Group D

Just in case the Powerpoint does not work here are the summary points from our presentation. Enjoy!

Compulsory Villagization in Tanzania: Aesthetics and Miniaturization

Chapter 7 in Scott’s Seeing Like a State

Presented by Maggie, Nickhil, and Emily

►    Place: Tanzania

►    When: 1973-1976

►    By Whom: Julius Nyerere

►    Date of Independence:

   1964 (from Great Britain)

►    What: the forced resettlement

of 5 million Tanzanians

►    Why: settlement was previously “illegible” due to scattered population; intended as a development and welfare project

►    Why It’s Unique:

§         Not a punitive appropriation

§         Not ethnic cleansing

§         Not for military security (contrast to Soviet collectivization)

►    Shaped by goals associated with capital-intensive agriculture

►    Implemented by a weak state

►    Pre-villagization (before 1973):

►    11-12 million scattered, rural dwellers practicing subsistence farming

►    Frequently sold crops at local markets, outside of state control and taxation

►    Closely attuned with local environmental conditions (crop rotations, weather patterns, soils in the “stingy environment”)

►    Manual labor as opposed to mechanized

►    Process of Villagization

►    Concentrated planned villages in rectangular grids

►    Residents grow cash crops for the state using state-supplied machinery

►    Purpose: delivery of services, more productive agricultural system, encourage socialist forms of cooperation

►    Heavy reliance on “scientific agriculture” and tractors

►    Roughly 60% of villages were located on semiarid land unsuitable for permanent cultivation

►    Intended to “educate” the previously unlearned villagers

►    Agricultural experts perceived as the solution

►    Why It Failed

►    No attention to local knowledge

►    No mapping of soils, rainfall patterns, or topography

►    Field reconnaissance performed by air

►    Blind allegiance to machinery and large-scale operation

►    Irony of implementing a colonial agrarian policy immediately after independence

►    Designed to benefit bureaucrats, not the villagers

►    Rejection by villagers (previously practiced periodic movements across the land: prior, they moved from annually flooded lands to poor soils on high lands)

Scott’s Thesis

►    The modernist faith was self-serving

►    Lacked the cooperation of the people on the ground (villagers)

►    Destined to encounter resistance since authoritarian state aspired to control everything

►    Focused around the command center in the capital, not individual settlements

►    Impossible to redesign communities into an imposed, artificial boxes and grids

Our Opinions

►    Agree with Scott’s thesis--clearly the project failed

►    However, he offers no anecdotal or specific accounts from Tanzanians themselves

►    Does not offer solutions

Pertinence to 21st Century Challenges

►    Lack of local knowledge and input

►    Need to integrate scientific understanding and direct experience on the ground

►    Lines of communication between state (or aid group) and the local community

►    Realistic understanding of time: cannot completely re-organize a state overnight, or change individuals’ perspectives when change is imposed upon them 

Specific Examples

►    Relation to climate change campaign

§         Community members need to understand the root causes and the goals before they commit themselves to a local or federal policy

►    Jatropha Curcas

§         pressed seeds contain up to 40% oil

§         Goldman Sachs cited it as one of the best candidates for future biodiesel production

§         Large plantations in India by many research institutions and by women's microcredit groups to ease poverty among semi-literate Indian women

§         Focusing on poor farmers in drylands of sub-Saharan Africa to join the “biofuel future”

§         Potential to be a positive program, but little research has been performed, and it’s unclear whether farmers or multinationals will be the ones reaping the benefits

§         DO NOT EAT—HIGHLY TOXIC