The Persistence of the Black Farmer: The Contemporary Relevance of the Lenin-Chayanov Debate1

Abstract

Previous empirical studies of black farmers have identified socioeconomic and demographic variables as important to their success and survival. The theories of Lenin and Chayanov also highlight the role of demographic and socioeconomic factors in the differentiation of the peasantry. Panel data from a survey of black small-scale farm operators in the North Carolina Piedmont are used to test hypotheses based upon the Lenin-Chayanov debate . A multivariate analysis shows that black farm- ers who survived owned tobacco quota, had more on-farm household labor, had smaller households, and had higher gross farm incomes than those who left agriculture. These results point to the need to synthesize Lenin's macro-level focus on class formation and Chayanov's micro-level focus on enterprise formation in order to understand smallholder persis- tence. Over the five-year period studied, approximately 50 percent of the original respondents were no longer actively operating farms indicating that the future of the black smallholder remains precarious.