The Politics of Land Grabbing

State and corporate power and the (trans)nationalization of resistance in Cameroon

Dados Bibliográficos

ID2285667
AutoresRalph Tafon (0000-0003-2264-6892, Sodertorns Hogskola Huddinge Sweden, autor correspondente), Fred Saunders (0000-0002-6112-0984, Sodertorns Hogskola Huddinge Sweden)
Ano2019
Volume19
Fascículo1
Páginas41-63
Data de publicação2019-01-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoJournal of Agrarian Change (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 1471-0358 • E-ISSN: 1471-0366
EditoraWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/joac.12264
OpenAlexW2800712479
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas9
Referências citadas38

Approaching land grabbing as a site of politics wherein power functions in the challenge and/or stabilization of agrarian socioecological injustices, we capture agrarian relations in Cameroon in 2 fundamental ways. Drawing on Laclauian insights, we discuss power as a "counter-hegemonic" practice, to characterize the resistance strategies of local NGOs, in terms of their articulated discourses around the socioecological effects of land grabs, on the one hand, and the political possibilities that this articulatory practice opens, in terms of (trans)nationalizing resistance across social identities and space, on the other hand. Here, the analysis adopts a Foucauldian-inspired critique with strong commitments towards agrarian socioecological justice, in a context where policies to protect democratic access to land are absent. Second, framed as a hegemonic/governmental "form of rule," we capture how state and diplomatic actors sought to override dissent and stabilize the contentious land deal. We also show how a moment of presidential "nondecision," characterized by a hyper-centralized bureaucracy conjoined with these hegemonic forces to disempower local administrative and judicial leverage, thereby fostering corporate power. The article thus contributes to debates on state and corporate powers, as well as the strategies of, or possibilities and constraints for resistance "from below" to irradiate and structure into a compelling force

Agrarian society · Context (archaeology · Dissent · Economic system · Economics · Geography · Hegemony · Land grabbing · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Power (physics · Resistance (ecology · Sociology · State (computer science · African history and culture studies · Agriculture, Land Use, Rural Development · Land Rights and Reforms · Law