Groups, classes and peasant politics in Ghana and Papua New Guinea

Abstract

This thesis is a study of the politics of the big peasant class in Ghana and Papua New Guinea . The big peasants emerged from pre-existent rural elites during the development of cash cropping associated with the interaction between Ghanaian and Papua New Guinean societies and the world economy . Some attempt is made to take account of the diversity of local responses to that interaction. The politics of the big peasantry was mainly group politics . These groups were primarily parochial . They had national linkages through brokers and reciprocal relationships with governmental personnel , particularly in agricultural extension services . It was not until the 1950s that Ghanaian big peasants formed an interest group on the national level . In Papua New Guinea big peasant interest associations have yet to transcend provincial boundaries. The arguments about the nature of the big peasants' socioeconomic development and for group-oriented politics are elucidated in a series of case studies of big peasant/group politics ill various locales. Two chapters , three and seven , provide a general introduction to the rural development of Gnana and Papua New Guinea and serve as background to the case studies. An emphasis has been placed on the innovative , restless elements of peasant character . The big peasants in Ghana and Papua New Guinea are innovative for two reasons : an initial security based on the subsistence affluence of their societies , and increasing awareness of their position within a terminal development economy. The big peasants' entrepreneurial activism is in fact a frenetic attempt to evade the reality that they are in an economic cul de sac.