Kay - Reflections on Latin America New Rurality

7/26/2019 Kay - Reflections on Latin America New Rurality

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Focus

Reflections on Latin American Rural Studies in the

Neoliberal Globalization Period: A New Rurality?

Cristobal Kay

ABSTRACT

This article explores the emergence over the last decade of a new approach

to rural development studies in Latin America known as the new rurality.The various interpretations and ambiguities of this approach as well as theensuing debates are discussed. Analysis focuses on four major transforma-tions in the rural economy and society which are usually highlighted by thenew ruralists. These changes are interpreted as arising from the regionsneoliberal shift and its closer insertion into the global system. A novel dis-tinction is made between reformist and communitarian proposals for a newrurality. The merits as well as the limitations of this new approach to ruralstudies are examined.

INTRODUCTION

The 1960s and 1970s witnessed a fertile stage of agrarian and rural thinking in Latin

America. . .while in the 1980s and part of the 1990s this field of research and thinking turned

into a desert (Mora and Sumpsi, 2004: 6)

The persistence of rural poverty. . . and rising inequality in the distribution of incomes

remain vexing aspects of rural development in Latin America, in spite of expensive programs

intended at reducing poverty and inequality. This widespread failure calls upon exploring

alternative approaches to rural development that may have greater chances of success (de

Janvry and Sadoulet, 2004: 1)

The shift in the 1980s and 1990s away from an inward-directed import-substitution industrialization development strategy towards an outward-oriented strategy, which linked the agricultural sector more closely to global

An earlier version of this paper was presented at the DEV/EDU Seminar Series in the School of

Development Studies in the University of East Anglia, at the workshop on Agrarian Questions:

Lineages and Prospects held at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University

of London; and at the seminar on Rural Latin America: Contemporary Issues and Debates held

at the Centre for Latin American Research and Documentation (CEDLA), Amsterdam. I am

grateful for the comments received from participants at those events as well as those of three


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markets, provoked a major restructuring of Latin Americas rural economyand society. This major turn from a State-driven to a neoliberal market-drivendevelopment strategy led to the emergence of a new rurality approach to

rural development. While this approach offers many new insights into theregions rural transformations it is argued in this essay that it must be de-veloped more systematically and coherently for it to be of greater analyticalvalue. This essay is an attempt to bring some clarity and structure to thevarious contributions made to this novel approach so far, as well as to pointout some of its limitations.1

Rural studies in Latin America expanded enormously during the 1960sand 1970s especially in those countries with major peasant movements oragrarian reform programmes of one kind or another. Courses on rural econ-

omy and society became very popular and job prospects for professionalsin this field were good. The social sciences in Latin America at this timewere much influenced by Marxism and dependency studies, although neo-classical and structuralist theories predominated in economics. Discussionfocused on such questions as the revolutionary character of the peasantry,the rural class structure, the different types of agrarian reform, the advan-tages and disadvantages of agrarian co-operatives, the feudal or capitalistnature of the mode of production in the countryside, the various paths oftransition to agrarian capitalism (such as from below or from above),

which class alliances were in the best interests of the peasantry, the peasan-tization or depeasantization or proletarianization of the peasantry, the impactof agribusiness and, finally, the dependent character of the process of capitalaccumulation and its implications for the rural economy and society. Few,with the exception of some neoclassical economists, questioned the idea thatthe State had a key role to play in the process of transformation. Perhapsthe book which best epitomizes the discussion during this period is Alainde JanvrysThe Agrarian Question and Reformism in Latin America. It has

been reprinted several times since it was first published in 1981 and has

become a classic text. Most social scientists familiar with the book considerit to represent a structuralist or dependency view of Latin Americas agrar-ian transformation, but a few begged to differ. In a telling sentence SolonBarraclough (1984: 649), the doyen of agrarian reform studies, commentsthat de Janvrys analysis is surprisingly similar to the neoclassical one hecriticizes and that his conclusions, like those of the neoclassical approachseem to be dictated more by their premises than by the realities they try toexplain.2

1. For an analysis of the main theoretical approaches used in Latin America for the study of

th i l t f ti f th l t 1940 t th id 1990 K (2007)


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Latin American Rural Studies: A New Rurality? 917

The 1980s debt crisis led to the implementation of structural adjustmentprogrammes which ushered in the neoliberal policies and the so-calledWashington Consensus. This involved reducing the economic power of the

State by privatizing state enterprises and downsizing public employees, dis-mantling protective tariff barriers, opening the economy to the world marketas well as to foreign capital and, last but not least, a shift to exports to payfor the debt. Emphasis was placed on securing macroeconomic stability forgrowth and investment. Most governments undid their agrarian reforms byneoliberal counter-reforms. In the most extreme cases expropriated landswere returned, either in their entirety or partially, to previous landlords; butmore commonly new land laws were passed which guaranteed private prop-erty, facilitated the break up of the collective or co-operative reformed sector

and promoted individual land ownership through special titling programmes(Kay, 2002).

With the rise of neoliberalism in the 1980s, analyses by economists of apredominantly neoliberal persuasion gained ground. Social sciences in LatinAmerica suffered a major setback with many academics being persecutedor exiled by the dictatorships in place in several countries at the time.In particular, the influential Marxist strand within the social sciences inLatin America lost further ground following the demise of the communistregimes in Eastern Europe in the late 1980s. Furthermore, the continuing

rapid urbanization as well as the upsurge in rural violence and predatorywars in some rural areas made it less attractive and more difficult, if notimpossible, to do field research. As expected this led to the decline ofagrarian and peasant studies in the 1980s and early 1990s, especially asneoliberal governments were not interested in designing public policiesgeared towards the rural poor. Governments were mainly interested in lettingglobal markets dictate developments in the country and did not want todistort market signals through public policies directed at a particular sectoror group. Governments were only interested in hiring neoliberal technocrats

and there was a limited scope for social scientists, except for agriculturaleconomics and farm management specialists. Rural social movements werealso in retreat due to State repression and the decline of left-wing parties.

The record of neoliberal policies on growth, employment, income inequal-ity and poverty is disappointing, and well below the achievement of the early

post-war decades of import-substituting industrialization. While the averageyearly rate of agricultural growth in Latin America and the Caribbean inthe period 195080 was 3.5 per cent, during the 1980s the decade of

World Development Report 2008: Agriculture for Development(World Bank, 2007; see this

issue for an Assessment of the Report) As Akram Lodhi (2008) following Watts (2009)


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structural adjustment this rate fell drastically to 2 per cent (Stallings andPeres, 2000). For some countries of the region this meant a negative agricul-tural per capita rate of growth. Production only recovered gradually during

the 1990s reaching a meagre average of 2.6 per cent. The incidence of ruralpoverty increased from 59.9 per cent in 1980 to 65.4 per cent in 1990 fallinggradually thereafter, but it was only after 2003 that rural poverty fell belowthe 1980 level (CEPAL, 2007: 5). During the 1980s, the wealthiest 10 percent of the population increased their share of income by over 10 per centwhile the poorest 10 per cent suffered a 15 per cent drop, thereby reflectingthe regressive impact on income distribution of structural adjustment (IDB,1998: 1415). Income distribution started to improve slightly only in thelast decade as a consequence of social policies and the fall in poverty. Thus

macroeconomic stability was achieved but at a high social cost (Gwynneand Kay, 2004). The region did manage to attract large amounts of foreigninvestment although often of a speculative kind. Neoliberal policies also suc-ceeded in boosting exports although these largely concerned raw materialsrather than industrial commodities or services. Non-traditional agriculturalexports (NTAE) such as vegetables, fruits, flowers and soybeans grew much faster than those of a traditional kind, such as coffee, sugar and

bananas, and those produced for the domestic market (David, 2001). Thisbrought about major changes in the pattern of agricultural production and in

social relations of production. The main beneficiaries were capitalist farmersand agribusiness with few benefits, if any, for the rural poor (Rubio, 2003).While stimulating NTAE, liberalization also led to rising food imports with adetrimental impact on peasant farming and food sovereignty (Spoor, 2002).

In short, neoliberal globalization has created an agriculture of two ve-locities as capitalist farmers supplying the export market have experiencedhigh rates of growth while peasant farmers supplying the sluggish domesticmarket have had to face unfair competition from the subsidized food exportsof the rich countries.

THE NEW RURALITY APPROACH

The transformations arising from the process of neoliberal globalizationstimulated rural social scientists to search for new concepts which capturedthe changes more clearly. From the mid-1990s studies and documents beganto appear talking of Latin Americas Nueva Ruralidad or New Rurality.3

3. The Argentinean rural sociologist Norma Giarracca is among the first to use the term new

rurality (Giarracca 1993) It is likely that she was inspired to coin the term by a discussion


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The concept gained in popularity as seminars and conferences were held onthe topic, hundreds of papers were written and dozens of books published inLatin America all using the novel term new rurality. 4 While the term was

at first confined to largely academic circles it was later extensively adoptedby multilateral institutions like the Inter-American Institute for Cooperationon Agriculture (IICA) and the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB),

by NGOs, and international financial institutions (BM/FAO, 2003; IICA,2000). The term became increasingly instrumentalized and (mis)used for

public policy purposes and for canvassing legitimacy of certain actions.Latin American governments began to use the term in their rural development

projects in the hope of capturing financial resources from the internationalcommunity.

The concept of new rurality is very much a home grown, Latin Americanapproach to rural studies5 although there may have been some influencefrom those European studies using an actor-oriented perspective (Long andLong, 1992; van der Ploeg, 1993) and more specifically by those whichanalysed part-time farming (Arkleton Trust, 1985; Gasson, 1986) and thepluriactivity (Marsden, 1990; Reis et al., 1990) and multifunctionalityof farming and territories (Losch, 2004).6 In particular, Brazilian socialscientists, especially those trained in France, have been influenced by theFrench variety of this literature which probably explains the popularity of

studies on rural pluriactivity and multifunctionality in Brazil (Carneiro andMaluf, 2003). In the European literature some authors are beginning to usethe term new rural pluriactivity (Eikeland, 1999) and there are even callsto stop using concepts such as rural and instead pursue the study of thepost-rural (Murdoch and Pratt, 1993).

4. The Department of Rural and Regional Development of the Javeriana University in Bogota,

Colombia, organized several international conferences on new rurality and has been among

the pioneers in the diffusion and development of the concept (Perez, 2006, 2007; Perez andFarah, 2001, 2004).

5. In my view Rubios (2002) statement that new rurality is largely a European concept is

partly misguided, although some of her critical comments are relevant. Chiriboga (2000)

too refers to its partial European origins but he also highlights the influence of multilateral

agencies of technical co-operation. The term is certainly much more common in Latin

America than in the USA, UK or other European countries. When searching the term

nueva ruralidadin Google.com on 2 April 2008, I got 14,800 results, while with the term

new rurality I only got 780 results. Most of the results for the English term referred to

Latin America and few to Europe or other developed countries, while almost all references

to the Spanish term referred to Latin America, as expected.

6. The term part-time farming began to be used in Europe in the late 1960s and 1970s to referto small farmers who are obtaining a second income from non-agricultural sources, often

from urban employment (Gasson and Himmighofen 1983) The term pluriactivity started


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Nevertheless, there are important differences between these terms andnew rurality as should become evident from the analysis which follows.Put briefly, in my view, the term new rurality is a richer and broader term

encompassing phenomena not covered by the other terms. Above all, thenew rurality literature refers to a context quite different from that of highlyadvanced countries, especially when considering the impact of the Com-mon Agricultural Policy (CAP) on the rural economy and society of thecountries of the European Union (EU). Therefore, the new rurality approachshould be considered on its own merits. I hope that this article can con-tribute to correcting the common Euro-centric focus in the rural literatureon these topics by encouraging social scientists to take more note of thecontributions emanating from Latin America. As far as I know, the rural

livelihoods approach, which emerged slightly earlier in the UK (Bebbington,2004; Chambers 1988; Ellis, 2000), did not have a direct and immediate in-fluence on the new rurality thinkers in Latin America although these twoapproaches share some commonalities such as their emphasis on the im-

portance of non-agricultural activities in the countryside. It is only recentlythat some authors are making the linkages between these two approaches(Rodrguez and Tapella, 2008).

The concept of new rurality clearly captured the imagination of manyof those concerned with rural issues and stimulated new research on Latin

Americas rural transformation, but the term has never been fully and sys-tematically developed.7 As its usage became more widespread new charac-teristics were added to the definition in a haphazard and piecemeal manner,and often without reference to the early users of the concept. Indeed it could

be argued that this very lack of rigour has contributed to its popularity asit allowed users to interpret it in a manner which suited their purposes. Inshort, the term has become an umbrella concept used to refer to any newdevelopments in the rural areas or any issues which had previously been ne-glected or insufficiently emphasized by previous frameworks. The resulting

lack of coherence needs to be redressed if this perspective is to be furtherdeveloped.

How New is the New Rurality?

Sergio Gomez (2001), a Chilean rural sociologist, has made a significantcontribution to the debate on new rurality by asking the pertinent, if imper-tinent, question: the new rurality: how new is it?. While he acknowledges

7 The Venezuelan rural sociologist Luis Llamb can perhaps be credited for attempting to


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that many important transformations have occurred in the rural sector, hismain conclusion is that perhaps, what is new is that we now look at a realitywhich was previously ignored (Gomez, 2002: 12, my translation). Indeed,

the earlier predominant agrarianist and productivist approach was blind tothe transformations taking place as these were centred in rural non-farmand off-farm activities. However, some central features of the new ruralitywere of concern to social scientists decades ago, even though they employeda different language. Caribbeanist Lambros Comitas (1973), for example,wrote in the 1960s of the occupational multiplicity of rural Jamaicans,drawing attention to the broad range of economic activities that particularlysmall rural households have to use to generate a viable income, rangingfrom own-account farming to off-farm employment. As early as the 1960s,

the Brazilian sociologist Julio Barbosa had already observed that peasantsobtain their incomes from a variety of sources arising from farm, off-farm,agricultural and non-agricultural activities (Dillman, 1976). To highlight thisfact he coined the term polivalency of employment (Barbosa, 1963). Asnoted by Feder (1971: 134) this is a phenomenon not mirrored in statisticsand to which little attention has been paid until now by observers of LatinAmerican agriculture. In a pioneering study, Carmen Diana Deere (1990)drew attention to this literature and opened new theoretical ground by pro-viding a conceptual framework for analysing the multiple income-generating

activities by members of peasant households and which takes into accountclass as well as gender relations. She deployed this analytical structure for adetailed empirical investigation in northern Peru of the multiple class rela-tions in which rural households participate and of the gender relations withinthem.

While it is regrettable that the new ruralists fail to draw on this earlierliterature, those critics who argue that the changes highlighted by the newruralists are not significant enough to warrant a new approach also seemignorant of it. Furthermore, they do not identify which alternative approach

they consider adequate or superior to the new rurality perspective (Riella andRomero, 2003). Some writers even argue that nothing has really changedas the problems of poverty, violence, inequality, injustice, social exclusion,and so on, continue to exist. In their view there is no new rurality but acontinuation of the old situation. While many of the same old problems arestill evident today this does not necessarily invalidate the need for a newapproach. The reasons for such situations may differ from the past, and thenew rurality approach might lead to changes in public policy which tacklemore effectively some of the problems mentioned or at least prevent

them from worsening. While certain problems of the past persist it couldwell be that they have been intensified by new circumstances prevailing in


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Interpretations of New Rurality

Writers contributing to the flood of publications on the new rurality have

interpreted the concept in a variety of ways. Most authors do not distinguishbetween the different uses of the concept and consequently do not discusshow their particular interpretation relates to others, or to what extent it is anew interpretation.8

First, in the most common interpretation, it is used as a framework to anal-yse the transformations of neoliberal globalization by highlighting certainissues which other approaches have under-emphasized or even ignored. Thequestions addressed involve establishing whether a new rurality exists as anempirical fact and, if so, elucidating the nature of these fundamental changes

and whether they mean that we need to change the way we understand ru-ral development.9 While those embracing the new rurality approach (newruralists, if I may refer to them in this way) stress different aspects of therural transformations, all highlight the increasing diversification of rural ac-tivities and importance of non-agricultural employment and non-agriculturalincomes in the livelihood strategies of peasants and agricultural workers. Byusing the term rurality they are seeking to adopt a framework which goes

beyond the mere agricultural in the rural economy. One of the contributionsof new rurality analysis is to question the assumptions of many analysts

and public policy makers by arguing that rural communities are highly in-tegrated into markets and do not operate solely within an agricultural-basedsubsistence logic. The evidence presented by the new ruralists shows that

peasants engage in multiple activities (i.e. pluriactivity and multifunctional-ity)10 such as agricultural and non-agricultural, on-farm and off-farm and are

both producers and wage labourers. Peasants are consequently inserted intoa variety of markets and have multiple linkages to urban areas. The study ofthese transformations is not limited to the economic sphere, although this isgiven priority, but also embraces changes in society, particularly regarding

the emergence of new social actors and new social movements.Second, new rurality is interpreted as a way of rethinking rural devel-

opment in terms of a variety of normative goals such as the achievementof poverty reduction, environmental sustainability, gender equity, revaluingthe countryside, its culture and people, facilitating decentralization, recast-ing and even overcoming the ruralurban divide and replacing the analysisof ruralurban relations with localglobal relations. This normative take

8. Hubert C. de Grammont (2004), Rafael Echeverri (2001) and Jose Mara Caballero (2001)

are among the few scholars who have made an effort to distinguish between the variousways the concept of new rurality can be used or is being used. See also Favareto (2006).

9 Llamb argues that the transformations of the rural sector are of such significance since


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on new rurality can be named reformist as it aims at improving currentconditions through a variety of new projects and interventions without fun-damentally altering the existing structure of the current economic, social and

political system.Third, for authors inspired by Marxism or variants thereof the concept

of new rurality is used to propose radical change from below, rather thanseizing power and transforming society from above as in some communistrevolutions of the past. The rural communities are seen as developing post-capitalist relations which may then be diffused to the rest of society, therebysuperseding the neoliberal paradigm and capitalism.11 This view of newrurality can be characterized as the communitarian vision.

NEW REALITIES IN THE COUNTRYSIDE

I am going to analyse fours aspects of the major transformations in LatinAmericas new rurality: the shift to rural non-farm activities, the increasingflexibilization and feminization of rural work, the growing ruralurban inter-actions and the rising importance of international migration and remittances.

New ruralists tend to focus on some of these aspects and may include otheraspects which I have not mentioned as I consider them less relevant.12

Rural Non-Farm Activities

Rural non-farm activities have become increasingly important in terms ofemployment and incomes for rural dwellers in Latin America. While in theearly 1980s less than a quarter of the rural population had their principaloccupation in non-farm activities (Klein, 1993), by the end of the 1990sthis had risen to two-fifths, being mainly engaged in the service sector such

as retail trade, rural tourism, transport and personal services (Haggbladeet al., 2002; Kobrich and Dirven, 2007). The participation of women was

particularly notable accounting for about half of those employed in theseactivities (Dirven, 2004: 545; Reardon et al., 2001: 400). At the beginning

11. Some Marxists prefer not to use the term new rurality, seeing it as limited in its critique of

neoliberalism or even having an affinity with it, especially since the term has been captured

by international financial and development institutions.

12. Most studies on new rurality refer to a particular country or region(s) within a country. Fora sample of research on new ruralitys pluractivity or multifunctionality see: for Argentina,

Cucullu and Murmis (2003); Gras (2004); Neiman and Craviotti (2005); Tapella (2004); for


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of the 1980s non-agricultural rural income constituted over a quarter of totalrural income; by the late 1990s this had risen to almost half (Berdegue et al.,2000: 2). While some authors characterize this process as the deagrarianiza-

tion of the countryside (Bryceson, 2000), others more recently talk of theemergence of post-agricultural rural families (Grammont and Arias, 2008).Some of these rural non-farm activities have a greater dynamism, are more

productive and generate higher incomes than agricultural activities, hencetheir importance continues to grow in terms of employment and incomescompared to agricultural activities. However, these rural non-farm activitiesare of two kinds: those that require greater skills and capital, exhibit greater

productivity and hence generate higher incomes and those that are marginal,have low productivity and provide meagre incomes, arising from the dis-

tress situation experienced by the poorest peasant households. Thus the riseof non-farm activities furthers the process of peasant differentiation, whichwill be discussed later.

The Flexibilization and Feminization of Rural Work

The process of neoliberal globalization has intensified the competitive pres-sures on Latin Americas agriculture. This has extended and deepened cap-

italist relations of production throughout the countryside, worsening condi-tions of rural employment. The continuing mechanization of capitalist farmsand displacement of peasant farms has reduced employment opportunities foragricultural workers. Capitalist farmers have responded by reducing labourcosts, shedding permanent and stable workers in favour of a temporary andflexible workforce. They increasingly make use of labour contractors whoare in charge of supplying a certain number of workers for a specified period.In this way they avoid assuming responsibility for non-wage costs such associal security payments, pensions, housing and health care facilities. Work-

ers are increasingly paid by result or piecework which intensifies work aswell as extending the number of hours worked. This wider use of labourcontractors has weakened rural trade unions.

The organization of agricultural workers is now made more difficult asthey come from different localities, have temporary and insecure labourcontracts, if any, and are inhibited by their dependence on the goodwill oflabour contractors for future employment. The existence of a surplus of agri-cultural labour makes them vulnerable to exploitation by their employers andleaves them little option but to accept these more precarious employment

conditions. As the State is not particularly active in enforcing labour rightsand decent working conditions, employers have found it relatively easy


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for profits and wealth for rural capitalists but intensifies exploitation of ruralworkers and reproduces social exclusion.

The increasing flexibilization of rural activities has affected men and

women. However, the rapid expansion of exports of horticultural com-modities, flowers and fruits has mainly created employment possibilitiesfor women. Employers prefer to employ female workers as they are seen to

be more willing to accept temporary work and lower wages than men andto be less likely to join trade unions. Employers also argue that women are

better workers as they take greater care in their work which is importantwhen dealing with flowers and perishable products. Thus there has been afeminization of seasonal agricultural wage workers linked to NTAE (Deere,2006; Lastarria-Cornhiel, 2006). It is estimated that about half of the workers

employed in the non-traditional agricultural activities are women while aneven greater proportion, probably over two thirds, of workers in the agro-industrial processing plants are women.13 The few permanent jobs availabletend to be filled by men, as are the higher and better paid supervisory posi-tions. Nonetheless, many women value their increased participation in thelabour market as it offers them an opportunity to negotiate better relationswith their partners or parents and reduce patriarchal domination within thehousehold, as well as gain greater independence. In some instances violencetoward women has increased as men react negatively to challenges of their

patriarchal authority. Furthermore, the increasing incorporation of women inthe labour market has often increased their overall work burden as men havegenerally not assumed greater responsibility for domestic work within thehousehold. This has led to women working a double shift which sometimeshas impaired their health.

In short, neoliberal globalization has led to worsening labour conditionsand has drawn women into the rural labour market. Female workers have

become a key component of the non-traditional agricultural export boomand are more socially visible as they occupy a key position within one of the

countrys most dynamic export sector.

RuralUrban Interactions

Another change highlighted by the new rurality approach is the blurring ofthe distinctions between the rural and urban worlds. The traditional concep-tion of a ruralurban divide, while not redundant, is being challenged bythe increasing interaction between the rural and urban spheres. Some earlier

13. The proportion of women in non-agricultural rural activities is particularly high in Central

American countries reaching 80 per cent of economically active rural women in 1998 while


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authors spoke of cities of peasants or the countryside in the city as migra-tion of rural people to cities greatly increased (Linck, 2001; Roberts, 1978).Today, however, the situation is more fluid and varied: not only do peasants

move to cities, but urban inhabitants move to rural areas, and new urbansettlements spring up in the countryside leading to what some have called itsrurbanization (Carneiro, 1988; Delgado, 1999). With the proliferation ofsmall urban communities and intermediate cities in the last few decades thelinkages with the surrounding agricultural areas have thickened (Schejtman,1999).

An increasing proportion of rural inhabitants now work sporadically inurban areas engaging in such activities as construction (usually men) andservices (commonly women). They may take up temporary residence in

urban areas or commute where transport facilities permit. The reverse isalso happening as a sizeable proportion of urban residents, especially thoseliving on the outskirts of cities or in periurban areas where shantytownsare common, find seasonal work in rural areas especially during the harvest

period. They are often hired by labour contractors who provide transport and,if required, accommodation. Improved transport infrastructure and lowertransport costs as well as the shift towards casual employment have ledto this increasing mobility of workers between rural and urban areas. Thesedevelopments have intensified competition for work between urban and rural

residents, especially in those rural areas located close to urban areas.Rural areas are also becoming more industrialized as agricultural process-

ing plants and to a lesser extent some industries are established near villagesand hamlets where employers can take advantage of the cheap source of rurallabour, especially women. Thus urban labour practices are spreading intorural areas. The increasing fluidity between rural and urban labour marketsis partially eroding real wage differentials between urban and rural areas.The growth of rural tourism and the penetration of the media and telecom-munications have diffused cultural values, news and information across the

ruralurban areas, thereby enhancing further their cultural convergence.Thus a double process of urbanization of the rural areas and the ruralization

of urban areas can be observed, although it is the cities and urban valueswhich are clearly dominant. Despite this closer relationship the rural andurban divide is still marked in terms of income, incidence of poverty andlife chances, especially in the more remote rural areas.

Migration and Remittances

Another noteworthy change is the importance acquired by international mi-


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international migration by rural workers is unprecedented. While in the pastworkers from a handful of Latin American countries (namely Mexico andsome Caribbean countries) migrated to neighbouring countries or the USA,

todays migrants originate from several countries (namely Guatemala, Hon-duras, Nicaragua, Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia) and destinations have widenedto include Europe (mainly Spain) and Canada. People in extreme povertyare less likely to migrate abroad, although they may migrate within theirown country or to a neighbouring one. 14 Not only do migrants have to paytransport and subsistence costs but where the migration is illegal, they alsohave to pay substantial sums to people smugglers who help them cross the

border(s). While in the past international migration was largely confined tomen, today an increasing proportion of migrants are women.

The decision to migrate is often part of the household livelihood strategyand usually involves the younger members of the family. Most migrant work-ers send remittances back home, although these tend to tail off as the years go

by. These remittances are crucial for the livelihoods of the households backhome, often making up a large proportion of their income. Remittances areusually used for consumption purposes, health care, education and for hous-ing improvements. In some instances migrants invest in housing for theirown future use as they intend to return to their community or village. Theyare less commonly used for investing in agriculture and other productive

activities. Sometimes remittances have unintended side effects as receivinghousehold members become dependent on them and feel less pressured toseek work.

Countries as well as households have become dependent on remittances. Insome countries remittances now exceed the value of agricultural exports andmay even constitute the main source of total foreign exchange earnings. Forexample, in 2005 remittances from abroad were equivalent to 71.4 per cent oftotal export earnings in Guatemala, 62.6 per cent in El Salvador, 58.5 per centin Honduras and 54.6 per cent in Nicaragua (Edelman, 2008: 248). In several

of the poorer countries of the region remittances surpass foreign directinvestment several-fold, and have become a significant proportion of nationalincome fluctuating around 10 per cent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP)in Honduras, El Salvador, Dominican Republic, Nicaragua, Guatemala andBolivia (Fajnzylber and Lopez, 2007: 5).

International migration and remittances come at a high price, however, ascrossing borders, particularly illegally, is a highly risky as well as expensiveoperation. Migration disrupts the cohesion of both individual households

14. The proportion of members from poor households who migrate within total households

varies by country For example in Mexico around 60 per cent of the households that report


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and communities as the elderly, the less educated, the less entrepreneurial,the less able-bodied and the very poor are often left behind. It also aggravatesinequalities and processes of differentiation within the communities. Those

who make it to the richer countries are generally subject to racism and poorand precarious employment conditions as employers take advantage of theirvulnerability. Governments have done little to remedy this miserable stateof affairs or to facilitate a more productive use of remittances.15 In a waygovernments have colluded in this human drama as migration can be seen to

be advantageous. Exporting workers has become a major source of foreignexchange earnings and by reducing the number of poor and contributingto household survival, migration eases the potential for social conflict andremoves pressures on governments to undertake more effective measures to

reduce poverty.In short, remittances and the rural non-farm economy have become a

major source of income for most peasants in Latin America. 16 Povertyreduction programmes in countries like Bolivia, Honduras and Ecuadorhave had such limited success, if any, that the poor have had to design theirown survival strategies among which migration and off-farm activities have

become common options (Kay et al., 2008).

NORMATIVE VISIONS OF A DIFFERENT COUNTRYSIDE

What gives the new ruralities literature its policy thrust is its belief that rurallife can be sustainable. However, there are rather different visions of whatthis would mean. Hence I make a distinction between a reformist and acommunitarian vision of new rurality.

Reformist New Rurality Proposals

Most new ruralists subscribe to a normative interpretation of new rural-ity (without always acknowledging this explicitly) as they propose a se-ries of recommendations for public policies or interventions by NGOs andthe international donor community which seek to ameliorate the negativeconsequences of neoliberal globalization. They do not necessarily advo-cate a radically different path of rural development but look for ways of

15. There are some exceptions to this generalization. For example, in Mexico the government

provides matching funds for community development projects funded by hometown as-sociations based in the US, as analysed by Fox and Bada (2008). However, these efforts

have not achieved the expected results because migrants have become disenchanted with


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reorienting public policy and widening its scope so as to improve rural liveli-hoods. They seek to reform the system rather than contesting it hencemy use of the label reformist to characterize their proposals for change. In

this sense they argue that the new rurality approach is a more useful analyti-cal framework for designing more effective rural development policies thenthose being implemented by governments and other institutions at the timeof their analysis.

The reduction of rural poverty was the single development objective mostforcefully stressed by early advocates of a new rurality. Their conceptionof poverty was more holistic, requiring a wider array of public policies totackle it. They were aware of the limitations of the market and stressedthe importance of institutions. The new ruralists criticized policy makers

and NGOs for adhering to a traditional productivist approach to ruraldevelopment which by focusing too narrowly on agriculture, livestock andforestry production failed to perceive the emerging reality and the newchallenges facing farmers, peasants and rural labourers. Public policies andinterventions by NGOs were perceived as being increasingly irrelevant tothe new concerns of rural people arising from the diversification of ruralincomes and the increasing importance of non-farm and off-farm activitiesin rural livelihoods. They also criticized government policies for prioritizingthe needs of capitalist farmers and agribusiness at the expense of peasant

farmers and rural labourers. These normative new ruralists wish to fosterprivatepublic partnerships, promote commodity chains and clusters forcertain agricultural products seeking to raise productivity, to move up thevalue chain through agro-industrial processing and to advance technologicalinnovations and competitiveness. This is to be achieved through partnershipsand consensus-building efforts at local and regional level and the promotionof closer linkages between urban and rural areas. Thus the term ruralityunderpins the need for a new approach to rural development, one whichembraces a wider vision of the rural than the mere agrarian, and one which

prioritizes the rural poor.As the new rurality approach became more popular, its agenda broadened

out to include almost every conceivable development objective therebyblunting its early focus on key strategic rural development goals. Hence,policies for a new rurality were expected to promote decentralization, localdevelopment, social participation, equity, empowerment of women, youthemployment, organic agriculture, sustainable development, rural industri-alization, agricultural commodity chains, agro-industrial clusters, compet-itiveness, and so on.17 Some authors even proposed several goals without

17 Most writings on new rurality tend to have normative elements but in some new rurality


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930 Crist obal Kay

providing any sequence as to their attainment and apparently without beingaware that these cannot be achieved simultaneously, that there are trade-offsand that some are contradictory.

For a Communitarian New Rurality

Although what I call the communitarian approach to new rurality is clearlyalso a normative interpretation, its explicitly post-capitalist advocacy makesit deserving of a category of its own. This community-based new ruralityhas been put forward with great conviction by the Mexican scholar DavidBarkin (2001a, 2001b, 2006b). His starting point is the examination of a cer-

tain type of new rurality which peasants themselves are already constructing.He argues that we have to learn from the strategies that peasant communitiesare adopting to confront neoliberal globalization and construct an alterna-tive to individual empoverishment and ecological degradation. Although hisexamples are drawn from only a few peasant communities in Mexico theyencapsulate the desires, if not yet the reality, of those community mem-

bers, activists and public intellectuals, like Barkin, who are searching for analternative development strategy to the dictates of neoliberal globalization.

Barkin identifies the communitarian alternative as resting on three ba-

sic principles: autonomy, self-sufficiency and productive diversification(Barkin, 2001a: 33). Neither autonomy nor self-sufficiency are understoodin the absolute sense of the community remaining isolated and completelyself-sufficient enterprises. Rather the idea is that by diversifying their pro-duction system, communities enhance their ability and power to decide howand to what extent to engage in the market. This form of selective marketengagement will enhance their autonomy and self-sufficiency. Product di-versification, of course, goes against the trend of increasing specializationwhich is usually observed in capitalist farming. In their attempt to achieve

these three goals community members defend their traditional productivesystems as well as their culture and strengthen their community organi-zation. Barkin acknowledges that this strategy for a communitarian newrurality requires a territorial perspective as it has to be defined regionally to

become feasible and sustainable. Furthermore, achieving the three aims ofautonomy, self-sufficiency and productive diversification requires outsideresources. These resources can be mobilized both from the non-agriculturalincomes of community members and from the remittances sent back by thosewho have migrated to urban centres within the country or abroad, mainly to

the USA. It also requires the construction of new markets that are not ex-ploitative but are based on solidarity principles of fair-trade markets. Barkin


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the most basic staple of the Mexican diet. They have been able to achievethis by using the monetary remittances of migrants to support maize culti-vation as well as by setting up in urban areas their own tortillerasmaking

hand-made tortillas thereby capturing more of the value chain. They are alsoable to command higher prices as the texture and flavour of these tortillasis much appreciated by customers, thus keeping white maize productionviable.

Barkins proposal of a new rurality has echoes of the fierce debate betweencampesinistas (peasantists) anddescampesinistasorproletaristas (depeas-antists or proletarianists) which took place in Mexico in the late 1970s andearly 1980s and spread throughout most of Latin America. Campesinistas,often categorized as neopopulists, believed in the superiority and survival

of peasant farming while the descampesinistas, following a more classicalMarxist interpretation, believed that the superiority of capitalist farming andthe process of social and economic differentiation would lead to its demise.Most peasants would be proletarianized and a few would become capitalizedsmall farmers.18 It is an unresolved debate which every so often resurfacesin different guises. While he does not make the link himself, Barkins com-munitarian new rurality vision is, in my view, a useful contribution to thisinconclusive debate.19

Barkin is aware of the crisis facing the peasantry in Mexico and elsewhere

and this prompts him to interpret new rurality as a communitarian ruraldevelopment strategy which aims to strengthen the peasant economy as wellas the peasant organization, culture, identity and sustainability. He views acommunitarian peasantry as being friendlier to the environment, more able tosecure a decent standard of living for its members and to promote solidarity,equity and empowerment. The communitarian new rurality seeks to pursuean alternative development path for a new rural society in which peasantsachieve autonomy and food sovereignty based on a diversified productionand environmentally sustainable system.

The aims of the community-centred new rurality bear some similarities tothose of theEj ercito Zapatista de Liberacion Nacional(EZLN) in Chiapas,Mexico and those of the Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra(MST) in Brazil who struggle for agrarian reform and the establishment ofcommunities on expropriated land. The leadership of the MST has a moredifficult task as it has to develop such community organizations and activi-ties compared to the Chiapas case where some members have a collectivistexperience or memory arising from their indigenous identity and/or from

18. An analysis of this debate within the Mexican context can be found in Foladori (1981). For

a concise exposition of the general debate see Kay (2001: 377 86)


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932 Crist obal Kay

their experience as members ofejidos the collectivist-statist organizationof the reformed sector. The MST has been very successful in mobilizingthe rural poor (and to some extent the urban poor) in gaining access to land

and creating communal organizations. However, they have been less suc-cessful in achieving their aim of promoting collective agriculture (Wolford,2003). Although the land reform beneficiaries receive substantial economicsupport from the State in the form of finance for schools, health centres,infrastructural improvements and other communal services, the movementhas been able to maintain its autonomy from the State and to avoid fallinginto clientilistic dependency, a common tendency in the countrys politics.20

More widely there are also some similarities with the Movimiento Al Social-ismo(Movement Toward Socialism MAS) government of Evo Morales

(Urioste and Kay, 2005). However the aims of this movement are even moreambitious as it wants to incorporate the communitarian principles arisingfrom their own indigenous communities into the development strategy forthe country as a whole rather than confining them to the rural areas (MPM,2007).

While the experiences of the MST in Brazil and of the EZLN in Chiapasgive some hope for the construction of such a communitarian new rurality (itis still too early to assess the MASs proposal for a countrywide community-

based development strategy), there are several issues which limit its viability.

Barkin (2001a: 38) himself recognizes that several obstacles lie in the wayof the community-centred new rurality. Among these he identifies the insti-tutional obstacles arising fromcaciquismo, which is the Mexican expressionof political clientelism and bossism of local power holders, which we havealready touched on in the case of Brazil. In addition resistance can be ex-

pected from both a fossilized bureaucracy and from State authorities to anyattempt to manage the countrys natural resources autonomously or to dis-engage from clientelistic mechanisms of state control on the part of peasantcommunities.

However, there are other obstacles which Barkin does not mention andwhich in my view greatly jeopardize the achievement of this communitariannew rurality. In calling for a renewal of rural society, Barkin is surprisinglyreticent about the importance of the State and, more widely, the internationalcommunity such as NGOs, solidarity groups and transnational peasant or-ganizations such asV a Campesina(Borras, Edelman and Kay, 2008). YetState support is absolutely crucial for economic and political reasons. Toregenerate rural society for a communitarian new rurality requires massiveinflows of human, financial and other economic resources. While remit-

tances are one such source they are clearly insufficient and are an uncertainand possibly undesirable source of revenue involving as they do the out-


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urgently requires the young and able-bodied. Apart from the loss of thisvaluable human resource, remittances are also a dependent source of incomeand thereby contradict the principle of autonomy. They are dependent on

the continuation of migration and on the willingness both of migrants tosend money back home and recipients to pool remittances so as to financecommunity development projects. Politically, the communitarian new ru-rality requires not just the removal of the political obstacles that Barkinmentions (which are indeed quite formidable in the Mexican case) but alsothe active political support of the State. In this sense the experience of thegovernment of President Morales in Bolivia provides a better platform for acommunitarian new rurality so long as his MAS government is able to stayin power.

It is also doubtful whether the goals of autonomy and self-sufficiency,even when understood in a relative sense, are either attainable or desirable.To achieve some of their aims, communities will have to forge allianceswith other social and political groups thereby limiting their autonomy butat the same time strengthening their political influence and power. As forself-sufficiency, it may be more appropriate to aim for food sovereignty atthe national level. The key is to secure the capacity for achieving a reliablefood supply and a good standard of living which will require engagementwith markets. By expanding the solidarity markets it will be possible to sell

in fair markets which would provide the economic resources for financingtheir other new rurality goals.

Certain aspects of this communitarian new rurality are not sufficientlyelaborated and hence may appear contradictory or unrealistic. The pursuit ofautonomy and self-sufficiency by rural communities is seen as a way of pro-tecting them from the ravages of neoliberal globalization. At first sight thismay be taken to mean that the community does not engage with the capitalistmarket. However, this is not exactly the case as Barkin (2006b: 2) seeks toelaborate an alternative framework for the productive incorporation. . . of

communities into the global economy. In his view this can be achievedthrough a strategy forsustainable regional resource management whichexplicitly aims to overcome rural marginalization, contributing to reducethe force of the underlying drivers of social conflict (ibid., emphasis inoriginal). The argument is not for complete autonomy or self-sufficiency, ashe seeks to create opportunities for participation in international trade undermore advantageous terms (ibid.). The reader is thus left wondering whetherthese qualifications render the terms meaningless. The question thereforeremains as to what extent it is possible today for a rural community to con-

struct such an autonomous and self-sufficient new rurality. Can it be done inisolation? Would it not require a simultaneous transformation of the national


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934 Crist obal Kay

as the major social and political forces needed to bring about this new worldare not identified.

BRINGING CLASS AND THE STATE BACK IN

The main limitations of the new rurality approach are the absence both ofclass analysis and of the political forces which shape the State. Regardingclass, for example, it fails to analyse contradictions and conflicts betweencapitalist and workers as well as the processes of social and economic differ-entiation of the peasantry. The lack of analysis of the political sociology ofthe State leads new ruralists to propose a variety of policies which, although

commendable, have little chance of ever being implemented, or which, ifapplied, will not necessarily have the desired outcome in favour of the peas-antry. The new rurality approach, particularly in its reformist version, thusfails to fully appreciate the limitations of neoliberalism and the constraintsimposed by capitalist globalization on the development possibilities of the

peasantry and rural workers (Teubal, 2001).While new ruralists are to be credited for highlighting the importance of

rural non-farm activities they misinterpret their origins and, above all, ex-aggerate the possibilities they offer for the well-being of peasants and rural

workers. For the majority of the peasantry neoliberalism has meant an in-creasing inability to access productive resources and sometimes has even ledto the loss of their own resources, such as land, owing to neoliberal enclosureand accumulation through dispossession (Akram-Lodhi and Kay, 2009).21

It is this crisis of the peasant economy which has forced many peasants toengage in multiple activities to make ends meet. Their dwindling accessto productive resources has led to their deagrarianization and forced them toengage in non-farm activities. Members of the peasant farm household haveincreasingly been pushed to seek wage employment of a precarious kind

leading to the flexibilization and feminization of rural labour. About half ofadult males in rural households are engaged in wage labour and off-farmwage work in agriculture is still more important than non-agricultural wagework, but the difference today is minor compared with the past. Meanwhile,only a quarter of rural adult females are engaged in off-farm wage work,and non-agricultural employment is far more important than agriculturalemployment (World Bank, 2007: 2045). Furthermore, the degree of prole-tarianization varies between Latin American countries: while in Chile andCosta Rica wage labour accounts for over 60 per cent of the agricultural

labour force, in Bolivia and Peru this figure is reduced to less than 15 percent (ibid.: 206).


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The situation is, of course, very complex and varies across countries.Diversification into rural non-farm activities has indeed afforded some peas-ants an upward mobility ladder, a means of achieving higher incomes and

capital accumulation, but this is restricted to a minority of peasant farm-ers who were already better endowed with land, capital, human resources(better educated and superior skills) and social capital. They were thus ableto shift to higher value crops and profitable non-farm activities as well asnegotiate better deals with suppliers, buyers and agribusiness. Furthermore,in the labour market they were able to capture the better quality jobs which

pay higher wages as well as providing more secure and better employmentconditions.

In short, for the poorer peasants multi- or pluriactivity has been little

more than a means for survival leading to a process of depeasantization,deagrarianization, semi-proletarianization or even proletarianization. Hencetheir increasing exploitation as they have become mainly providers of cheapand flexible labour for capitalism and have to a large extent lost their capacityto produce cheap food. Only for the already well endowed peasant farmershas diversification become a strategy of capital accumulation and improvedwell-being.

This inability to analyse the class dynamics in society and above all to ap-preciate the relevance of the process of peasant differentiation leads the new

ruralists astray in their policy proposals. The new ruralists are strong advo-cates of promoting the rural non-farm economy due to its higher productivityand growth potential. However, even if governments were to implement such

policies and target them specifically at the peasantry their outcome would atbest intensify the ongoing process of peasant differentiation. The majorityof the peasantry those who are considered as non-viable by neoliberaleconomists or as lacking productive potential by others would be un-able to benefit from such policies given their lack of resources. There is, ofcourse, a way of remedying this lack of resources in order to achieve a more

inclusive and widespread pro-peasant development. However, this wouldentail structural changes which are not contemplated by the new ruralists,with the exception of the communitarian new ruralists. It would mean firstand foremost strengthening the land base of poor peasant farmers so as toachieve a minimum threshold for engaging productively in non-farm activ-ities as well as shifting to higher value agricultural activities. 22 This opensthe question of political power and the State. Bringing class back in hastherefore to be coupled to bringing the State back in as well.

Many of the policies proposed by the new ruralists have little chance

of being carried out. Most governments tend to give little priority to the


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936 Crist obal Kay

rural sector and even where they do, the post-structural-adjustment Statelacks the resources or capacity to implement effective policies. Further-more, an encompassing pro-peasant rural development would involve the

redistribution of land and the provision of credit, technical assistance andother services to peasants and rural workers.23 An analysis of the politi-cal forces and power relations in society and how they shape and to whatextent they control the State apparatus is needed to assess the feasibilityof the new ruralists policy proposals. Such an analysis would also assistin identifying alternative courses of action supported by a new correlationof forces in society and in the State with the goal of implementing moreequitable and inclusive development strategies. The new ruralists have lit-tle to say about peasant and indigenous movements and how to strengthen

those forces in society which favour and can bring about the necessarystructural changes.24 The MST in Brazil, the peasant and indigenous move-ment in Bolivia and the Zapatistas in Mexico provide some pointers in thisdirection.

A certain eclecticism and the lack of recognition of class and politicalforces shaping the State blinds new ruralists to processes of domination,subordination and exploitation and leads them to propose policies which arenot feasible, or tend to be contradictory and are likely to produce differentoutcomes from those desired. Given the highly unequal distribution of assets,

incomes and power in Latin American societies the starting point for anew rurality has to be the transformation of class and political forces insociety.

An expression of the abject failure of rural development policies is thehigh rate of outmigration from the poorer Latin American countries to theUSA and Europe, mainly Spain. It is paradoxical, ironic and tragic that

perhaps the greatest contribution to rural poverty reduction has come fromthe poor themselves, from those who have emigrated and sent remittances totheir families. This substantial and persistent emigration not only reduces the

number of poor in the country of origin, but also creates an important sourceof income for poor people who remain behind and receive remittances. Thisflight from the countryside is hardly a strong foundation on which to builda new rurality. The actually existing new rurality in those countries is a

23. Land reform measures are generally not contemplated by the reformist new ruralists,

probably due to the mixed experiences of State-driven agrarian reforms in the past. Over

the last decade the World Bank has promoted market-led agrarian reforms but these haveturned out to be very limited in reach and impact. For a critical analysis of the market-led

agrarian reform see Borras Kay and Lahiff (2008) Thus the land problem still remains


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negation of the rural development and poverty reduction expectations ofthe new ruralists.25 Hence it is also reveals a major shortcoming of thisapproach.

CONCLUSIONS

As Jose Bengoa, a well known Chilean anthropologist and specialist on LatinAmerican indigenous peoples put it: To assert that a new rurality existsmeans that at least some basic changes of importance have been producedand nothing tells us that this occurs in a homogeneous and definitive manner.

The new and the old continue to blur into each other and very often in acurious manner (Bengoa, 2003: 63, my translation). This statement reflectsthe scepticism in some quarters regarding the concept of new rurality. It iscertainly true that the new and the old continue to intermingle, especially insuch a heterogeneous and unequal economy and society as Latin America.Given this ambiguity, Bengoa proposes instead the concept of displace-ments, being a more prudent and non-committal term than new rurality. Inmy view, the term displacements fails to do justice to the significant trans-formations undergone by the peasantry and is too ambiguous for analytical

purposes. Nevertheless, some authors are beginning to use the term as theyfind it suitable for analysing the diverse mutations and shifts of peasants asthey combine new and old activities in a variety of ways to reconfigure theirlivelihoods.

The new rurality approach certainly has its flaws, as I have pointed outin this essay. At least it has had the merit of opening the eyes and mindsof many people to changes that had previously been ignored, thereby stim-ulating further reflections on Latin Americas current rural transformationsas well as on rural development studies. New rurality is largely a normative

approach within the context of the continuing outflow of migrants from theLatin American countryside and the crisis facing the peasantry due to thewidening and deepening of capitalist relations in the period of neoliberalglobalization. The new rurality analysts thus seek to find new ways of secur-ing sustainable livelihoods for peasants and rural workers and, in the commu-nitarian version, envision a post-capitalist transformation of the countrysideso as to achieve the goals of equity, food sovereignty, sustainability andempowerment.

25 Nevertheless rural poverty in the region declined after reaching its highest point of


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938 Crist obal Kay

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Cristobal Kay is Professor in Development Studies and Rural Develop-

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Documents

Kay - Reflections on Latin America New Rurality