Beyond Urban Bias: Peasant Movements and the State in Africa
Focusing on sub-Saharan Africa, this study tests the hypothesis that state intervention in agrarian economies causes peasant movements to engage in broad-based contention, on regional and national levels. The study traces the connections between government land and agricultural institutions and the characteristics of rural movements that make claims on them. Case studies of regions of Tanzania, Senegal, Côte d’Ivoire, and Ethiopia show the ways in which rural movements are constructed in response to the political and social environments in which they arise. That is, the comparisons demonstrate that the character of political authority and social organization are important determinants of the form taken by peasant movements.
