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The ideology of ‘communal’ land tenure in Zimbabwe: Mythogenesis enacted?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 December 2011

Angela Cheater
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Extract

Land is widely regarded as central to the politics of both colonial and postcolonial Zimbabwe. Land was, ostensibly, the core issue over which the liberation struggle was waged. On the successful redistribution of land, in Shamuyarira's (1984: 8) view, will depend ‘the future reputation and credibility of the new socio-economic and political order among the Zimbabwean masses’. Land, then, is ‘vital’ (ibid.) to both leaders and led in Zimbabwe.

Résumé

L'idéologie d'un système agraire ‘communal’ au Zimbabwe: mythogenèse en action?

Cet article analyse le modèle idéologique contemporain basé sur les ‘terres communales’ au Zimbabwe, en montrant comment et pourquoi il constitue une représentation peu vraisemblable des usages agraires pré-coloniaux; il poursuit l'étude en décrivant comment ce semblant de modèle a vu le jour au début de la période coloniale. Finalement, le rôle du modèle au sein de l'Etat moderne (colonial et post-colonial) est examiné, ainsi que l'élaboration des systèmes juridiques plus récents, postérieurs à l'indépendance, qui d'un côté renforcent le modèle mais d'un autre côté le contredisent, au fil du processus permanent qui vise à renforcer le contrôle juridique de l'Etat sur les terres.

Type
Politics of land, politics of meaning
Information
Africa , Volume 60 , Issue 2 , April 1990 , pp. 188 - 206
Copyright
Copyright © International African Institute 1990

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