for services in creased. In economy. The costs of guaranteeing subsistence were thus to be borne

the fact of this dilemma, the state advocated an ironic solution : the by the rural community.

development of communal form s of rights to landed property. In a society whose econom ic fortunes were now tied to the most

The government cr eated a characteristic form of citizenship : fluctuatin g of capitalist en terprises, the copper industry, the

one in which rights were constrained not on ly by national mem ber ship government sought to insure that the risks to subsistence were borne by

but also by member ship in a subnationality, a "tribe." An d it made the rural community. An d it did so by promoting communal entitlements

access to land a function of social and political affiliation. Lan d to rights in land. The or igins of communal land rights thus lay at

could be acquired in a rural community by affiliating with its least as much in cap italism an d in the fiscal problems it created for political officials and by establishing membership in a kin group which the state as they did in the inherent cultural properties of the rural 60 belonged to that political community. To retain rural land right s, population . 65 61 then, urban dw ellers had to remain "tr ibal ized. 11 The government promoted both political an d familial form s of affiliation. Urban Another Institution : The Village authorities issued documents establishing the tr ibal political Thus far I have emp loyed the African data to criticise several affiliation of the urban labor force; for some purposes, such as the major components of the curren tly or thodox theories of agrarian change: trying of court cases, they also extended the political authority of their statement of in itial conditions, their specification of 40 41

characteristic trajectories of change, and their analysis of one key determined that the region's rural population properly belonged in agrarian institut ion : that of pr operty rights. villages. As noted by Kay , "throughout the who le of north-eastern

The African experience provokes a skeptical reappraisal of Zambia ruthless regrouping for administrative convenience was

68 arguments pertaining to a second major rural inst itut ion : the vil lage . systematically carried out.11 And as Kay quo tes from the B.S.A.C.'s

As noted above, the fate of this institution is central to both own records, "many •••res isted and were sent to prison before the

69 theories. The prevalence of village dwelling is taken to illustrate order was finally obeyed. 11 In this area , then, village-dwelling was the importance of values other than tho se stressed by capitalist not the form of residence preferred by rural Africans . Ra ther, it was societies: social affiliation, status, and commun ity membership, for the administrators who sought to form villages. That the proponents of example. Vil lage institutions are held to prevent exploitation and to villagization were the agents of one of the mo st dedicated embod ime nts provide a pre-capitalist defense against the market's threat to of capitalism adds a disquieting note to our reappraisal of the

70 subsistence. Moreover , they are held to promo te equality. So central orthodox position . are villages to the orthodox conception of agrarian change that the Even today it would appear that states prefer village dwe lling fate of rural societies are often portrayed in terms of the patterns of to a greater degree than do rural people . A no table case in point is

66 change exhibited by village commun ities. Tanzania. It was not the need to collect taxes that led to

The African ma terial casts doubt upon these arguments. In villagization in Tanzania. Nor was it the need to affirm law and order

Africa , village dwelling simply was often not the basic form of rural among a recently conquered and therefore restless popu lation. Rather , settlement . Where rural preferences could be acted upon, persons often the desire on the pa rt of state officials to provide public services preferred to live in isolated homesteads . Where village were formed , and thereby "transform" Tanzania's rural society appears to have led to it was often at the behest of states . Moreover, many of these states a conviction that the tendency toward dispersed settlement mu st be

67 were profoundly capitalist . overborn and the people concentrated into villages . In the name of

With the establishment of the "Pax Britannica" in north-eastern "development , 11 the government of Tanzania sought to group rural

Zambia , for example, most societies were characterized by residence in dwe llers into groups large enough that the government could provide family homesteads . In the late nineteenth century, however , the dispensaries , clinics, schools, water supplies , agricultural inputs,

British South African Company [B.S.A.C.] -- the creation of that mo st marketing facilities, and other service s, and so secure an unleashing

71 dedicated proponent of capitalist expansion, Cecil John Rhodes -- of the productive forces of Tanzania's agrarian society . It is 42 43

notable that the state legitima ted its reconstruction of rural society Moreover, vil lages were sometimes created to fac ilitate the by propounding a theory of African agrarian history in which extraction of manpower and taxes. This cons ideration is perhaps best

72 ''colonialism [had)'encouraged individualistic social attitudes," illustrated in Russia, where the fiscal needs of the central whereas prior to colonialism, Africans had lived cooperatively in administration, linked with its lack of administrative capabil ities , socially integrated, mutually supportive, "village coUDilunities." made the establishment of collective liability a useful means of

Tanzanian scholars have not hesitated to criticize the validity of collecting taxes. Rural jurisdictions were assigned ''fiscal quotas"

73 these claims . and held collective ly liable for them ; it wa s left up to these

In evaluating the presumpt ion of village-liv ing as the na tural jurisdictions to organize their own collection procedures. A common form of agrarian settlement , then, the African literature encourages us response was the forma tion of corporate institutions wh ich assumed the toward caution. In some areas, vil lages appear not to have been the collective liability and attached communal rights to key resources, preferred mode of habitation. In other cases, where they were such as land, as a means of facilitating the extraction of resources. preferred, they were preferred by states . As in the case of Tanzania, The extreme form of this response was the formation of the some of these states were socialist ; as in the case of the late British repartitional CODDilune.

South Africa Company , however, some were rampantly capitalist. As discussed by Blum , "the land-equalizing commune was not of

75 We can look outside Africa and to other cases. Important among anc ient origin." Rather, it appears to have arisen in response to the se is pre-industrial Europe . There , once again, we find a large the need for paying of the so le tax, first introduced in the eighteenth variety of "anc ient " forms of settlement ; the village simp ly was not a century. As Blum indicates : preferred mode of settlement . Moreover, when settlement took the form of vil lage dwe lling , "the exercise or ma intenance of author ity over fiscal cons iderations played a large part in its introduct ion and land and peasant seems often to have been important in the creation of spread . The state wanted to make sure that the ind iv idual peasant

74 compact settlement ." People were grouped the more easily to be had enough land to meet the obligations it demanded of him. The administered. The need for domination thus provides one reason for the peasant , for his part , was equally interested in get ting enough concentration of population. land to pay his taxes and obrok and support his family. In

addition, • those in high places perhaps feared tha t the

di scontent of those •••peasants who had little or no land, if 44 45

76 allowed to go unappeased, might break out into violence. proprie tor •••furnish [ed] each tiaglo with that amount of land

that would prov ide each of them with equal quant ities of

79 The result was the creation of the repartitional commune . It is worth produce. quot ing Blum at greater length on this ma tter :

In the instance of the repartitional commune , then, village

The serf owners , saddled with the respons ibility for collecting dwelling and common rights over property are joine d. According to the

the tax, realized that it wa s in their own interest to see to it reigning orthodoxies , these are two of the key institutions

that each of their peasants had the economic capacity to pay the characteristic of pre-capitalist soc ieties . But here we find that

levy. rather than being expressive of cultural preference, they are

The method many proprietors adopted to reach the goal was institutional responses to the imperat ives of po litical domination and

the use of a new kind of assessment unit that bore an old name , resource extraction. They are contrivances elaborated to solve the

80 the tiaglo ••••it meant the peasant labor unit, •••and the problem of political control and taxation in agrarian societies .

77 obligation the unit had to pay its seignior . Informed by the skepticism engendered thus far , one may take

* * * one further step : a re-reading of the literature on corporated

Each tiaglo normally had to pay the same amount of dues villages. The locus classicus is Wolf's 1957 article in which he

81 and services. But the number of assessment units var ied from one analyzes the corporate communities of Mesoamerica and Java . In this

homestead to another according to the number of workers in the article we do in fac t find cu ltural accounts of corporate villages :

homestead, or its overall potential . Thus, the total sum of the creation of ritual centers, little traditions , redistribut ive

obligations each homestead paid varied. In this way the amount communes and festivals , and so forth. We also find stress on

the serfowner demanded of each peasant family was adjusted to its characteristic values : equality, community , and the preservation of

capacity to pay.78 communal rights in land . But what we also find is that these

* * * communities were created as acts of political domination ; as Wolf

This in turn led to the equalization and redistribution of states, '�istorically, the closed corporate conf igurat ion in

82 holdings. Since each tiaglo had the same amount to pay , and since Mesoamerica is a creature of the Spanish Conquest11 and "In Java,

it usually derived all or mo st of its income from the land , the similarly, corporate peasant commun ity did not take shape unt il after 46 47

the coming of the Dutch, when for the first time the village as a A Behavioral Characteristic : The Preference for Subsistence territorial unit became a moral organism with its own government and Initial condit ions , institut ional traits, and characteristic

83 its own land at the disposal of its inhabitants.11 patterns of transition : these three elements help to define the

In the subsequent literature, as we have indicated, it is the orthodox models of agrarian society. So too does a fourth element : culture of the corporate village that gets discussed ; indeed, the the psychological tr aits of rural dwe llers . None of these traits is cultural correlates of village settlement are promoted into causes, and more central to the convent ional models than the preference for the corporate vil lage is treated as an embodiment and defender of pre­ subsistence production. capitalist values. Yet, in Wolf's original treatment of this In the natural economy model, the preference for subs istence institution, we can see that it was impo sed by the state. A further stands as a corol lary to the model's initial conditions : the lack of reading of Wolf indicates the reasons for this imposition. One was to markets and thus the absence of exchange. And it prov ides a extract resources - corvee labor and taxes - from the rural populat ion motivational underpinning to the characteristic response to the

84 while "avoiding the huge costs of direct administration. 11 The penetration of market forces: the initial resistance to communities were assigned collective liability for the supply of these commoditization and to "buying and selling." In the model of the resources ; by being given communal rights over land , they were also peasant economy , peasants are he ld to participate in markets by given the resources by which to compel and to facilitate such levies. necessity, not preference ; they do so ma inly because it is the only way

Another reason was the state's fear of landlessnes s; the administration to secure subs istence . Indeed, the preference for subs istence mode s of sought to protect itself against the burden of a landless population living stands as a "pre-capitalist" artifact - one that he lps to and created communal rights to land to prevent the seizure of land by account for the tens ion between the peasantry and other classes in the wealthy interests. Corporate villages provide a low cost means of transition to capitalism. increasing the revenues extracted from rural commun ities while It is Hyden who perhaps best captures the flavor of these obviating as well the costs to the fisc wh ich can be impo sed by a arguments : landless peasantry.

The argument is • • • that • • • where the peasant mode is very

much alive , there is an economy other than the market economy.

Mo reover , this economy of affection is being maintained and 48 49

defended against the intrusions of the market economy , The behavior, then, is in fact endogenous to the configura tion of

resistance of the African peasant economies to capitalism • is capitalist forces as present ly structured in the developing areas.

85 still a phenomenon not to be ignored . The most direct il lustration of these arguments can be taken

from the export markets of Africa . Many export crops are "cash crops ,"

With respect to Africa, Hyden concludes : pure and simple; they have no direct use in consumption and are grown

purely for the market. Recent ly the volume of agr icultural exports

So common is this situation •••that it is not an exaggeration from Africa ha s de clined, crea t ing shortages of for eign exchange ; this

to claim tha t the principal structural constraint to development decline has been taken by Hyden and other s as ev idence of the

are the barriers raised • by the peasant mode of production disruptive power of a pre-capitalist peasantry. But , I would argue , it

• [Policy makers mu st] get the peasant involved in the cash should be viewed in a different light .

nexus ••••In order to appropriate the surplus product from the In Africa, over 80 percent of the population and over 50

peasant more effectively there is no other way ava ilable but to percent of the gross domestic product commonly reside in agr iculture.

raise peasant productivity and make him produce more that for his The governments are therefore reliant on the industry for financ ial

86 own domestic needs . resources. One way in wh ich governments tax agriculture is by

regulating the marke t for export crops . In many ca ses , the government

Hyden and others thus posit the existence of a pre-capitalist is the sole legal buyer of these crops . It pur chases them at an agrarian society characterized by a preference for subsistence which in administrative ly set price in the domestic ma rket and sells them at turn frustrates the growth of capitalism. The correct argument , I pr ices prevailing in the wor ld market, The go�ernment accumulates would argue, in fact runs in the opposite direction . On the ba sis of revenue generated by the difference be tween the domestic and world

African materials , I would argue that the operat ion of market forces market pr ices. Table 1 presents the ratio of the dome stic and wor ld induces subsistence production on the part of peasants ; that a key prices, adjusted for the co sts of transport, ma rket ing and processing. reason for this is that the state is employed to control the market to In most cases, it suggests, producers of cash crops are heav ily taxed . expropr iate resources from rural populations ; and that in the face of such adverse market conditions , peasants are of course reluctant to

"buy and to sell." What is taken as a "pre-capitalist" form of 50 51

Table 1: Nominal Protection Coefficients for Selected Export Crops One implication of government fiscal policy is that the returns

Crop 1971-75 197 6-80 to participating in the market place are lowered for many farmers. In

Cocoa any ca se, they certainly are lowered by comparison with the returns to

Cameroon .37 .45 producing crops which can be consumed on the farm or so ld outside of

Ghana .47 .40 official marketing channels. This phenomenon is illustrated in table

Ivory Coast .56 .38 2, which compares the net return of five major export crops in Uganda

Togo .so .25 (cott on, robusta coffee, tea, cocoa, and tobacco) with the net return

Coffee to five commodities for which government control s did not exist (maize,

Cameroon (Arabica ) .72 .60 millet , beans, groundnuts, and plantains).

Cameroon (Robusta) .36 The government' s use of market controls to levy resources from

Ivory Coast .68 .36 agriculture thus lowers the returns to farmers from production for the

Kenya .94 market , both in absolute and relative terms. This in and of it self

Tanzania .so .59 would account for the peasant's turning away from cash crop production•

Togo .42 • 23 But the analysis can run even deeper. For the manipulation of

Cotton agricultural market s, I would argue, not only reduces the returns to

Cameroon • 79 farming but also places farmers under the economic and political

Ivory Coast .79 1.05 control of persons with political influence.

Kenya 1.07

Malawi .68 • 75

Mali .55 .44

Senegal .65

Sudan • 78 .60

Togo .62 .7 9

Upper Volta • 79

Source : IBRD, Ac celerated Development in Sub-Saharan Africa: An Agenda for Act ion , Washington D.C. : IBRD, 1981 , p.56. 52 53

The best way to illustrate these argument s is to return to the

market for export crops. Governm ents are not only interested in a Table 2: Comparative Net Returns of Major Crops in 1975 and 1977/78 securing public revenues from this market; they are also interested in (Shilling s per kilogram , estimate) securing foreign exchange. Tow ard this end they overvalue their

currencies (see table 3). The effect of overvaluation is 197 5 1977/78 straigh tforw ard. By maintaining an artificially strong currency, 1. Seed Cotton -1.37 -3.40 government s lower the perceived price of foreign products. The policy 2. Robusta Coffee -0 .38 +0 .74 is therefore popular with industrialists, who seek cheap imports of 3. Tea (green leaf) -0 .16 -0 .31 plant and capital equipment ; elites, who seek more cheaply to fulfill 4. Cocoa -0 .25 -0.10 their tastes for im ported product s; and governm ent s them selves, who are 5. Fire-cured Tobacco ..... -12.20 starved for foreign currencies with which to purchase vehicles, off ice 6. Maize +0 .68 +2 .07 equipm ent, capital goods and other form s of imports. 7. Finger Millet +l .36 +5 .08 But the price of a policy of overvaluation is the lowering (in 8. Beans +1 .90 +5 .OS term s of dom estic currency) of the earnings generated in foreign 9. Groundnuts . . ... +5.64 markets by export s. Foreign dollars convert into fewer units of 10. Plantains +1 .03 +l .90 dom estic currency, for the value of the dom estic currency has been

set at an artificially high level. The se effect s are summarized in a. Net returns eq uals average price less average costs. diagram 1.

p * Source : Ministry of Agr icul ture & Forestry, '�ricing Policy & p Agricultural Production: Discussion Paper," (Entebbe : Ministry of s Agriculture & Forestry , August 1978) . lf,Oj$ Po = Diagram 1: Overvaluation

pl = 1/,1/ $ D

Fo re ign Currency Qs Q so= Q 1 Qllo D 1 54 55

The horizontal axi s indicates the quantity of foreign goods, here

indexed in terms of dollars ($), demanded or supplied; the vertical

axis represents their price in terms of domestic currency, here called Table 3: Estimat es of the Ov ervaluation of African Currencies, 1979 cedis (¢). The supply curve is the marginal cost curve of the export Cameroons 1.00 industry; it shows the amount of exports (or dollars) which will be Ghana 3.00 supplied for any given valuation of the local currency. The demand Ivory Coast 1.10 curve represents the demand for imports (or foreign dollars), given Kenya 1.40 their perceived price in terms of cedis. Ov ervaluing the cedi (from ¢0 Malawi 1.05 to t1) lowers the cedi price of the dollar (from P0 to P1). The result Mali 1.10 is to cheapen import s. But the correlative effect is to weaken the Nigeria 1.40 incentives to export , so that the supply of export s declines from QS Senegal 1.40 0 to Qs • Sudan 1.30 1 The withdrawal from cash crop markets is thus an expected Tanzania 1.50 result of the efforts by states to manipulate prices in market s - in Togo 1.10 this ca se, currency markets - so as to secure public resource s for the Upper Volta 1.10 fisc. But also important is that overvaluat ion places farmers in a Zambia 1.50 position of economic and political bondage.

To gain insight into this effect, we may return to Diagram 1.

At the overvalued price of the domestic currency (P1), the quantity of Source : Doris J. Jansen, "Agricultural Pricing Policy in Sub-Saharan Africa in the 1970s," December, 1980 , and Franz Pick, Pick's Currency foreign exchange demanded (QD ) is greater than the quantity supplied Yearbook, 1976-1977 , (New York : Pick Publishing Corporat ion , 1978) . 1

(QS ); there is thus an excess demand for foreign exchange at the 1 official price for it (i.e. at the official exchange rate). One result

of this induced scarcity is to drive up the market value of foreign

exchange; those who can get it can sel l it at a price that lies

significantly above the official price. As can be seen in diagram 1, 56 57

with Qs supplied at the official exchange rate, the market clearing allocate them. The losers in this system are those who are not located 1 * in positions of access to this scarce resource and who nonetheless must pr ice would in fact be p (i.e., where demand equals supply). Another purchase imported goods. result is that at the official exchange rate demand can only equal Typically there are no peasant farm ers in the Central Bank or supply through rationing; fixing the pr ice at P1 maint ains a condition on the comm ittee that allocates foreign exchange or import licenses. of excess demand (QD > Q5 ) and those in control of allocating foreign 1 1 Yet the farmer s rely on imports. Hoes, cutlasses, sprayers,

exchange can chose those who will - and who will not - get a chance to pesticides, ox ploughs and im plements, sack and bags, mil ling machines,

im port foreign goods. and so forth : these farm im plem ent s are often imported. Moreover,

The consequences are obvious. Those in charge of the foreign shirt s, shoes, bl anket s, soap, batteries, etc. : these consum er goods

exchange "m arket " stand to reap enormous rewards from it. If they can are often imported or are manufactured with imported equipm ent. But * secur e foreign exchange at pr ice P1 , they can resell it at p ; given the scarcity of foreign exchange, the value of import s is * alternatively, if they can import foreign goods at the art ificially extrem ely high (p in diagram 1) these import s will only be pr ovided if

lowered price of P1 , they can resell them at the market clearing pr ice they can command at least that value. The consequence is that the * of p . Moreover, the beneficiaries of this system are those in farmer s must pay a prem ium to those who have sufficient political power political control. For with fixe d pr ices in the first instance, this to secure pr ivileged access to foreign exchange or to the im port s it

"market " is in fact not a market at all; the initial allocation of can buy.

scarce resources takes place through adm inistrative and political Overvaluat ion thus weakens the incentives to operate in

channels, and only in the second instance - when the benefit s of the markets. It lowers the price of export s, increases cost s of farm ing

scarcity are reaped in black markets - through the establishment of and raises consumer pr ices for farmers. And it does so while involving

competitive pr ices. the farmers in a system of regulated foreign exchange markets: one in

In this system , the beneficiaries are those in the Central Bank which they are subject to po litical and econom ic dom inat ion by persons

or those who make appointments to it. They are those who sit on the with influence in the nat ional capital.

foreign exchange allocation committees and the com mittees which Conventional orthodoxies define the peasantry in term s of allocate im port licenses, or those who make the appointment s to these political subor dination and a pr eference for subsistence. In dynam ic

comm ittees. They are those who receive im port licenses, or who term s the peasantry is define d in term s of their reversion to 58 59

subsistence ; this is seen as a pre-capitalist resistance to the spread of my knowledge of rural Africa. These approaches require for their of the market economy . My argument is that these characteristics can truth initial conditions which historically have rarely existed. They better be explained in terms of a model of revenue extraction. are overly subjectivist, attributing institutions to preferences under

The preference for subs istence need not be attributed to pre­ circumstances in which these inst itutions have clearly been imposed. capitalist values ; rather, it is a preference that any person, and And they are over ly economist, in that they place too strong an especia lly any capitalist, would express under highly disadvantageous emphasis on the impact of the market on agrarian societies and too market conditions . The powerlessness of peasants need not be little on the impact of states. Time and again throughout this essay, introduced as a separate defining trait ; along with the preference for an approach has proved fruitful that relates the characteristics of subsistence, it can be accounted for as the joint consequence of the rural societies to the requirements of the state. Wha t is called for, way in which markets have been manipulated to extract resources from then, is an approach to the explanation of rural institut ions that is agriculture . Nor need the withdrawal to subsistence be seen as state centered -- one tha t looks at the effect upon rural society of exogenously determined, e.g. as a result of pre-capita list forces ; the demand for power and resources on the part of states under rather it should be seen as endogenous - a form of behavior totally conditions in which people and wealth are concentrated in agriculture. accountable in terms of the systems of relations that define the contemporary political economy of third world agrarian populations .

Political powerlessness, a preference for subsistence , and tendency to withdraw from markets and to keep them at arm' s length : these characteristics are used to define peasants, They appear , however, to be integral features of a process whereby states employ marke ts to extract resources from agriculture. In this sense , states

87 can be said to create peasants.

CONCLUSION

In this paper I have attempted to summarize two of the dominant mo dels of agrarian change . And I have sought to critique them in light 60 61

4. George Dalton, ed. Tr ibal and Peasant Economies (Garden City, New

York: Natural History Press, 1967); Eric R. Wolf, Peasant Wars of

the Tw entieth Century (New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1969) ; Joel S. NOTES Migdal, Peasants, Politics and Revolut ion (Princeton: Princeton

University Pre ss, 1974); James C. Scott, The Moral Economy of the 1. By capitalism is meant an economic system in which there exist s (1) Peasant (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1976); Samuel market exchange of both produ ct s and factors of production; (2) in L. Popkin, The Rat ional Peasant (Berkeley and Lo s Angeles : particular, private markets for labor; and (3) economic University of California Press, 1979) , accumulation, thu s securing the reproduction and expansion of the

means of produ ct ion. 5. George Dalton, '�raditional Production in Primitive African

Economies" in Tr ibal and Peasant Economics, ed. George Da lton 2. See, for example, Karl Polanyi, The Great Transformat ion (Boston: (Garden City, New York: Natural History Pr ess, 1967), p. 75. Beacon Press, 1957) and Karl Marx and Fr eder ik Engels, Pre­

Capitalist Socio-Economic Format ions: A Collection (London: 6. George Dalton, "Sub sistence and Peasant Econom ies in Africa," in Lawrence and Wishart , 1979). Ib id, p. 157.

3. Ferdinand Tonnies, Community and Society (New Yor k: Harper 7. Kar l Marx, 11Precapitalist Economic Formations," in Karl Marx and Torchbooks , 1963) and Henry Maine, Ancient Law (London: Lardon J. Fr ederick Engels, Pre-Capitalist Socio-Economic Format ions, p. 97 . Murray, 1961).

8. Ib id, p. 98.

9. Ib id, p. 106.

10. James c. Scott, "Protest and Pr ofanati on: Agrarian Revolt and the

Little Tradition, " Theory and Society 40977), p. 213. 62 63

11. Eric Wolf, "Closed Corporate Peasant Communities in Mesoamerica 21 . Goran Hyden, Efficiency vs Distribut ion in East African Co­

and Central Java, " Southwestern Journal of Anthropo logy 13(195 7), operatives (Nairobi : East African Literature Bureau , 1973), p. 4.

p. 6.

22. See the discussions in William Derman , Serfs , Peasants and

12. A pr ime illustration would be Joel S. Migdal, Peasants, Politics, Socialists (Berkeley and Los Ange les : University of Cal ifornia

and Revolutions. Press, 1973); Dean E. McHenry , Tanzania's Ujanea Villages

(Berkeley : Institute of Internat ional Studies, University of

13. Dalton, quo ting Raymond Firth in "Subs istence and Peasant California , 1979) ; S. A. Qu ick, "Bureaucracy and Rural Soc ialism in

Economics," p. 159. Zambia ," Journa l of Modern African Studies 15097 7): 379-400 ; and

Donal Cruise O'Brien, The Mourides of Senegal (Oxford : Clarendon

14. Scott , The Moral Economy of the Peasant , p. 5. Press, 1971).

15. Robert Redfield, Peasant Society and Culture (Chicago : University 23 . As quoted by L. A. Fa llers in "Are African Cul tivators to be Cal led

of Chicago Press, 1956), p. 46 . 'Peasants'?" in Economic Deve lopment and Soc ial Change , ed . George

Dalton (Garden City : The Na tural History Press, 1971 ), p.170.

16. Wolf, Peasant Wars, p.279.

24 . Redf ield, Peasant Soc iety and Culture .

17. Ibid, p.280.

25 . Teodor Shanin, "Introduction, " in Peasants and Peasant Society, ed .

18. Ibid, p.282 . Teodor Shan in ( Harmondsworth : Pengu in Books , 1971 ), p. 150.

19. Scott , "Protest and Profanation," p.231 . 26 . Claude We lch, "Peasants as a Focus in African Studies ," African

Studies Review 20(1977), p.5.

20, Ibid. 64 65

27. Eric R. Wolf, ''Types of La tin American Peasantry : A Preliminary 34. Goran Hyden, Beyond Ujamaa in Tanzania (Berkeley and Los Angeles:

Discussion," American Anthropologist 57(1955), p. 454. University of Cal ifornia Press, 1980), p. 31.

28. Fallers, "Are African Cultivators •••, " p. 171. 35, Gavin William s, "The World Bank and the Peasant Problem," in .fu!lll

Development in Tropical Africa, ed. Judith Heyer, Pepe Roberts, and

29. A. V. Chayanov, The Theory of Peasant Economy, ed. Daniel Thorner, Gavin Williams (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1981), p. 31.

Basile Kerblay, and R. E. F. Smith (Homewood, Illinois: Richard D.

Irwin for the American Economic Association, 1966) . 36 . Migdal, Peasants, Politics, and Reyolution ; Wolf, Peasant Wars.

30. Wolf, Peasant Wars, p. xiv. 37. Jack Goody, "Economy and Feudalism in Africa," The Economic History

Review 23(December 1969) , pp. 394-395 .

31. Quotation from Guy Routh, "Mores and Motivations of Peasant and

Proletarian Households in Tanzania," (University of East Africa 38. Ibid, p. 395 .

Social Science Conference, Dar es Salaam, December 1970) by Goran

Hyden, ''The Resilience of the Peasant Mode of Production: The Case 39. Polly Hill, Studies in Rural Capitalism in West Africa (Cambridge :

of Tanzania," in Agricultural Development in Africa: Issues of Cambridge University Press, 1970) and Sara Berry, Cocoa, Custom and

Public Policy ed. Robert H. Bates and Michael F. Lofchie (New York: Socio-economic Change in Rural Western Nigeria (Oxford: Oxford

Praeger, 1980), pp. 224-225. University Press, 1975).

32. Ken Post, "Peasantization and Rural Political Movements in Western 40. Jan S. Hogendorn, "Econom ic Initiative and African Cash Farming,"

Africa ," Archives Eurofieenes de Sociologie 13(1972), pp. 226-227 . pp. 283-328 in Colonialism in Africa, 1870 - 1960, ed. Peter

Duignan and L. H. Gann (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,

33 . Ibid, p. 233 , 197 5). 66 67

41. Cruise O'Brien, The Mourides of Senegal and G. K. Helleiner Peasant 48. Quoted in M, P. K. Sorrenson, Land Reform in Kikuyu Country

Agriculture. Government, and Economic Growth in Nigeria (Homewood, (Nairobi : Oxford University Press, 1967), p.66,

Ill. : Richard D. Irwin, 1966).

49 . Ibid, p. 20 - 21 .

42. Giovanni Arrighi, ·�abor Suppl ies in Historical Perspective : A

11 Study of Proletarianization of the African Peasantry in Rhode sia, SO. Sorrenson, Land Reform, p.58.

in Giovanni Arrighi and John S. Saul, Essays on the Political

Economy of Africa (Nairobi : East African Publishing House, 1973), 51. See, for example, Lord Hailey, An African Suryey: Revised, 1956

p. 185. (London: Oxford University Press, 1957); Frederick D. Lugard, �

Dual Mandate in British Tropical Africa (London: F. Cass, 1965);

43 . Ibid. and Margery Freda Perham, Natiye Administration in Nigeria (London:

Oxford University Press, 1937).

44. See also the cases de scribed in Robin Palmer and Neil Parsons, eds.

The Roots of Rural Poyerty in Central and Southern Africa (Berkeley 52. C. K. Meek, Land Law and Custom in the Colonies (London: Oxford

and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1977). University Press, 1949) , p. 10.

45. Beverly Grier, "Underdevelopment, Modes of Production, and the 53. Ibid, p. 193.

11 State in Colonial Ghana, The African Studies Review 24 (1981), p.

35. 54. Ibid.

46 . Ibid, p. 33 , 55. Robert L. Tignor, "Colonial Chiefs in Chiefless Societies," Journal

of Modern African Studies 9(1971), p. 350. See also M. Clough,

47. Dav id Kimble, A Political History of Ghana (Oxford: Clavendon Chiefs and Politicians : Local Politics and Social Change in Kiambu,

Press , 1963), p. 345. Kenya , 1918 - 1936 , PhD Di ssertation, Stanford University, 1978. 68 69

56 . Max Gluckman, "Foreword" to W. Wa tson , Tr ibal Cohesion in a Money 59. L. H. Gann , A History of �orthern Rhodesia, (London : Chatto and

Economy (Manchester : Manchester Univers ity Press for the Rhodes­ Windus , 1964) , p. 253 .

Livingstone Institute, 1958), pp. x - xi.

60 . Watson , Tr iba l Cohesion ; also J. van Ve lsen, "Labour :!i::;ration as a

57 . West, Land Policy in Buganda . Positive Factor in the Cor:tinu ity of Tonga Tribal Society," in

Social Change in Modern Africa , ed. Aiden Southall (London : Oxford

58. Frederick Enge ls, "The Frankish Period" in Karl Marx and Frederick University Press , 1961).

Engels , Pre-Capitalist Socio-economic Formations . Histor ians would

no longer agree perhaps with the picture of "emerging feudalism" 61 . Excellent discussions are included in Elena L. Berger, Labour , Race

upon which Marx and Engels based their analysis . Wha t would be in and Colonia l Ru le : The Copperbelt from 1924 to Independence

doubt would be the Frankish crown's ability to control the (Oxford : Clarendon Press, 1974) and Charles Perrings , Black

splintering of po litical power . (g. See Marc Bloch, Feudal Mineworkers in Central Africa (Hew York : Africana Pu blishing

Society, trans . L. A. Manyon, London 1961 , chap . XXVII , esp. pp . Company 1979) .

361-8) But of med ieval awarene ss of the connection between land 62. The best discuss ion rema ins A. L. Eps tein, Politics in an Urban law and political domination there can be no doubt. Professor S. African Community (Manche ster : �'.anche ster University Press for the F. C. Milsom in The Legal Framework of Engl ish Feudalism Rhodes-Livingstone Institute , 1958) . demonstrates land law as essential in the process by which the

English crown at the he ight of its power increased its control at 63 . See Perrings, Black llineworkers . See also Helmuth Beisler, the expense of pr ivate courts, .!!!_ the pr ice of allowing the feudal Urbanization and the Government of Migrat ion (New York: St. magnates to ma intain and indeed increase their control over the Martin's Press, 1974). peasantry, by refusing ownership of peasant land to any but his

lord . (S. F. C. Milsom, The Legal Framework of English Feudalism,

Cambridge , 1976, esp. chap . 1 ('Disciplinary Jurisdiction', and 2

'Proprietary Ideas'.) I wish to thank Eleanor Searle for these

po ints and citations . 70 71

64 . Most obvious ly, these costs are the costs of providing subs istence between the state and private enterprises and in my conviction

and the costs of policing an unruly urban mob, Insofar as that the state was set upon solv ing its own fiscal problem by

unemp loyment is assoc iated with landlessness, however, a third cost controlling the formation of land laws . Privat e enterprises

is implied : the cost of administering an "unattached" population. naturally cared less about the problem than did the state ; and ,

People without property lack claims to resources mediated by a when they did care , they often had policy preferences at var iance

legal system, Propertylessness therefore implies freedom from with those of the state's administrators.

administration and , from the states' point of view, freedom from

control, People without property pose a threat to public 66. See, for example, Joel S. Migdal , Peasants, Politics and

administration. In Africa, therefore, the states clearly favored Revolut ions .

the retention of rights to land . This was apparently true as we ll

in �ngland . For Marx clearly argues that the "king and parl iament" 67 . The arguments in this sect ion echo those first advanced in Samuel

resisted enclosure, and did so for many of the reasons we have just L. Popkin, The Rat ional Peasant (Berke ley and Los Angeles :

discussed (Karl Marx, "The So-Called Primitive Accumulation," Part University of California Press , 1979) . In this , and other ma tters,

VIII, Capital (New York: Charles H. Kerr and Co., 1906) , pp . Popkin's work is bril liant ly prophetic .

789ff) ; as Marx states , "legislation was terrified at this

revolut ion" (Ibid., p. 790). 68. George Kay , Soc ia l Aspects of Village Regrouping in Zambia (Lusaka :

Institute for Soc ial Research, University of Zamb ia , 196 7), p. 11 .

65. For add itional arguments see Claude Meillassoux, Maidens, Meal and

Money : Capitalism and the Domestic Community (Cambridge : Cambr idge 69. Ibid, p. 10.

University Press , 1981); Harold Wolpe , "Cap italism and Cheap Labour 70 . Note also the Kenya case, where Sorrenson notes : "The Kikuyu did Power in South Africa," Economy and Society, 1, no . 4 (197 2): 425-

not live in vil lages , but in dispersed hou seholds . • Dur ing the 456 ; and Robin Palmer and Neil Parsons , eds., Roots of Rural Mau Mau Emergency the Kikuyu , the Embu and some of the Meru Poverty in Central and Southern Africa (Berkeley and Los Angeles :

population were concentrated in 732 villages •• " Sorrenson, Land University of California Press, 1978) . Where I differ from these Reform, p. 3. approache s is in my sens itivity to the divergence of interests 72 73

71. The best studies are Michaela Von Freyhold, Ujamaa Villages in 77. Ibid, P• 512 .

Tanzania (New York and London : Monthly Rev iew Press, 1979) ; Dean E.

McHenry, Jr ., Tanzania's Ujamaa Villages (Berkeley : Institute of 78. Ibid , p. 513 .

International Studies , 1979) ; and Goran Hyden, Beyond Ujamaa in

Tanzania (Berkeley and Los Angeles : University of California Press, 79. Ibid , p. 514.

1980).

80 . It is relevant to note that in several societies in Africa , states ,

72. Hyden, Beyond Ujamaa, p. 98. in order to secure repayment of agricultural investments, have made

village units collectively liable for debts ; defaults by any farmer

73. See , for example, Samuel S. Mu shi, "Modernization by in these vil lages is suffic ient to disqualify all farmers in that

Traditionalization : Ujamaa Principles Rev isited," Taamuli 1, no . 2 village for future loans . Moreover, in many parts of Africa,

(March 1971). agricultural goods , once harve sted by farmers , are automatically

the property of the state ; they cannot be bought and sold in the

74. C. T. Smith, A Historical Geography of Western Europe Before 1800 market. The reason is that the harvest stands as collateral . The

(London : Longmans , 196 7), p.261. See also J. G. Hurst, '�he state has defined property rights over the harvest in such a way as

Changing Medieval Village in England ," in Pathways to Medieval to facilitate the movement of capital into the rural areas. Once

Peasants, edited by J. A. Raftis , Papers in Medieval Studies 2 again, then, we find corporate institutions and collect ive rights

(Toronto : Pont ifical Institute of Medieval Studies , 1981), pp . 27- being created by states . That in these cases the states are

62. explicitly operat ing so as to promote the movement - and recovery -

of capital only adds to the force of our critique of the dominant

75. Jerome Blum , Lord and Peasant in Russia (Princeton : Princeton theor ies of the origins of agrarian inst itutions .

University Press , 1961), p. 510.

81 . Eric R. Wo lf, "Closed Corporate Peasant Communities in Mesoamer ica

76 . Ibid, p. 514. and Central Java ," Southwestern Journa l of Anthropo logy , 13095 7) :

1-18. 74

82 . Ibid, p. 7.

83 . Ibid , p. 8. Wolf is quot ing J. S. Furnivall, Netherlands India : A

Study of Plural Economy (Cambridge : Cambr idge University Press,

1939) .

84 . Wolf, "Closed Corporated Peasant Communities," p. 10.

85 . Hyden, Beyond Ujamaa, p. 19.

86 . Ibid , p. 31 .

86 . Coquery-Vidrovitch, in writing about pre-colonial African

societies, defined the African mode of production as one in

which states did not directly control producers (e.g. through

enserfment of slavery) but rather controlled and manipulated

trade to accumulate resources from them. Her analysis is at

least as applicable, in my view, to contemporary Africa as it

was to the pre-colonial period , and very like ly more so. See

Catherine Coquery-Vidrovitch, "Recherches sur un mo de de production

Africain," La Pensee 144( 196 9) : 61-78.