In James Scott’s novel Weapons of the Weak: Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance he plainly describes what can only be viewed as the worsening of the lives of the village poor in Sedaka, Malaysia. He attributes the increase in economic inequality to Malaysia’s green revolution. Consequently, Scott analyzes the impact of these changes on the poor, sighting several causes.
The green revolution began in the 1970’s in Malaysia. It was brought about by an advance in technology, a new form of high yielding seeds. These new seeds led to the ability to double crop, or have more than one crop yield per season. Also, many of the large farmers opted to bring in combine harvesters to increase the speed at which they could harvest, making it easier for them to double crop. These new technologies may seem economically beneficial to all if viewed by the untrained observer. However, those who benefited were few. These new developments only benefited the wealthiest in society, consequently leaving the poor even poorer for many reasons.
More than anything the combine harvesters led to the increased troubles of Sedaka’s poor. “Combine harvesting has meant, then, a loss of nearly half the wages previously received for paddy work by the poorer strata of Muda’s peasantry (76)”. Combine harvesters were valued by many large farmers as brilliant new technology. It allowed for them to eliminate the need of a labor force for cutting and threshing. “By the irrigated season of 1979 … they (combine harvesters) were harvesting fully 60 percent of Sedaka’s patty land. A year later they were harvesting more than 80 percent (115)”. Transplanting was the only work left for patty workers in Sedaka. Thus a problem presented itself for the one-quarter of Sedaka’s population who subsisted solely from wage labor.
Combine harvesters also allowed for large farmers to take up the practice of broadcasting, which took work away from those who helped with the pre-season planting. The lack of work led to a decrease in the need for laborers. Since there was less demand for laborers, the price of wages went down. This greatly affected those who did not have enough land to provide year round subsistence for their families. This group of poor who farmed less than 3 relong, in other words those considered below the poverty level, had to struggle to survive. Some peasants had to move temporarily or permanently to larger cities to find work to provide for their families.
After the civil war, America found itself with a high production rate, resulting in overproduction and falling of prices, as well as an increase on economic stress and the beginning of panic and prosperity cycles. The wars demand for products had called for a more efficient production system; therefore new machinery had come into place. New tools, such as the reaper, shown in document D, the wheat harvest of 1880, were introduced and facilitated production for farmers, making overproduction more probable. Variation on prices than begun to occur as shown in document A, Agriculture prices in 1865-1900, where a greater amount of goods became available for a more convenient price. This had farmers in distress, for they were losing more money than they were making.
Even with these faults, this society appreciates the hard work of farming compared to the easy way of living today. One point of Berry’s argument is that he believes that the land is falling more and more into the hands of speculators and professional people from the cities, who, in spite of all the scientific agricultural miracles, still have more money than farmers. Big technology and large economies have caused more abandonment of land in the country than ever before. Many of the great farmers are clearly becoming different because they lack manpower and money to maintain properly. The number of part-time farmers and ex-farmers increases every year due to the problems with money and resources.
Even tho the green revolution had stopped starvation in some of the world, it has also caused some. The green revolution was the use of new technology to grow food for the people of the world that started in the 1950’s. These new technology were such things as Gmo’s, pesticides, fertilizers. The main goal was to stop hunger and make second and third world countries better and not living in poverty. The green revolution Raised the amount of food in the world, made the world's population increase in a dangerous rate and harmed and damaged the earth and its people.
At the same time, the local agricultural economy was experiencing a deep economic depression due to the severe droughs that had occured throughout the past decade. The loss of crops cut out the average farmers'/planters' main food source as well a...
After the devastation left from the Civil War, many field owners looked for new ways to replace their former slaves with field hands for farming and production use. From this need for new field hands came sharecroppers, a “response to the destitution and disorganized” agricultural results of the Civil War (Wilson 29). Sharecropping is the working of a piece of land by a tenant in exchange for a portion of the crops that they bring in for their landowners. These farmhands provided their labor, while the landowners provided living accommodations for the worker and his family, along with tools, seeds, fertilizers, and a portion of the crops that they had harvested that season. A sharecropper had “no entitlement to the land that he cultivated,” and was forced “to work under any conditions” that his landowner enforced (Wilson 798). Many landowners viewed sharecropping as a way to elude the now barred possession of slaves while still maintaining field hands for labor in an inexpensive and ample manner. The landowners watched over the sharecroppers and their every move diligently, with harsh supervision, and pressed the sharecroppers to their limits, both mentally and physically. Not only were the sharecroppers just given an average of one-fourth of their harvest, they had “one of the most inadequate incomes in the United States, rarely surpassing more than a few hundred dollars” annually (Wilson 30). Under such trying conditions, it is not hard to see why the sharecroppers struggled to maintain a healthy and happy life, if that could even be achieved. Due to substandard conditions concerning sharecropper’s clothing, insufficient food supplies, and hazardous health issues, sharecroppers competed on the daily basis to stay alive on what little their landowners had to offer them.
Many of us view poverty as mainly a third world issue, because it tends to have little effect on the majority of individuals on a recurring basis. Yet, it is a difficult situation prevalent in all types of civilization, despite the overall advances in technology, medicine and education that one country may have over the other. Poverty does not necessarily have to affect a specific individual, but as a country, it affects all levels of production; even when the production of a single country begins to falter, it could potentially have major effects on others, creating a continuous cycle.“Poverty is color blind”, it does not discriminate, and is a societal problem that needs to be dealt with today (Fullerton, par. 3). If not helped or solved,
The smallholders (farmers) were in “the midst of a nation brought to the verge of moral, political and material ruin” (Foner, 2013,p.642). They have been faced by numerous struggles politically as well as economically. To begin with, they were denied the right to direct vote and choose a representative to remedy their problems. Corruption has manifested through the congress and legislatures. The capitalists hav...
Augusta Dwyer, a journalist strongly decribes the struggle, and despair that occur in third world countries. He book is based on breaking chains in poverty in a effective and more governmental situated way, that just added democracy to its part. He book decribes four social movements, which are the following; the Landless Rural Workers Movement (MST) in Brazil, the Peasant Union of Indonesia (SPI), the Indian Alliance, and Argentina’s National Movement of Factories Recovered by Workers (MNFRT). The title term “broke but unbroken” provides the meaning of what the book structures out to be: identifying the intersections of hopelessness and hope where grassroots social movements concentrate their efforts on diminishing poverty in a more sustainable and effective way than governments or aid institutions. A major theme throughout the book is how the
Imagine you are born into an impoverish country where government officials take advantage of the poor and the struggle to make ends meet are no longer endurable. To what extent would you go to get out of poverty? In Paul Farmer’s Pathologies of Power, the stories of two Haitians, Acephie Joseph and Chouchou Louis exposed the injustice poor people faced in underprivileged country. In the chapter “On Suffering and Structural Violence” Farmer makes a valid and supportive argument on how those individuals were constrained by poverty and suffered structural violence. Paul farmer defines structural violence as continuously suffering inflicted on the poor by people of power such as government
During the 1930s, the country was in a state of economic depression. Some Americans lost their jobs, while others received a pay cut. There was a low amount of cash circulating the system, and most items were bought on credit. Because families were low on money, they could only buy the bare necessities. They had to spend their money wisely. Since only a minimum amount of food was bought, the supply of crops exceeded the demand. This caused the prices for farmers selling crops to decline. Therefore, the cost of production was more than the profit of selling the crops, making it extremely difficult for farmers to survive.
Just as food insecurity and social agricultural movements are no longer limited to the Global South, so to have such movements extended beyond the borders of rural landscapes into urban settings across the globe (Dubbeling, & Merzthal, 2006, pp. 20, 21; De Zeeuw, Van VeenHuizen, & Dubbeling, 2011, pp.
Our nation was founded on agriculture, and for hundreds of years we were able to migrate across the nation bringing our farming tools and techniques with us. Technology has driven populations away from rural areas towards industrialized cities. With money now being pumped into cities, rural farmers are suffering the most. Farmers are taking out large loans in order to sustain their farms, leading to debt and in some cases suicide. Patel spoke about a farmer in India whose husband took his life because he was unable to live with the amount of debt from his struggling farm. This man left his wife and chi...
Social satisfaction often came from within the household, by working together and other rural-like amusements. Families often relied upon one another for both, economic and social support, and their communities played a role as well. They lived in small villages, either working in agriculture or as skilled craftsmen. Often everything was performed by hand. During the transition to industrial revolution living, new employment opportunities opened up for women, men and children alike. Families split apart, moved away, or engaged in work that other people of the same gender and age would themselves engage in. Enclosures laws required that grazing grounds be fenced in at the owner 's expense and as a result left many families bankrupt. Machines now capable of huge outputs made small hand weavers extinct. Working in a factory was the only choice which remained for many people. Harsh working conditions, reduced wages, longer working hours (up to 18 hours/day) left time for little to no family contact all of which contributed to the breakdown of traditional rural family values. . Furthermore, dwelling units were often shared with other
On today’s life, social inequality is given based on a variety of different characteristics, of race, ethnicity, gender, culture, economic class, immigration status, and sexual preference that a person may have. It is the power of privilege the holds the honor and respect, and the prestige of income and property, that wins every time. Auto-differentially positioning the poor as minority groups to hold less power, and manipulated by those who want to maintain themselves as elite. “Often experiencing unequal treatment compared to the dominant group, giving them a collective sense of being discriminated against” (Carl 2013, Pg.41) It is clear that society still struggles to find opportunities to live in equality with the poor. Rewarding them with only unequal distribution of opportunities that only increases, today’s wage gap and the disadvantages that they must overcome on their way to survive and succeed in life. What factors can increase this inequality? The poor must overcome the lack of economic resources, the stereotypes created among their group, and the government cutbacks that they must live on their daily basis till the rest of their lives.
Agriculture has changed dramatically, especially since the end of World War II. Food and fibre productivity rose due to new technologies, mechanization, increased chemical use, specialization and government policies that favoured maximizing production. These changes allowed fewer farmers with reduced labour demands to produce the majority of the food and fibre.