The transformation of peasant agriculture is a central concern of many African leaders. Since the population of most African countries is predominantly peasant, rural change is considered a requisite of national development. Several leaders have turned to the socialistic experiences of the Soviet Union and China for models of rural transformation. Some have seen in the idea of establishing rural socialist communities, a notion similar to that of the nineteenth century Russian Narodniki, an appropriate strategy for such transformation. They believe that such communities will involve the peasantry in new political and economic relationships of a sort which will improve the way of life of both rural and urban inhabitants. Among African adaptations are such entities as the Algerian socialist villages and the Tanzanian Ujamaa villages.

Tanzania's efforts to establish Ujamaa villages, in turn, have attracted attention throughout Africa and the Third World. The country formally committed itself to building a socialist state in the Arusha Declaration of early 1967. Major private industries were immediately taken over by the government. Leaders, however, realized that the key to their efforts would be the establishment of socialism in rural areas. In September of 1967 President Nyerere issued a policy paper titled “Socialism and Rural Development,” which proposed the creation of Ujamaa villages where people “lived and worked together for the good of all” (Nyerere, 1967b: 337-66). Since the majority of the peasants lived scattered on individual plots of land outside villages, people had to be moved together.