Book sparks heated debate on land reform programme
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
December 7, 2012 in Opinion
WHILE stories on Zimbabwe’s controversial land reform programme have
virtually disappeared from the mainstream media, save for tangential
references, a heated debate is raging among scholars on the issue,
especially following the publication of the contentious book, Zimbabwe’s
Land Reform: Myths and Realities, by Professor Ian Scoones, an agricultural
ecologist in the UK, and his local co-authors.
Opinion by Dale Dore
The exercise emerged as a highly contested reform process both nationally
and internationally.
Scoones and colleagues claim to have come up with new, in-depth and
much-needed empirical research showing the process provides the greatest
scope for improving Zimbabwe’s agriculture and development.
However, some researchers such as Zimbabwe’s Dr Dale Doré, former Oxford
scholar and agricultural economist, vehemently disagree.
Ian Scoones and his co-authors caused a splash with the publication last
year of their controversial book Zimbabwe’s Land Reform: Myths and
Realities.
Accompanying the book were a series of eight videos, Voices from the Field,
as well as downloadable summaries, YouTube debates, blogs and interviews
with BBC World TV.
Articles were serialised in The Zimbabwean newspaper and a website was set
up, replete with congratulatory sound-bites from distinguished professorial
colleagues.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. This review therefore
assesses the evidence behind this mass of publicity for the study’s
findings.
It begins with a synopsis of the book as told by its lead author. It then
examines some of the book’s main themes.
The first is the authors’ insistence that their study is based on solid
empirical evidence that is used to analyse the complexities of resettlement.
Second, it reviews the study’s research methods, especially the analysis
used to dismiss the so-called “investment myth”. Third, it looks into the
book’s assumptions, objectives and narrative to explain the gaps in their
story of resettlement.
Finally, the conclusion discusses whether there is any substance to the
hype, and it compares two visions of land policy in Zimbabwe.
The Scoones story
Scoones has told his story to many different audiences, but always in the
same well-practiced and carefully scripted way. In essence, he claims that
the realities on the ground reveal a far more positive picture of
resettlement than the negative images or “myths” portrayed by the media.
He begins his story by noting that the issues surrounding resettlement are
complex and nuanced. He then disarms his audience with certain caveats by
admitting, with hand on heart, that the story of resettlement is mixed.
Yes, he says, the process was deeply problematic. Violence, abuse and
patronage certainly did occur, and Masvingo province’s experiences (research
region) were of course different to other parts of the country.
But these contentious issues are quickly shelved as he deftly steers the
debate towards the study’s main objective, which is to find out how the
livelihoods of those who were resettled had been transformed. “To be
honest,” says Scoones in all sincerity, “we were surprised. We had a whole
set of unexpected results.”
Contrary to the myths that there was no investment in resettlement areas and
that a rural economy had collapsed, their research revealed an important and
as yet untold story of land reform. They found that new patterns of mixed
small-scale farming based on crops and livestock had transformed the dual
agrarian economy. He tells how resettlement has benefitted a broad set of
people: the land-hungry from nearby communal areas, townspeople making a go
for farming and civil servants investing their skills.
One of his main claims was that two-thirds of the settlers were just
ordinary people. Only a few were cronies. In sum: they found hardworking and
entrepreneurial new farmers who made significant investments to create a
vibrant and dynamic rural economy.
But he goes further. Just as commercial farmers were assisted in the 1950s,
and smallholders supported in the 1980s, newly-settled farmers deserve
external support and investment to build on their entrepreneurial dynamism.
Given this opportunity, he claims, new farmers will rise to the occasion by
contributing to local livelihoods, national food security and broader
economic development.
Empirical evidence and complexity
There are two key facets of their study that the authors emphasise.
The first is the strong empirical foundations of their work. Their research,
they say, was based on detailed, solid evidence bought to light by real,
on-the-ground facts involving 400 households across 16 survey sites over a
10-year period.
Moreover, they aver that their study was both objective and balanced because
they were “agnostic to the diversity of theoretical positions”.
The second facet they emphasise is the complexity of resettlement issues.
One of their stated aims was to challenge simplistic generalisation (or
myths) with solid data on complex realities.
For Scoones, it was therefore indefensible for the BBC to treat his
“mountains of research evidence (reality)” as if they were equivalent to an
“unsubstantiated commentary” by the Commercial Farmers Union (myths).
But is Scoones claiming too much for this study? Is it plausible for a study
to be both detailed, empirical and objective as well as also being capable
of analysing complex systems?
Noam Chomsky recently said: “As you deal with more and more complex systems,
it becomes harder and harder to find deep and interesting properties.” He
believes that research needs to confine itself to simple questions to find
credible and convincing answers.
Not surprisingly, Scoones struggles hard to sustain the contradiction
between analytical rigour and complexity. Good examples of this difficulty
are the book’s chapters on labour markets (Chapter 6) and “real” markets
(Chapter 7).
Scoones defends controversial findings
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
December 7, 2012 in Opinion
RECENTLY, in the latest of the Sokwanele “land debate” contributions, Dale
Doré used his slot to critique our work in Masvingo.
Opinion by Ian Scoones
Since the publication of the book, Zimbabwe’s Land Reform: Myths and
Realities, exactly two years ago we have had plenty of reviews, and a number
of critiques.
Most common is the refrain, that Masvingo is different to other areas (of
course, it is: see the blog on Masvingo Exceptionalism). Others have focused
on the credentials and backgrounds of the research team, while others have
questioned our sampling and methodology.
Still others have called us names familiar to the discourse from the
liberation struggle (sell-outs, collaborators, sympathisers, liberals,
apologists and so on). Others have been plain bonkers or simply abusive, and
I won’t share these, in case there is a family readership.
All this shows the heated nature of the debate, and frustrations felt. Doré’s
piece focuses on methodology, while offering no new data to counter our
arguments.
He questions our approach to the study of complexity in particular which
aimed at discovering emergent patterns from diverse data, arguing instead
for a model-driven reductionism.
In this regard, he has problems with our chapters on labour and markets,
suggesting that they are neither novel nor revealing. Well, others disagree,
and so do I.
This data offers, I would argue, fundamentally new insights into labour
regimes and market processes, which have not been discussed before, and
certainly both chapters analyse the processes and outcomes in great detail.
The frustrations Doré feels may be due to disciplinary preferences (he is an
economist), but exploring patterns and processes on the ground in great
detail, I believe has important merits, and reductionist approaches may do
violence to the complexity observed.
Also, as part of his methodological assault, he disputes our use of
baselines against which change is measured. But if you read the book you can
see we were careful on this — using data on nearby communal areas, the past
work of Bill Kinsey and colleagues on old resettlements and the limited
available data on the production and economics of commercial farms.
And in relation to the baseline costs on investments, I am afraid he missed
the detail in the footnotes which contains all the assumptions: the analysis
cannot thus so easily be dismissed as “sheer nonsense”. Doré goes on to
accuse us of simply creating “straw men” myths to ease the flow of our
narrative.
This is an argument I have heard before.
Surely, people have argued, no-one ever believed these myths! Well, just
take a look at any media commentary, donor document and many academic pieces
and you will see these myths (and many more) are alive and well.
A particularly pure form appeared in the press recently penned by University
of Zimbabwe Professor Tony Hawkins if you need convincing further.
Later, in the piece, Doré also accuses us of lack of triangulation, an
approach to probing the robustness of data.
Triangulation may be of methods (and we used every method, qualitative and
quantitative we found appropriate) or of cases (and again the site
comparisons, within and between clusters, was central in the book), although
we do admit that we did find it difficult to gain perspectives from former
farm owners and workers, despite many attempts.
Finally, Doré accuses us of making “egregious false claims” about the
process of land reform.
Again, I beg to differ. Our book offered the stories of what happened on 16
farms — all were different (as is clear from studies from elsewhere). The
simplistic picture Doré paints, backed up not by empirical information, but
by broad proclamations, is not enough to understand the diversity of
settings, processes and outcomes of Zimbabwe’s land reform.
Two years on (and why did it take this long for his review to emerge?), we
actually have many more cases to compare with, improving possibilities of
triangulation. In several talks recently in Harare, I presented a map,
showing all the studies I know about which have looked at what has happened
in the new resettlements since 2000.
It (a series of researches) is an impressive array, with pretty good
geographical coverage, although clearly still some gaps. This is definitely
an incomplete picture, so please let me know if you are doing something that
is not captured here, as it is an important base for comparative analysis
and reflection, both on commonalities and differences.
While there are important variations across sites, there is an emerging,
common story that Doré and others still find difficult to accept. These are
indeed inconvenient truths.
The accumulating and converging evidence points to the following:
A1 farms are doing relatively well (although could do better), with a solid
“middle farmer” group within them who are re-investing profits from
agriculture in their farms.
By contrast, A2 farms have struggled, although things have improved since
the end of hyperinflation and in the multicurrency environment since 2009.
They have been greatly assisted by contract farming arrangements that have
provided much-needed capital and inputs.
Private and community investment in the resettlement areas is significant,
especially in the A1 sites. But more needs to be done, with clear needs for
public investment in infrastructure.
Capture of farms by high-level, politically-connected elites has taken
place, and this varies between different parts of the country, especially in
relation to proximity to Harare. However, even in these areas, the dominant
story remains small and medium-scale A1 and A2 farmers.
A1 farmers, particularly on land that was invaded and occupied, are largely
from nearby communal areas and small towns, while A2 farmers are
predominantly former or serving civil servants, teachers and businesspeople,
with urban connections.
The potential for production across the resettlements is far from being
realised due to inefficiencies in input markets, a lack of credit and rural
finance and the high costs of transition in infrastructure, and up and
downstream industries.
However, production has not collapsed, and is booming in some commodities
and areas. Markets may be informal, but they generate employment and
spin-off benefits from economic linkages in an area.
There are nuances and variations — yes complexity — but the picture is
increasingly clear, as are the policy challenges.
The now infamous five myths we set out to examine in Masvingo are rejected
countrywide, although with important qualifications — as indeed we offered
in the 288 pages of small type in our book for Masvingo.
As Zimbabwe moves into a new phase, and a new election settlement sometime
next year, the more consensus building and solid debate around facts and
evidence that occurs the better.
Scoones is a co-author of the controversial Zimbabwe’s Land Reform: Myths
and Realities.