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Some Conventional Orthodoxies in the Study of Agrarian Change
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 13 June 2011
Abstract
The paper presents a critical review of two major approaches to the analysis of agrarian societies in light of evidence taken from the scholarly literature on Africa. The first approach posits the existence of “natural” societies; the second, of “peasant” societies. The existence of such “precapitalist” societies is often invoked to account for patterns of change in contemporary rural societies. The author argues that these approaches are overly culturally and economically determined, and that they undervalue the importance of the state. Many of the so-called precapitalist features of these societies are themselves found to be products of the societies' encounter with agents of capitalism. Moreover, many result from the efforts of states to secure domination and control over rural populations.
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References
1 By capitalism I mean an economic system in which there exists: (1) market exchange of both products and factors of production; (2) in particular, private markets for labor; and (3) economic accumulation, thus securing the reproduction and expansion of the means of production.
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