The Scarce State

Inequality and Political Power in the Hinterland

Datos Bibliográficos

ID19904060
AutoresNoah L Nathan (0000-0002-3681-4925, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, autor de correspondencia)
Año2023
Fecha de publicación2023-01-31
Open AccessSí
TipoBOOK
RevistaScarce State (SOURCE_BOOK)
EditorialCambridge University Press (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1017/9781009261111
OpenAlexW4321483699
Open LibraryOL48180139M
ISBN9781009261111
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas16

States are often minimally present in the rural periphery. Yet a limited presence does not mean a limited impact. Isolated state actions in regions where the state is otherwise scarce can have outsize, long-lasting effects on society. The Scarce State reframes our understanding of the political economy of hinterlands through a multi-method study of Northern Ghana alongside shadow cases from other world regions. Drawing on a historical natural experiment, the book shows how the contemporary economic and political elite emerged in Ghana's hinterland, linking interventions by an ostensibly weak state to new socio-economic inequality and grassroots efforts to reimagine traditional institutions. The book demonstrates how these state-generated societal changes reshaped access to political power, producing dynastic politics, clientelism, and violence. The Scarce State challenges common claims about state-building and state weakness, provides new evidence on the historical origins of inequality, and reconsiders the mechanisms linking historical institutions to contemporary politics

Clientelism · Democracy · Development economics · Economics · Elite · Grassroots · Inequality · Market economy · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Power (physics) · Scarcity · Shadow (psychology) · Sociology · State (computer science) · Land Rights and Reforms · Law · Political Economy and Marxism · politics and government · united states