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This chapter argues that the meaning the doctrine of the Naxalites appears to have for non-believers is different from what it had for the believers. This is patently indicated by the programme of agrarian revolution linked to a policy of urban terror. Observers, sympathetic to the Naxalites, have upbraided them for their policy of ‘individual terror’, and have pointed out its incompatibility with the mass line entailed in the Marxist–Leninist theory of revolution to which the Naxalites vowed allegiance. The humanitarian appeal of the Naxalites is not only at odds with their inhuman methods, but with the experience of their own humanity. Their defence of communist dogma only develops as an attack on communist history and communist organizations. Their positive vision, that of Chairman’s China, is only fleshed out as the negativity of Revolution and the abyss of terror.

This concluding chapter provides a summation of the main findings of the book as a whole. Parks were much more important to the concerns of the aristocracy than has usually been suggested, and they had a strong, and often negative, effect on many rural communities and some urban ones. The central place of hunting in the creation of parks is emphasized, along with the significance of organized hunting as an expression of power and authority. It is also suggested that an interest in leisure, as expressed through the reservation of land for hunting, had an impact on the extent to which lords organized their estates in a commercial or market-focused way. The negotiations and confrontations that surrounded parks are shown to have been an important part of the early history of enclosure, a process that involved the shaping of social norms as well as of agrarian practices.

This introductory chapter sets out the purpose of the book, which is to explore the early beginnings of agrarian capitalism in England. The question of how and why capitalism developed in England has been a source of debate. Several historical sources were used to examine a wide range of topics such as rights to land and the level of rent, the land market and inheritance, the distribution of land and wealth, the landless, wage-earners, rural craftsmen, as well as the labour laws.

Scandinavian party systems have often been seen as ‘ultra stable’, a view that was certainly justified between 1945 and the early 1970; however, the general election of 1973 in Denmark signalled a new era of instability as the three major parties saw their aggregate share of the vote slashed; soon similar developments became visible in Norway, to some extent in Finland, and (a little later) in Sweden. The main political actors in the Scandinavian democracies are organized around conflicts between labour and capital, and between the rural peripheries and urban centres; the five party families of the classic Scandinavian model (social democracy, conservatism, liberalism, agrarian ‘centrism’, and communism) are deeply anchored in these social bases, with class especially having been a more important determinant of party loyalty than in other west European democracies; in particular, the mutual tolerance and moderation that parties typically accord each other in consensus democracies has resulted in the creation of an extensive and well‐known mixed welfare economy. However, the classic five‐party model no longer provides a comprehensive account of party politics in Scandinavia: since the early 1970s a variety of other parties, old and new, have emerged, and this has led to doubt as to whether the Scandinavian party systems remain distinctive, although they may still be located in the category of moderate pluralism. The increasing fragmentation of parliaments has also affected governments in different ways in the four countries. The introduction discusses these changes; the next three sections cover the same topics as those in the other country case studies in the book, and examine (the erosion of) party legitimacy, party organizational strength (finance, members), and the systemic functionality of political parties (in governance, political recruitment, interest articulation and aggregation, political participation, and political communication).

This chapter focuses on the crisis in the political economy of north India during the period from 1825 to 1845. It suggests that the most striking fact about the downturn of the 1830s in north India was the way in which a wide range of adverse climatic, ecological, and monetary conditions converged. It explains that this crisis resulted from a disturbance of the links between state, commerce and agrarian society which had been established after 1740. It also argues that the decline of princely consumption and agrarian patronage in the intermediate economy magnified the disruption caused by a political assault on the north Indian monetary system and the collapse of the false commercial economy which had remitted its Europeans' political perquisites to Britain. This was not a crisis of modernisation, it represented the impact on the Indian localities of imperialism.

Conventional models of state formation and the ways in which early polities might be expressed in the archaeological record for England in the 7th century have emphasised the importance of long-distance exchange in promoting socio-economic complexity. Such models, however, are open to challenge or refinement from interpretations that would emphasise other social dynamics, and beg serious questions about the relationships between agrarian production, elite acquisition and consumption and structures of power and jurisdiction. This chapter presents a critical evaluation of some current assumptions and approaches, and examines the interpretative questions in the light of recent evidence from south-east Suffolk, often seen as the heartland of the early kingdom of the East Angles.

When Mexico declared independence in September 1821, Chiapas, along with the rest of Central America, joined the new nation. Then, in 1823, precipitated by the collapse of Iturbide's Mexican Empire, the other former Central American provinces broke away to form the Central American Union. Chiapas, though, chose permanent annexation to the Mexican republic the following year. This chapter is organized as follows. The first section reviews the historiography of other regions of Mexico and Central America during these years in order better to understand the way that history and geography may have influenced political and agrarian relations in Chiapas during the half-century after independence. The second section looks at politics and state-building in Chiapas between 1824 and 1855, focusing on the relationship between regional elites in the central valley and the central highlands, national governments, and Indian communities. The third section provides an overview of commercial agriculture, population, and labour, and analyzes the agrarian laws which were passed in the state in the post-independence period. The fourth section examines the process of land privatization in different regions of Chiapas and the relationship between the alienation of public and communal lands and the spread of agrarian servitude — both labour tenancy (known as baldiaje) and debt peonage. The fifth section addresses the question of why, despite the growing dispossession of communal land, no peasant rebellion emerged in Chiapas during these years, while the next section examines the Labour Tenancy Law of 1849, a short-lived attempt to regulate baldiaje and limit the role of servile labour in commercial agriculture. Finally, the last section looks at the impact in Chiapas of the laws of the Reform and civil conflict between liberals and conservatives in the period 1855–67, and highlights the way in which local political factionalism contributed to Chiapas's Caste War of 1869–70.

This chapter considers the agrarian question in Chiapas during the Porfiriato. First, it examines the geographical and financial restrictions faced by rural producers in the state. Second, it analyses quantitative data regarding demography, rural property, investment, output, and labour. Third, it scrutinizes the impact of land legislation and land privatization on rural social relations and agrarian structure. Finally, it addresses historiographical questions regarding the social impact of Porfirian agrarian policy in Chiapas and its role in the Revolution of 1910–20.

This chapter examines pluralism and liberalism, both of which are widely used to characterize Indian society. It argues that, although their meanings overlap to some extent, there are also important differences in their connotations. Tolerance of diversity is an important component of the liberal outlook and plays a critical role in India’s traditional social order. Liberalism is compatible with ‘competitive’ inequality but not with ‘hierarchical’ inequality. This chapter makes a distinction between language and religion on the one hand, and caste and tribe on the other, as markers of enduring social identity. It also looks at the multiplicity and durability of communities of birth, focusing on tribes and castes as well as their mutual relations. The chapter concludes by considering two major policy initiatives undertaken by the Indian government immediately after independence to reduce inequalities and disparities in the interest of equity and social justice: agrarian reform and positive discrimination.

This chapter examines how rustic life was reinvented in the Middle West. In middle America, hicks, hillbillies, and hayseeds drove down the cultural barometer. They spoke in a nasal dialect and perpetuated peculiar locutions, like “crick” and “warsh.” The picture was almost a mirror opposite of the Jeffersonian ideal that saw agrarian life as the taproot of civilization. The heartland was a national embarrassment. Rustics were simpleminded, ignorant, usually boring, and sometimes downright comical. The chapter shows how, between the 1940s and 1960s, heartland residents gained exposure to newer and more positive interpretations of the rustic life. It also considers shifting perceptions of the Wild West in the 1880s by looking at the stories of two Nebraskans: William F. Cody and Polly Spence. Finally, it suggests that the monetary connotation of landownership encourages residents to focus more on the landscape in conjunction with rustic life.

This chapter investigates a neglected political episode of the late 2nd century BC — the expulsion from the Senate, by the censors of 115, of the ex-consul C. Licinius Geta, who was then himself elected as censor for 108. The evidence for these events is very inadequate, but analysis of the narratives of the period in Appian and Sallust enables us to piece together the picture of an arrogant aristocracy and the resistance to it by those who spoke for the Roman People. Geta's family had been responsible for many laws (legendary and historical) for the benefit of the citizens; attention is drawn to a neglected tradition, in Columella, that a tribune Licinius first divided the common land into equal seven-iugera plots after the expulsion of Tarquin, and it is argued that the Licinius Stolo who limited the size of holdings passed his law early in the 2nd century BC.

This chapter explains the organization of production in Sripuram. It investigates the relations which are entered into by the members of the village, among themselves and with outsiders, for the purpose of production. Some brief observations are then reported on the mechanisms of distribution and exchange. Most of the cultivable land in the village is irrigated and used for cultivating paddy. Additionally, most of the land continues to be held by the old landowning class. It is noted that ownership of land is vested in people with different social backgrounds and that landowners do not constitute a homogeneous class. Land has come into the market; the old landowners are now scattered; new laws have been passed which seek to reorganise agrarian relations. Village handicrafts have undergone a process of disintegration. The village has become, in a multitude of ways, part of a much wider economic system.