Land and differentiation in rural Fiji
Date
1989
Authors
Overton, John
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Canberra, ACT : Development Studies Centre, Research School of Pacfic Studies, The Australian National University.
Abstract
Fiji, despite the peculiarities of its indigenous social structure and its land
tenure systems, can be seen to be exhibiting patterns and processes of
socio-economic differentiation that, in some respects, are not unlike those
experienced in rural communities in other parts of the developing world.
Previous explanations of such differentiation pointed to various
dichotomous relations: between traditional and modern, individual and
communal, rural and urban, Fijian and Indian, or capitalist and
proletarian. This study, involving the analysis of survey data on a number
of Fijian communities, questions all these suggested divisions. The
theoretical perspectives adopted to date - modernization or Marxism -
do give some insights into Fijian society but cannot explain the complexity
of social and economic divisions. Instead, it is suggested that
there is no basic pattern of significant socio-economic differentiation
within the Fijian communities studied, though there are major tensions,
conflicts and differences in outlook. Any class divisions that may exist
are predicated externally upon the relations between rural people and
the urban-based entrepreneurs.
Critical in all these relations, and for simmering tensions within rural
society, is land tenure. The case study evidence points not only to severe
pressure on land, and inequalities in land endowment, but also to 'extra
legal' practices being used by landowners and tenants together to circumvent
a cumbersome, inequitable and inflexible official land tenure
system. Land is the key because its availability or otherwise largely
determines the ability of people to engage in commercial agriculture,
their involvement in off-farm labour, and many of their day-to-day
relationships with their neighbours. Differentiation in rural Fiji cannot be
understood without reference to the realities of land and land tenure.
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