On ‘Cultural Darning and Mending’: Creative Responses to Ceist an Fhearainn / The land Question in the Gàidhealtachd

2021 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 157-177
Author(s):  
Mairi McFadyen ◽  
Raghnaid Sandilands
Keyword(s):  
Creative Process ◽  
Land Reform ◽  
Reciprocal Relationship ◽  
Consciousness Raising ◽  
Cultural Activism ◽  
Land Question

Mairi McFadyen and Raghnaid Sandilands offer an account of various collaborative contributions and activities relating to creative cultural activism in the context of the Ceist an Fhearainn or the ‘Land Question’ in the Gàidhealtachd. They introduce the metaphor of ‘cultural darning and mending’ to describe a playful yet questioning creative approach that invites people to take agency in their own place, entering into an ethical and reciprocal relationship with the land, its past, people and their stories. They argue that the act of ‘taking cultural ownership’ is a vital step in consciousness-raising for land reform, a creative process that allows us to make imaginative connections that cut across time. By drawing on our pasts to assemble environmentally and socially just futures, they suggest that creative, cultural and convivial activism holds the potential to create the circumstances necessary for transformation and change.

‘The Clach’: Alexander Mackenzie and the Land Question in the Late-Nineteenth Century Highlands and Islands

2017 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 68-86 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ben Thomas
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Land Reform ◽  
Reform Movement ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
Pragmatic Approach ◽  
Early Experiences ◽  
Late Nineteenth ◽  
Land Question

This article uses the career and writings of the Highland land reformer Alexander Mackenzie, to shed new light on the evolution of Highland land reform in the years leading up to the Crofters' Act of 1886. Mackenzie's output as a writer and journalist shows that his early experiences of living and working on the land are vital to understanding his approach to the land question, and led him to focus not on abstract or ideal principles but on building popular consensus to secure the most pressing reforms. This moderate and pragmatic approach was not universally popular though, especially among Mackenzie's more radical reformist contemporaries. The tensions these disagreements created are symptomatic of the problems that beset the ‘Crofting Community’ in the 1880s and ‘90s: problems that would eventually cause the land reform movement to split. Nevertheless, Mackenzie's influence on the Crofters’ War was huge, and deserves greater scholarly recognition.

The Land Question in South Africa: 1913 and Beyond

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cherryl Walker
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Land Reform ◽  
Local Development ◽  
Legal Framework ◽  
Transition To Democracy ◽  
Agrarian Change ◽  
Political Resistance ◽  
History Of ◽  
Land Question ◽  
White Hegemony

Since 1913, the “land question” in South Africa has revolved around the major inequalities in access to and rights over land between the black majority and the white minority of the population, and how these disparities should best be understood and overcome. The roots of this inequality are commonly traced back to the promulgation of the Natives Land Act in June 1913, which provided the legal framework for the subsequent division of the country into a relatively prosperous white heartland and a cluster of increasingly impoverished black reserves on the periphery. Historians have cautioned against according this legislation undue weight within the much longer history of colonization, capitalist penetration, and agrarian change that has shaped modern South Africa. The spatial divide of white core and black periphery has, however, been central to the political economy of 20th-century South Africa. Beginning in the 1950s, the apartheid government attempted to maintain white hegemony, drive an urban–industrial economy, and deflect political resistance by turning these reserves into the ethnic “homelands” of African people. This involved increasingly repressive policies of urban influx control, population relocation, and the tribalization of local administration in the reserves. Since the transition to democracy in 1994, the post-apartheid state has struggled to develop an effective land reform program that can address the crosscutting demands for land redistribution, local development, and representative government that this history has bequeathed. For many analysts, these ongoing challenges mean that “the land question” remains unresolved; for others it means that the question is itself in need of reformulation. In order to review these developments, a three-part periodization is used to organize the discussion: (1) the segregation era (1910–1948), (2) the apartheid era (1948–1990), and (3) the transition to democracy and the post-apartheid era that began in 1990.

Reform and resistance: The political economy of land and planning reform in Kenya

Urban Studies ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 57 (6) ◽  
pp. 1164-1183 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ellen Bassett
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
Land Management ◽  
Land Reform ◽  
The Political ◽  
Land Reforms ◽  
Public Land Management ◽  
Land Politics ◽  
Human Rights Movement ◽  
Land Question

In August 2010, Kenyans voted to adopt a new Constitution. Amongst its many provisions was devolved governance, which established 47 independent counties each led by a directly elected governor and legislative assembly. The Constitution also sought to address the country’s ‘land question’ by radically reworking land institutions and administration. The Constitution introduced an independent body, the National Land Commission, empowered to oversee public land management and allocation. Constitutional provisions devolved significant powers and responsibilities in land management and planning to the county level. These reforms – stressing transparency, accountability and greater community participation in land planning and administration – were intended to halt endemic corruption at the Ministry of Lands, address land injustices, enhance tenure security, and facilitate better-functioning land markets. This paper examines the unfolding institutional reform around land pursuant to the 2010 Constitution. It explores the political economy of land in Kenya by examining incentives for and impediments to institutional change toward better land management and long sought-after land justice. As with many reforms adopted throughout the Global South, Kenya’s land reforms were premised on ‘getting the incentives right’. Incentivising behaviour is extremely complicated in a sector as complex, dynamic and profitable as the land sector. The research highlights the role of urban planners, actors rarely examined in the literature on Kenya’s land politics. Kenya’s faltering land reform is a result of the internal conflicting incentives of land actors and the fact that no legal reform will be sufficient to alter entrenched behaviour without renewed pressure from a broad-based land justice/human rights movement.

‘This is Our land’

2010 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 39-69 ◽  
Author(s):  
A.S. Mlambo
Keyword(s):  
Land Reform ◽  
Fast Track ◽  
Colonial Period ◽  
Decisive Factor ◽  
Land Acquisition ◽  
White Race ◽  
Post Colonial ◽  
Reform Programme ◽  
Land Question

This study seeks to trace the role of race in the evolution of the land question in Zimbabwe from Occupation to the ‘fast-track land reform programme’ of 2000 and beyond to explore the extent to which the era of colonial domination made the racialization of the land issue in the post-colonial period almost unavoidable. It contends that Mugabe’s use of race to justify the campaign to drive whites from the land from 2000 onwards was facilitated (in part) by the fact that race had always been used by the colonial authorities as a decisive factor in land acquisition and allocation throughout the colonial period and that using the alleged superiority of the white race, colonial authorities alienated African land for themselves without either negotiating with the indigenous authorities or paying for the land. Consequently, Mugabe’s charge that the land had been stolen and needed to be retaken clearly resonated with some segments of the Zimbabwean population enough to get them to actively participate in the land invasions of the time.

The Psychology of Creative Processes in Music

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric Fillenz Clarke
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Creative Process ◽  
Psychological Functioning ◽  
Ecological Theory ◽  
Cognitive Models ◽  
Reciprocal Relationship ◽  
Creative Processes ◽  
Social Perspectives ◽  
4E Cognition ◽  
Tuning Systems

In contrast to cerebral or mentalistic psychological accounts of creative processes, this chapter argues for an approach based within the frameworks of ecological theory and 4E cognition—the idea that psychological functioning is embodied, extended, embedded, and enacted. The chapter considers “everyday” and exceptional notions of the creative process and reviews cognitive models of musical creativity as a form of decision-making, as well as the tension between individualistic and social perspectives. As an alternative, it offers an account that recognizes the reciprocal relationship between materials (instruments, notations, tuning systems, recording/playback systems) and human minds and bodies conceived individually and collectively, drawing attention to four important features of musical creating: (1) the different scales at which it takes place, (2) its temporality, (3) its distributed and collaborative character, and (4) its intimate entanglement with environmental affordances.

scholarly journals Writing back to colonialism, again: The novel The Chimurenga Protocol and the ‘new’ resistance literary culture in post-2000 Zimbabwe

Literator ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 36 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Oliver Nyambi
Keyword(s):  
Land Reform ◽  
Fast Track ◽  
National Identities ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Recent Past ◽  
Resistance Literature ◽  
The Third ◽  
Cultural Sphere ◽  
Land Question

Some contemporary Zimbabwean literature demonstrates a discernible resistance thread. These literary works create fictional life-worlds in which the ambivalence of colonial land and economic injustices are exposed as potentially mutating and threatening the independent nation. In this way, such works validate ‘nationalist’ corrective measures through inserting a narrative that implicitly refers back to past colonial imbalances. In the choreographed discourses of national sovereignty that characterise the Third Chimurenga – epitomised by Mugabe’s book Inside the Third Chimurenga – there are perceived dangers from infiltrating forces which pose a threat to the nation’s sovereignty. Britain’s refusal to fund land reform in Zimbabwe is viewed as an implicit declaration of that country’s intention to derail the Zimbabwean people’s movement towards total independence and the ‘fast track land reform’ of the Third Chimurenga. The anti-Britain campaign is inextricably linked to the land question. The cultural sphere (especially its literary, theatrical and musical dimensions) in Zimbabwe’s recent past has been faced with the political urgency of (re)defining the land question. Literary texts such as Nyaradzo Mtizira’s novel The Chimurenga Protocol, theatre performances such as Christopher Mlalazi’s ‘Election Day’ and musical compositions by the war veteran singer Dickson Chingaira are some of the artistic productions that reveal conflicting perspectives on the land and its significance in the people’s search for selfdetermination and national identity. Using the example of Nyaradzo Mtizira’s novel The Chimurenga Protocol, this article argues that whilst many Zimbabwean writers published in the post-2000 period have attempted to imagine ‘alternative’ national identities, the text’s anti-West thematic and aesthetic texture resonates with the state’s post-2000 ideological grand narratives of the nation and can therefore be read as the newest form of resistance literature in Zimbabwe’s postcolonial literary oeuvre.

Beyond Land Redistribution: A Case for Stewardship in Land Reform

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 83-96
Author(s):  
Menard Musendekwa ◽  
Munyaradzi Tinarwo ◽  
Rumbidzayi Chakauya ◽  
Ereck Chakauya
Keyword(s):  
Land Reform ◽  
Indigenous Communities ◽  
African Countries ◽  
Human Right ◽  
Colonial Era ◽  
Post Colonial ◽  
Religious Conflicts ◽  
Current Article ◽  
The Right ◽  
Land Question

The right to own and derive value out of the land, (cf. ownership) is a human right enshrined in the constitution of most democratic countries. Land reform is arguably the most emotional, socio-economic, and political subject of the colonial and post-colonial era of the African continent. It is a subject that has remained sacred and a taboo creating a fertile ground for protracted political, social, economic, and religious conflicts. Many African indigenous communities are genuinely struggling to address inequality and deprivation. Despite the overwhelming economic demand to address the land question, only a handful of African countries have been bold enough to tackle the issue head-on, sometimes with dire consequences. In the current article, we use the Zimbabwe land reform programme as a case and through a biblical lens show cause for land not just as a commodity where belonging is the ultimate deciding factor but rather emphasise ownership by stewardship. This perspective is compatible with modern systems of governance, ubuntu in the African traditional culture, and encourage efficiency of production to achieve food security despite the polarised discourse of land reform in most countries.

Towards a reorientation in land reform: From a market to locality-driven approach in South Africa’s land restitution programme

2012 ◽  
Vol 12 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 173-191 ◽  
Author(s):  
B. Ikubolajeh Logan ◽  
George Tengbeh ◽  
Brilliant Petja
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
Land Reform ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Racial Justice ◽  
The South ◽  
Rural Change ◽  
Market State ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
Land Question ◽  
Land Restitution

Despite general agreement that land reform can be a catalyst for positive rural change in sub-Saharan Africa, the means towards this end are frequently coloured in ideological hues, which manifest themselves in confounding binaries like racial justice/environmental justice, market/state and equity/efficiency. The fractures surrounding sub-Saharan land reform are most obvious in the south, where the land question traces its roots to racially motivated colonial policies. The South African government, like others in the region, is attempting to combat landlessness through market-led land reform. This article assesses the implementation of the country’s Land Restitution Programme in the Polokwane district. Its main argument is that the modernist mega-narratives, which inform the programme, create a disconnect between the state and the landless. To address this problem, the article proposes a reorientation in which local narratives will replace theoretical mega-narratives at the centre of land reform programmes.

Land Reform in Kerala and West Bengal

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anirban Dasgupta
Keyword(s):  
Land Reform ◽  
Industrial Development ◽  
Industrial Sector ◽  
The State ◽  
Iron And Steel ◽  
Role Of The State ◽  
The Status ◽  
Distribution Of Power ◽  
Key Aspects ◽  
Land Question

This chapter examines patterns of land acquisition in the establishment of two enterprises that obtained the status of proto-national industries before independence in 1947: the Tata hydro-electric power companies in the Western Ghats, and the Tata Iron and Steel Company at Jamshedpur. The chapter comparatively shows how the legal instruments of dispossession varied according to the distribution of power, arguing that the entry of Indian capital in the industrial sector in the early twentieth century made possible two seemingly contradictory but mutually constitutive trends: the legal designation of private capital as capable of fulfilling a “public purpose,” and the increasingly direct involvement of the state in resource capture and management for the purpose of industrial development. The chapter uncovers the origins of key aspects of the “land question” in India, including the predominance of domestic over foreign capital, the enabling role of the state, and the persistence of surplus labor.

The Labour Party and Land Reform in the Inter-War Period

Rural History ◽  
2002 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 85-101 ◽  
Author(s):  
MICHAEL TICHELAR
Keyword(s):  
National Parks ◽  
Land Use Planning ◽  
Land Reform ◽  
Labour Party ◽  
Political Agenda ◽  
Important Position ◽  
Land Question ◽  
First Time ◽  
Second World

By the outbreak of the Second World War the ‘Land Question’ had lost its power to generate acute political controversy. Yet the issue of land reform did not disappear with the failure of the 1929–31 Labour Government to reintroduce Lloyd George's land taxes. Land reform after 1914 needs to be rescued from an over-identification with the decline of Radical Liberalism. This article will trace the way Labour Party policy developed after 1914. By 1939 it had adopted a set of policies based on the economic protection of agriculture, increased domestic production and marketing. At the same time it argued for the preservation of the countryside through land-use planning. After 1918 a long-term commitment to land nationalisation began to occupy a more important position in its land reform policies, particularly after 1931. In addition, new measures appeared on the party's political agenda for the first time, including the preservation of the countryside against urban intrusion, access to mountain and moorland, and the creation of national parks.

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