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Survey Article Rural Poverty and Development Strategies in Latin America

01 Jan 2006-
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors examined the marginality, social exclusion, new rurality and rural livelihoods, as well as the ethnic and gender dimensions of poverty, and argued that the starting point for the eradication of poverty has to be the implementation of a development strategy that addresses such inequalities while at the same time achieving competitiveness within the global system.
Abstract: Several approaches to the study of poverty are discussed, to learn from their strengths as well as their weaknesses. For this purpose the concepts of marginality, social exclusion, new rurality and rural livelihoods, as well as the ethnic and gender dimensions of poverty, are examined. The debate on the peasantization (capitalization) or proletarianization (pauperization) of the peasantry sets the scene for the analysis of the different strategies adopted by peasants and rural labourers to secure their survival and perhaps achieve some prosperity. In examining the success or failure of interventions by governments, civil society and international organizations in the reduction of poverty, it is claimed that the State has a key role to perform. Furthermore, it is argued that poverty is caused and reproduced by the unequal distribution of resources and power at the household, local, national and international levels. Therefore, the starting point for the eradication of poverty has to be the implementation of a development strategy that addresses such inequalities while at the same time achieving competitiveness within the global system.
Citations
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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Land grabbing has gained momentum in Latin America and the Caribbean during the past decade The phenomenon has taken different forms and character as compared to processes that occur in other regions of the world, especially Africa as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: Land grabbing has gained momentum in Latin America and the Caribbean during the past decade The phenomenon has taken different forms and character as compared to processes that occur in other regions of the world, especially Africa It puts into question some of the assumptions in the emerging literature on land grabbing, suggesting these are too food-centered/too food crisis-centered, too land-centred, too centred on new global food regime players – China, South Korea, Gulf States and India – and too centred on Africa There are four key mechanisms through which land grabbing in Latin American and the Caribbean has been carried out: food security initiatives, energy/fuel security ventures, other climate change mitigation strategies, and recent demands for resources from newer hubs of global capital The hallmark of land grabbing in the region is its intra-regional character: the key investors are (Trans-)Latin American companies, often in alliance with international capital and the central state Initia

492 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors employ contemporary peasant mobilizing discourses and practices to evaluate the terms in which we understand agrarian movements today, through an exercise of historical specification, and they consider why the terms of the original Agrarian question no longer apply to agrarians change today, and why the shift in the terms corresponds to the movement from the late-nineteenth century and twentieth century, when states were the organizing principle of political economy, to the twenty-first century, where capital has become the organising principle.
Abstract: This essay employs contemporary peasant mobilizing discourses and practices to evaluate the terms in which we understand agrarian movements today, through an exercise of historical specification. First, it considers why the terms of the original agrarian question no longer apply to agrarian change today. The shift in the terms corresponds to the movement from the late-nineteenth century and twentieth century, when states were the organizing principle of political-economy, to the twenty-first century, when capital has become the organizing principle. Second, and related, agrarian mobilizations are viewed here as barometers of contemporary political-economic relations. In politicizing the socio-ecological crisis of neoliberalism, they problematize extant categories of political and sociological analysis, re-centring agriculture and food as key to democratic and sustainable relations of social production.

284 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, a collection of essays on key perspectives, frameworks and methodologies for agrarian transformation and development is presented, with a focus on the nature, scope, pace and direction of agrarians' transformations and development.
Abstract: Agrarian transformations within and across countries have been significantly and dynamically altered during the past few decades compared to previous eras, provoking a variety of reactions from rural poor communities worldwide. The changed and changing agrarian terrain has also influenced recent rethinking in critical inquiry into the nature, scope, pace and direction of agrarian transformations and development. This can be seen in terms of theorising, linking with development policy and politics, and thinking about methodologies. This collection of essays on key perspectives, frameworks and methodologies is an effort to contribute to the larger rethinking. The following paper introduces the collection.

182 citations


Cites background or methods from "Survey Article Rural Poverty and De..."

  • ...Central states remain important in development processes, but have been transformed in terms of the nature, scope, level and direction of their development intervention (Evans 1997a, Ribot and Larson 2005, Keohane and Nye 2000, Gwynne and Kay 2004, Kay 2006)....

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  • ...The first contribution provides us with a macro, historical perspective about national agrarian transformation, peasant differentiation and class struggle using a political economy method in the best tradition of great agrarian comparative scholars such as Barrington Moore Jr. (1967). Terence J....

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  • ...Locating one’s analysis of the state in multiple levels, i.e., local, national and international, is an important challenge (Kay 2006)....

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  • ..., local, national and international, is an important challenge (Kay 2006)....

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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The Global Campaign for Agrarian Reform (GCAR) as discussed by the authors has made a significant impact (inter)nationally in reshaping the terms of the land reform debates, but its impact on other land policy dynamics has been marginal.
Abstract: Via Campesina’s ‘Global Campaign for Agrarian Reform’ (GCAR) has made a significant impact (inter)nationally in reshaping the terms of the land reform debates. However, its impact on other land policy dynamics has been marginal. Meanwhile, the campaign inadvertently exposed latent class-based and ideological distinctions within the transnational network. This essay explains how the GCAR emerged, and has been able to influence the broader global land reform debates, but has not been able (so far) to significantly impact other major dimensions of the land policy debates. It argues that if GCAR is to retain relevance, it must deepen and broaden its current position on land to go beyond the parameters of conventional land reform. Moreover, it must also find ways to better integrate ‘global issue framing from above’ with ‘local/national campaigns from below’ if it is to strengthen its process of ‘issue/campaign externalization/transnationalization’. Doing this may require the network to rethink some of its well-established organizational practices and ideological perspectives.

157 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The authors deconstruct the shaky premises of the dominant discourse of Jatropha as a pro-poor and pro-wasteland development crop, a discourse that paints a win-win picture between poverty alleviation, natural resource regeneration, and energy security goals.
Abstract: Jatropha curcas is promoted internationally for its presumed agronomic viability in marginal lands, economic returns for small farmers, and lack of competition with food crops. However, empirical results from a study in southern India revealed that Jatropha cultivation, even on agricultural lands, is neither profitable, nor pro-poor. We use a political ecology framework to analyse both the discourse promoting Jatropha cultivation and its empirical consequences. We deconstruct the shaky premises of the dominant discourse of Jatropha as a ‘pro-poor’ and ‘pro-wasteland’ development crop, a discourse that paints a win-win picture between poverty alleviation, natural resource regeneration, and energy security goals. We then draw from fieldwork on Jatropha plantations in the state of Tamil Nadu to show how Jatropha cultivation favours resource-rich farmers, while possibly reinforcing existing processes of marginalisation of small and marginal farmers.

156 citations


Cites background from "Survey Article Rural Poverty and De..."

  • ...This process favours rural capitalists as it eliminates small peasants as competitors in agricultural production and transforms them into cheap labour that capitalists can employ (Kay 2006)....

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  • ...Changes in social relations caused by commodification of exchange and redistribution and increasing dependence on cash can result in processes of further marginalisation and proletarianisation (or semi-proletarianisation) of the already marginalised rural poor (Kay 2006)....

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References
More filters
01 Jan 2011
TL;DR: The notion of capital is a force inscribed in objective or subjective structures, but it is also a lex insita, the principle underlying the immanent regularities of the social world as mentioned in this paper, which is what makes the games of society, not least the economic game, something other than simple simple games of chance offering at every moment the possibility of a miracle.
Abstract: The social world is accumulated history, and if it is not to be reduced to a discontinuous series of instantaneous mechanical equilibria between agents who are treated as interchangeable particles, one must reintroduce into it the notion of capital and with it, accumulation and all its effects. Capital is accumulated labor (in its materialized form or its ‘incorporated,’ embodied form) which, when appropriated on a private, i.e., exclusive, basis by agents or groups of agents, enables them to appropriate social energy in the form of reified or living labor. It is a vis insita, a force inscribed in objective or subjective structures, but it is also a lex insita, the principle underlying the immanent regularities of the social world. It is what makes the games of society – not least, the economic game – something other than simple games of chance offering at every moment the possibility of a miracle. Roulette, which holds out the opportunity of winning a lot of money in a short space of time, and therefore of changing one’s social status quasi-instantaneously, and in which the winning of the previous spin of the wheel can be staked and lost at every new spin, gives a fairly accurate image of this imaginary universe of perfect competition or perfect equality of opportunity, a world without inertia, without accumulation, without heredity or acquired properties, in which every moment is perfectly independent of the previous one, every soldier has a marshal’s baton in his knapsack, and every prize can be attained, instantaneously, by everyone, so that at each moment anyone can become anything. Capital, which, in its objectified or embodied forms, takes time to accumulate and which, as a potential capacity to produce profits and to reproduce itself in identical or expanded form, contains a tendency to persist in its being, is a force inscribed in the objectivity of things so that everything is not equally possible or impossible. And the structure of the distribution of the different types and subtypes of capital at a given moment in time represents the immanent structure of the social world, i.e. , the set of constraints, inscribed in the very reality of that world, which govern its functioning in a durable way, determining the chances of success for practices.

21,046 citations

Book ChapterDOI
14 Jan 2008
TL;DR: In this article, the authors define cultural capital as accumulated labor that, when appropriated on a private, that is, exclusive, basis by agents or groups of agents, enables them to appropriate social energy in the form of reified or living labor.
Abstract: Capital is accumulated labor that, when appropriated on a private, that is, exclusive, basis by agents or groups of agents, enables them to appropriate social energy in the form of reified or living labor. Most of the properties of cultural capital can be deduced from the fact that, in its fundamental state, it is linked to the body and presupposes embodiment. Cultural capital, in the objectified state, has a number of properties that are defined only in the relationship with cultural capital in its embodied form. By conferring institutional recognition on the cultural capital possessed by any given agent, the academic qualification also makes it possible to compare qualification holders and even to exchange them. Furthermore, it makes it possible to establish conversion rates between cultural capital and economic capital by guaranteeing the monetary value of a given academic capital.

13,768 citations

MonographDOI
TL;DR: Wade's Governing the market quickly established itself as a standard in contemporary political economy as discussed by the authors, and the synergy between markets and public administration and the way allocation decisions were divided between markets, public administration, and corporations was examined.
Abstract: Published originally in 1990 to critical acclaim, Robert Wade's Governing the Market quickly established itself as a standard in contemporary political economy In it, Wade challenged claims both of those who saw the East Asian story as a vindication of free market principles and of those who attributed the success of Taiwan and other countries to government intervention Instead, Wade turned attention to the way allocation decisions were divided between markets and public administration and the synergy between them Now, in a new introduction to this paperback edition, Wade reviews the debate about industrial policy in East and Southeast Asia and chronicles the changing fortunes of these economies over the 1990s He extends the original argument to explain the boom of the first half of the decade and the crash of the second, stressing the links between corporations, banks, governments, international capital markets, and the International Monetary Fund From this, Wade goes on to outline a new agenda for national and international development policy

4,104 citations

Book
01 Jan 1992
TL;DR: The concept of sustainable rural livelihoods as discussed by the authors is based on capability, equity, and sustainability, each of which is both end and means, and is defined as: "a livelihood comprises people, their capabilities and their means of living, including food, income and assets".
Abstract: The purpose of this paper is to provoke discussion by exploring and elaborating the concept of sustainable livelihoods. It is based normatively on the ideas of capability, equity, and sustainability, each of which is both end and means. In the 21st century livelihoods will be needed by perhaps two or three times the present human population. A livelihood comprises people, their capabilities and their means of living, including food, income and assets. Tangible assets are resources and stores, and intangible assets are claims and access. A livelihood is environmentally sustainable when it maintains or enhances the local and global assets on which livelihoods depend, and has net beneficial effects on other livelihoods. A livelihood is socially sustainable which can cope with and recover from stress and shocks, and provide for future generations. For policy and practice, new concepts and analysis are needed. Future generations will vastly outnumber us but are not represented in our decision-making. Current and conventional analysis both undervalues future livelihoods and is pessimistic. Ways can be sought to multiply livelihoods by increasing resource-use intensity and the diversity and complexity of small-farming livelihood systems, and by small-scale economic synergy. Net sustainable livelihood effects and intensity are concepts which deserve to be tested. They entail weighing factors which include environmental and social sustainability, and net effects through competition and externalities. The objective of sustainable livelihoods for all provides a focus for anticipating the 21st century, and points to priorities for policy and research. For policy, implications include personal environmental balance sheets for the better off, and for the poorer, policies and actions to enhance capabilities, improve equity, and increase social sustainability. For research, key questions are better understanding of (a) conditions for low human fertility, (b) intensity, complexity and diversity in small-farming systems, © the livelihood-intensity of local economies, and (d) factors influencing migration. Practical development and testing of concepts and methods are indicated. For the reader, there is a challenge to examine this paper from the perspective of a person alive in a hundred years’ time, and then to do better than the authors have done. Gordon Conway is Representative for the Ford Foundation in India, Nepal and Sri Lanka. He was previously Professor and Chairman of the Centre for Environmental Technology at the Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine. In the mid 1980s, he also established the Sustainable Agriculture Programme at the International Institute for Environment and Development in London. He has worked extensively in Asia, the Middle East and Africa, mostly on issues of agriculture and environment. For comments on an earlier draft we are grateful to John Lawton, Melissa Leach, and Michel Pimbert. The views expressed are ours and should not be attributed to the Institute of Development Studies or the Ford Foundation. URI http://opendocs.ids.ac.uk/opendocs/handle/123456789/775 Citation Chambers, R. and Conway, G. (1992) Sustainable Rural Livelihoods: Practical Concepts for the 21st Century, IDS Discussion Paper 296, Brighton: IDS Is part of series IDS Discussion Paper;296 Library catalogue entry http://bldscat.ids.ac.uk/cgi-bin/koha/opac-search.pl?q=rn:90567 Rights holder Institute of Development Studies Sustainable rural livelihoods: practical concepts for the 21st century 

3,945 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Wade as mentioned in this paper reviewed the debate about industrial policy in East and Southeast Asia and chronicles the changing fortunes of these economies over the 1990s, and extended the original argument to explain the boom of the first half of the decade and the crash of the second, stressing the links between corporations, banks, governments, international capital markets and the International Monetary Fund.
Abstract: Published originally in 1990 to critical acclaim, Robert Wade's Governing the Market quickly established itself as a standard in contemporary political economy. In it, Wade challenged claims both of those who saw the East Asian story as a vindication of free market principles and of those who attributed the success of Taiwan and other countries to government intervention. Instead, Wade turned attention to the way allocation decisions were divided between markets and public administration and the synergy between them. Now, in a new introduction to this paperback edition, Wade reviews the debate about industrial policy in East and Southeast Asia and chronicles the changing fortunes of these economies over the 1990s. He extends the original argument to explain the boom of the first half of the decade and the crash of the second, stressing the links between corporations, banks, governments, international capital markets, and the International Monetary Fund. From this, Wade goes on to outline a new agenda for national and international development policy.

3,863 citations