Everyday Forms Of Peasant Resistance Research Articles

Is subversion just another version of state aversion? Notes on Herzfeld’s Subversive archaism

Is subversion just another version of state aversion? Notes on Herzfeld’s <i>Subversive archaism</i>

From hoes to story-telling as \u201cWeapons of the Weak\u201d: farmers\u2019 resistance to neoliberal 2007 Multi-Product Management Stabilization Plan in Japan

While neoliberalism has promoted free trade, market rule, and productivist agriculture in the food production system, farmers and their unions in developed countries partially managed to shun the forces of neoliberalism. What are the underpinning strength and factors of such resilience? Discussions have concentrated at national policy and organizational level and tacit resistance at community and farm levels remain unexplored, inter alia from their historical embeddedness perspective. This study explores the way Japanese farmers frame their contemporary political situation with neoliberalism of the late 2000s with a grounded approach of face-to-face interview at a community level. The farmers resist it mobilizing Scott’s anthropological notion of “Weapons of the Weak” through story-telling instead of hoes in ancient time (Scott JC, Weapons of the weak: everyday forms of peasant resistance, 1985). In concrete, the farmers resisted a neoliberal policy of Hinmoku Ōdanteki Keiei Antei Taisaku, or the Multi-Product Management Stabilization Plan (MPP), in the early 2000s, which promoted larger scale farming to pursue the efficiency of scale merits. The policy was first introduced in 2005 as a concept and dominated the agricultural policy scenes from 2007 to 2009, and then its influence disappeared toward 2010. The rise and fall of the concept and policy provide us with rare opportunity to examine the historical embeddedness of the farmers and their resistance to such neoliberal globalization. We conducted interviews with the leaders of cooperative farms and stakeholders in Daisen City, Akita Prefecture, Japan; the study found that farmers’ framing of neoliberalism was ambivalent causing partial adoption and resistance. The leaders of the cooperative farms could form the cooperative farms but thought further development difficult because members intended to keep their farming independent. Close frame and discourse analysis revealed that farmers in Japan could express their frustration on neoliberal discourse and policy through multiple tactics of “Weapons of the Weak” by complaining to the leaders, miscalculating the figures, or claiming family-based food sovereignty that “we produce what goes into our family mouths.” Such tactics procrastinated the process and eventually stopped the policy. The incident demonstrates how farmers in the network can slow the progress of neoliberal discourse and policy implementation. From the analysis, the notion of “Weapons of the Weak” can be applied as a part of the combination with farmers’ historical embeddedness, symbolism of foods, framing, and electoral resistance.

Weak weapons, strong weapons? Hidden resistance and political protest in rural ecuador

The article critically applies the theory of everyday forms of peasant resistance (EFPR) to an analysis of land struggles in the Ecuadorean Andes. It explores the effectiveness of ‘weapons of the weak'used by indigenous peasants in conflicts with the haciendas. The relationship between hidden resistance and the rise of political organisation is also examined. Special attention is paid to the structural context and cultural underpinning of both covert and overt peasant action.

Rituals of Resistance

In context of new world orders threatening from above and new popular struggles breaking out from below, description and of mass protest in Latin America is confronted with need for comprehensive theories of social conflict. To account for these developments among subaltern classes, Latin Americanists are increasingly turning to views of James C. Scott regarding forms of resistance. I hope to show that important aspects of his model hinder our efforts to understand and develop theories of conflict in Latin America. Gilbert Joseph calls Scott's the most visible and polished of what now constitutes vital current in peasant and goes on to suggest that his analysis of 'everyday forms of peasant resistance' can contribute valuable insights to broader conceptualization of Latin American banditry (1990: 26). Susan Eckstein introduces survey of varied forms of protest in Latin America by citing Scott on hidden forms of peasant resistance and extending these forms to other economically subordinate groups (1989: 8). She says that Scott correctly and insightfully argues that peasants frequently engage in everyday forms of resistance, although she quickly adds that such quiet forms of defiance rarely result in major change and also discusses direct and explicit forms of resistance (1989: 8). Levine and Mainwaring call one of Scott's books a major recent statement in tradition of studies on popular classes (1989: 203 n. 1). Widespread and growing attention in studies of Latin America is thus being given to Scott's work (see also Tutino, 1986; Colburn, 1989b; Jimenez, 1989; Edelman, 1990; Foweraker, 1990; Gould, 1990; Orlove, 1991; and, more critically, Roseberry, 1989; Cook and Binford, 1990). In Joseph's and Eckstein's cases, at least, this is ironic, because both these writers go on to

Engendering everyday resistance: Gender, patronage and production politics in rural Malaysia

Labour relations, forms of resistance, and class consciousness in the Muda region of Malaysia have become increasingly differentiated along gender lines: women have come to define and prosecute their interests as workers, whereas men continue to adopt a far more deferential stance vis‐a‐vis their employers. To explain these patterns, this article shows how struggles within the labour process intersect with those in the local community and the household, and how gender meanings shape the struggles on these interconnected sites. This gendered analysis of class formation calls for a major rethinking of James Scott's notion of ‘everyday forms of peasant resistance’.

Everyday forms of peasant resistance

Everyday forms of peasant resistance

Everyday forms of peasant resistance in South–East Asia

James C. Scott and Benedict J. Tria Kerkvliet eds., Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance in South–east Asia, Library of Peasant Studies no. 9, Frank Cass and Co., London, 1986. 148 pp. Introduction. Cloth: £19.50.

James C. Scott: Weapons of the weak: everyday forms of peasant resistance. xxii, 389 pp. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, [1986]. £25.

An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. Please use the Get access link above for information on how to access this content.

Seminar: Everyday forms of peasant resistance

(1986). Seminar: Everyday forms of peasant resistance. The Journal of Peasant Studies: Vol. 13, Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance in South‐East Asia, pp. 144-148.

Everyday forms of peasant resistance

(1986). Everyday forms of peasant resistance. The Journal of Peasant Studies: Vol. 13, Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance in South‐East Asia, pp. 5-35.

Weapons of the weak: everyday forms of peasant resistance

Weapons of the weak: everyday forms of peasant resistance Get access Weapons of the weak: everyday forms of peasant resistance. By James C. Scott. New Haven, Conn., London: Yale University Press. 1985. 389pp. Index. £25⋅00. ISBN 0 300 03336 2. Michael Williams Michael Williams Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar International Affairs, Volume 63, Issue 1, January 1986, Pages 165–166, https://doi.org/10.2307/2620323 Published: 01 January 1986