land, rights, and the practice of making a living in pre-saharan morocco PDF
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University of Kentucky UKnowledge Theses and Dissertations--Anthropology Anthropology 2012 LAND, RIGHTS, AND THE PRACTICE OF MAKING A LIVING IN PRE-SAHARAN MOROCCO Karen Eugenie Rignall University of Kentucky, STUDENT AGREEMENT: I represent that my thesis or dissertation and abstract are my original work. Proper attribution has been given to all outside sources. I understand that I am solely responsible for obtaining any needed copyright permissions. I have obtained and attached hereto needed written permission statements(s) from the owner(s) of each third-party copyrighted matter to be included in my work, allowing electronic distribution (if such use is not permitted by the fair use doctrine). I hereby grant to The University of Kentucky and its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible my work in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I agree that the document mentioned above may be made available immediately for worldwide access unless a preapproved embargo applies. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of my work. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of my work. I understand that I am free to register the copyright to my work. REVIEW, APPROVAL AND ACCEPTANCE The document mentioned above has been reviewed and accepted by the student’s advisor, on behalf of the advisory committee, and by the Director of Graduate Studies (DGS), on behalf of the program; we verify that this is the fnal, approved version of the student’s dissertation including all changes required by the advisory committee. The undersigned agree to abide by the statements above. Karen Eugenie Rignall, Student Dr. Lisa Cliggett, Major Professor Dr. Richard Jeffries, Director of Graduate Studies LAND, RIGHTS, AND THE PRACTICE OF MAKING A LIVING IN PRE-SAHARAN MOROCCO ______________________________________ DISSERTATION ______________________________________ A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Kentucky By Karen Eugenie Rignall Lexington, Kentucky Director: Dr. Lisa Cliggett, Associate Professor of Anthropology Lexington, Kentucky 2012 Copyright © Karen Eugenie Rignall 2012 ABSTRACT OF DISSERTATION LAND, RIGHTS, AND THE PRACTICE OF MAKING A LIVING IN PRE-SAHARAN MOROCCO This dissertation explores the relationship between land tenure and livelihoods in pre- Saharan Morocco as an ethical struggle over subsistence rights and the definition of community. Research in an oasis valley of southern Morocco indicated how changing land use practices framed contestations over community, political authority, and social hierarchies. The dissertation specifically examines the extension of settlement and cultivation from the oasis into the arid steppe. The research methodology contextualizes household decision-making around land use and livelihood strategies within the framework of land tenure regimes and other regional, national, and global processes. Households with the resources and prestige to navigate customary tenure regimes in their favor used these institutions to facilitate land acquisition and investments in commercial agricultural production. Rather than push for capitalist land markets, they invoked a discourse of communalism in support of customary regimes. In contrast, marginalized families without access to land mobilized to divide collective lands and secure individual freehold tenure. This complicates a prominent critique in agrarian studies that privatization signals the immersion of peripheral lands into neoliberal tenure regimes. The research shows that in southern Morocco, resistance to communal tenure regimes favoring elites was rooted in a discourse of subsistence rights and ethical claims to membership in a just community rather than a simple acquiescence to the power of neoliberal property relations. The dissertation therefore explores the shifting fault lines of social differentiation and the political and cultural embeddedness of land in processes of "repeasantization," the resurgence of rural peasantries in the context of the growing industrialization of global food production. The research draws on cultural anthropology, geography, and political economy to explore an understudied issue in the anthropology of the Middle East and North Africa: the economic and environmental dimensions of agrarian livelihoods and rural social dynamics from a critical theoretical perspective. KEYWORDS: Land Tenure, Middle East and North Africa, Agrarian Change, Rural Livelihoods, Political Ecology Karen Eugenie Rignall Student's Signature June 7, 2012 Date LAND, RIGHTS, AND THE PRACTICE OF MAKING A LIVING IN PRE-SAHARAN MOROCCO By Karen Eugenie Rignall Lisa Cliggett, PhD Director of Dissertation Richard Jeffries, PhD Director of Graduate Studies June 7, 2012 Date ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS My first thanks go to the friends and research participants in the Mgoun valley and elsewhere in Morocco who made this dissertation possible. I was touched by the generosity with which they shared their stories and by the myriad ways, both large and small, that people in Mgoun welcomed my family into the life of their communities. Rachida and Malika Ouchaou supported our family and enriched my research through their creative insights and extensive networks. Moulay Ahmed El Amrani was the key to my fieldwork experience, facilitating both my professional and personal relationships. Mastafa Zahir and Elphège Ghestem welcomed us in Rabat and were instrumental in the choice of Mgoun for the research. Lahcen Azghari, Said Samlali, and El Houcine Attar were my closest collaborators in the research. The Ait el Hashimis were my second family, and there are many more people throughout the valley who I cannot name but who were deeply generous and welcoming. I can only hope that the profound personal experience my fieldwork represented finds some expression in the written product. The fieldwork was made possible by the National Science Foundation (project award no. 0920370) and the Wenner Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research (project award no. 8064). I am grateful for graduate support funding from the University of Kentucky as well the University of Kentucky Multi-Year Fellowship that made my graduate work possible. The Department of Anthropology was a wonderful place to do a PhD and I am grateful for the intellectual environment and institutional support. I want to thank MaryBeth Chrostowsky, Allison Harnish, Maria Moreno, and Monica Stephens for their camaraderie in our writing group. Thanks also to my cohort, Alissa Lamb, Lizz New, and Sheila Dorsey Vinton and the many other graduate students who created such a collegial environment in the department. Ilana Feldman, Mani Limbert, and Jessica Winegar offered warm encouragement along the way and models of anthropological scholarship to which I aspire. iii Jim Miller and Saadia Maski of the Moroccan-American Commission for Educational and Cultural Exchange assisted with the research clearance process and otherwise facilitated my fieldwork by welcoming me into their community of scholars. Mohamed Ait Hamza of the Institut Royal de la Culture Amazighe provided patient guidance that reinforced the foundation laid by his extensive scholarship on the region.Yahia Bouabdellaoui of the Institut Agronomique et Vétérinaire Hassan II was a welcoming interlocutor who related my experiences to the broader context of Morocco. Myriem Noussairi and Aziz Rahou of the United Nations Development Program were generous with their time and resources. Many local, provincial, and national government officials were similarly supportive of my work. My dissertation committee, Lisa Cliggett, Deborah Crooks, Hsain Ilahiane, Diane King, and Jerry Skees, mentored me throughout my graduate work, offering me richly diverse perspectives on how to conduct ethical, relevant research. As my dissertation chair, Lisa Cliggett was particularly supportive and provided a model for how to become a critically engaged anthropologist. Hsain Ilahiane provided uniquely helpful guidance based on his experience in the tamazirt. In the geography department, Morgan Robertson and Tad Mutersbaugh offered critical feedback at all stages of the project. I would like to thank my parents, Raymond and Raymonde Rignall, for instilling me with a curiosity about the world that hinges on ethical engagement and for their unwavering encouragement. My other parents, Sami and Betty Kalliney, patiently supported us in our various wanderings; it was their personal sacrifice that enabled the fieldwork to get started at all. Finally, my thanks go to Peter, who gave me immeasurable support and intellectual inspiration. This dissertation reflects the space he provided, the theoretical insights he offered, and the collective adventure that made the experience of fieldwork so rich. Nedjma and Zayd embraced the experience with their creative resilience, and this dissertation also reflects the many lessons they taught me. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ......................................................................................................................... iii LIST OF TABLES ...................................................................................................................................... vii LIST OF FIGURES ................................................................................................................................... viii Chapter 1--Introduction and theoretical framework ..................................................................................... 1 Overview of the argument ........................................................................................................................ 6 Theoretical framework of the dissertation: a political ecology of land use change .................................. 9 A political economy perspective on land use change ............................................................................. 18 The institutional dimensions of agrarian change .................................................................................... 22 Dissertation overview ............................................................................................................................. 25 Chapter II--Research site and methods ....................................................................................................... 31 Local histories: situating el Harte, Rbat/Imzilne, and el Bour ................................................................ 36 Research methods ................................................................................................................................... 47 Working with households: the organization of domestic life ................................................................. 60 Chapter III--The Mgoun Valley in context ................................................................................................. 65 Ethnographic perspectives on marginality in Mgoun ............................................................................. 67 The not-so-secret prison and the new state of proximity ........................................................................ 71 Mapping poverty in Morocco ................................................................................................................. 75 Useful and useless agriculture ................................................................................................................ 79 Agriculture and the state in Mgoun ........................................................................................................ 85 Chapter IV--Customary institutions and the social life of rural capitalism in Mgoun ................................ 93 Situating the private and the collective in a rural tenure regime ............................................................ 98 The rise of commercial agriculture, exchange values in land, and the mediation of custom ............... 105 The ambivalence of communality in el Harte's diverse economy ........................................................ 116 Chapter V--Land use change the new spatiality of livelihoods ................................................................ 124 Where the oasis ends and the steppe begins: the cultural construction of boundaries ......................... 127 Rooting new forms of mobility in the steppe: land extensions as livelihood transformation ............... 133 Understanding diversity through an analysis of differentiation: case studies....................................... 147 Understanding wealth dynamics in the context of land use change ..................................................... 162 Chapter VI--The practice of agriculture and peasantization in Mgoun .................................................... 168 Spatial dimensions of peasantization .................................................................................................... 174 Farming systems in the era of migration .............................................................................................. 180 Risk management through time ............................................................................................................ 184 Spatial dimensions of farm management .............................................................................................. 187 v Integration in oasis farming .................................................................................................................. 190 What makes this agriculture commercial? ............................................................................................ 192 Profit in the margins ............................................................................................................................. 196 Moving in and out of the market .......................................................................................................... 198 Patterns of differentiation in agriculture ............................................................................................... 203 Furtive home-building and everyday struggles over land .................................................................... 214 Competing enclosures and the right to subsistence .............................................................................. 216 Enclosure: redefining community or a last bulwark against neoliberal tenure? ................................... 226 Chapter VIII--Conclusion ......................................................................................................................... 232 A regional political ecology linking land, rights, and livelihoods ........................................................ 236 An institutional perspective: customary tenure regimes and rural capitalism in Mgoun ..................... 237 Household livelihood strategies and land use change .......................................................................... 238 The practice of agriculture and repeasantization .................................................................................. 240 Collective action and competing enclosures in Mgoun ........................................................................ 241 Policy perspectives on livelihoods and land use change ...................................................................... 242 APPENDIX A: NOTE ON TRANSLITERATION .................................................................................. 246 APPENDIX B: GLOSSARY OF TERMS................................................................................................ 247 BIBLIOGRAPHY ..................................................................................................................................... 248 VITA ......................................................................................................................................................... 264 vi
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