Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-nr4z6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-05-08T09:39:27.320Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Rural–Urban Migration and the Rural Alternative in Mwase Lundazi, Eastern Province, Zambia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 May 2014

Jan Kees van Dong
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Rural-urban migration tends to play a central role in analyses of Zambian society. Zambia is, by African standards, a highly urbanized country and has experienced an explosive urbanization since independence. Migration from the rural areas is seen as a major cause for rural stagnation. Consequently it is a major policy goal of the Zambian government to reverse this trend towards more urbanization. The political and academic discussion about this policy is mostly in terms of large aggregates of people; rural versus urban, or peasants and capitalist penetration. For example migration from rural areas to urban centers is seen as a logical consequence of maximizing benefits in individual choices given the market situation (Fry and Maimbo, 1971; Bates, 1976). Another view sees this migration as logical in the interests of international capitalism. Rural-urban migration provides cheap labor of benefit to an export oriented enclave economy. The role of rural areas is limited to the reproduction of labor and this conflicts with a possible role of rural people as commodity producers (Cliffe, 1978).

The danger of such reasoning is that it casts rural people in a passive role, determined by the logic of rural-urban terms of trade or the workings of an all encompassing capitalist system. It implies a centralist view of development (Long, 1977) and overlooks the fact that diverse reactions of peasants are possible, given the influence of a Southern African capitalist system on their economies (Ranger, 1978). This is illuminated by this study of Mwase Lundazi, a chieftainship in Lundazi district, Eastern Province.

Type
Articles
Information
African Studies Review , Volume 27 , Issue 1 , March 1984 , pp. 83 - 96
Copyright
Copyright © African Studies Association 1984

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Amin, S. 1972. “Underdevelopment and Dependence in Black Africa: Origins and Contemporary Forums.” The Journal of Modern African Studies 10/4: 503–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bates, R. H. 1976. Rural Responses to Industrialization: A Study of Village Zambia. New Haven: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Bwalya, M. C. 1980. “Rural Differentiation and Poverty Reproduction in Northern Zambia: The Case of Mpika District,” in Centre of African Studies, University of Edinburgh (ed.) The Evolving Structure of Zambian Society. Proceedings of a seminar held 30 and 31 May 1980.Google Scholar
Chauncey, G. 1981. “The Locus of Reproduction: Women's Labour in the Zambian Copperbelt, 1927–1953.” Journal of Southern African Studies 111: 135–64.Google Scholar
Cliffe, L. 1976. “Rural Political Economy in Africa,” pp. 112–31 in Gutkind, P. W. and Wallerstein, I. (eds.) The Political Economy of Contemporary Africa. Beverley Hills: Sage.Google Scholar
Cliffe, L.. 1978. “Labour Migration and Peasant Differentiation: Zambian Experiences.” Journal of Peasant Studies 5/3: 326–46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Colson, E. and Scudder, T.. 1975. “New Economic Relationships between the Gwembe Valley and the Line of Rail,” pp. 190–213 in Parkin, D. (ed.) Town and Country in Central Africa. London: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
District Notebooks and Annual Reports Lundazi District. Zambia National Archives. KST 1/3 and KST 1/4.Google Scholar
Dumont, R. and Mottin, M–F.. 1980. L'Afrique étrangléé. Paris: DeSeuil l'Histoire immédiate.Google Scholar
Fry, J. and Maimbo, F. J. M.. 1971. “An Investigation into the Change in Terms of Trade between the Rural and Urban Sectors of Zambia.” African Social Research 12: 95–111.Google Scholar
Heisler, H. 1974. Urbanization and the Government of Migration: The Interrelationships of Urban and Rural Life in Zambia. London: C. Hurst.Google Scholar
Henderson, I. n.d. “The Growth of a Wage Earning Labour Force in Colonial Zambia,” in Duplicated Readings for Social Science Foundation Course 1975–1976. Lusaka: University of Zambia.Google Scholar
Libby, R. T. 1980. “Review of ‘Narrowing the Gaps: Planning for Basic Needs and Productive Employment in Zambia’.” The Journal of Modern African Studies 18/1: 160–63.Google Scholar
Long, N. 1968. Social Change and the Individual: A Study of the Social and Religious Responses to Innovation. Manchester: Manchester University Press.Google Scholar
Long, N.. 1977. An Introduction to the Sociology of Rural Development. London: Tavistock.Google Scholar
Marter, A. and Honeybone, D.. 1976. The Economic Resources of Rural Households and the Distribution of Agricultural Development. Lusaka: University of Zambia. Rural Development Studies Bureau.Google Scholar
Marwick, M. G. 1965. Sorcery in Its Social Setting: A Study of the Northern Rhodesia Chewa. Manchester: Manchester University Press.Google Scholar
National Commission for Development Planning; Office of the President; Republic of Zambia. 1979. Economic Report 1979. Lusaka: Government Printer.Google Scholar
Pottier, J. 1980. “The Transformation of a Defunct Labour Reserve: The Case of the Mambwe People of Zambia.” Ph.D. University of Sussex.Google Scholar
Ranger, T. O. 1978. “Growing from the Roots: Reflections on Peasant Research in Central and Southern Africa.” Journal of Southern African Studies 5/1:99–133.Google Scholar
Southall, T. 1980. “Zambia: Class Formation and Government Policy in the 1970s.” Journal of Southern African Studies 7/1: 91–109.Google Scholar
Turok, B. (ed.). 1979. Development in Zambia. London: ZED Press.Google Scholar
Watson, W. 1958. Tribal Cohesion in a Money Economy: A Study of the Mambwe People of Northern Rhodesia. Manchester: Manchester University Press.Google Scholar