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Peasantry: delineation of a sociological 
concept and a field of study
Teodor Shanin

European Journal of Sociology / Volume 12 / Issue 02 / November 1971, pp 289 ­ 
300
DOI: 10.1017/S0003975600002332, Published online: 28 July 2009

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Teodor Shanin (1971). Peasantry: delineation of a sociological concept 
and a field of study. European Journal of Sociology, 12, pp 289­300 
doi:10.1017/S0003975600002332

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 P E A S A N T R Y : D E L I N E A T I O N
OF A S O C I O L O G I C A L C O N C E P T
A N D A F I E L D OF S T U D Y

i. The Genesis.

R U R A L sociology as a discipline in its own right emerged in the United

States at the turn of the century, and only subsequently appeared in
Europe (i). It was, however, focused on farming as an occupation rather
than on peasants as a social entity. The systematic study of peasantry
originated in Central and Eastern Europe; not surprisingly, because in those
societies a rapidly 'westernizing' intelligentsia was faced by a peasantry—
the poorest, most backward and numerically the largest section of their
nations. The issue of the peasantry became closely entangled with, and
re-inforced by, the ideologies of populism, socialism and modernization, as
well as with the re-discovery of the national self by people suppressed by
the Russian, Austrian, German and Turkish Empires. Consequently,
political leaders, social scientists and scores of amateur ethnographers
turned their attention to the peasant.
Since the 1920's European research into peasantry has encountered adverse
conditions. Nationalist ideologies, military dictatorships and Russian
collectivization favoured neither peasant political movements nor specific
studies of peasantry. The few studies of peasants published in English
remained individual ventures (2). Furthermore, western social scientists,
particularly anthropologists, found themselves conceptually handicapped
by the prevailing typological dualism of 'pre-industrial' or 'primitive' versus
'industrial' or 'modern' societies (3). (This type of analysis seemed, on
the whole, to follow the 'western' ethnocentric preoccupation with industrial-
ization and parliamentary democracy, as self-evident road toward progress).
In such a conceptual framework peasants disappeared as a specific entity:
bound together in a common category with neolithic tribesmen, Chinese
gentry and so on, they were encompassed under the general heading of
'primitive societies'. The impressive work which persevered in some of
the East European countries—notably in Poland (4)—was seldom translated

(1) Rural sociology as a specific subject ful fusion of East European "peasant studies"
has been taught at the University of Chicago and the expertise of U.S. rural and general
since 1892. In 1917 a section of rural sociology.
sociology was established by the American (3) See for example the testimony of
Sociological Association. R. REDFIELD in his Peasant Society and
(2) For example the studies by Tawney Culture (Chicago 1956), chapter I.
and Fei (China), Maynard (Russia), Arens- (4) Bibliografia Sociologii Wsi Polskiej
berg (Ireland), etc. The classical Polish 1918-1965 (Warszawa 1967) quotes about
Peasant in Europe and America by W. I. THO- 200 publications by Polish rural sociologists
MAS and F. ZNANIECKI (first published in during the 1918-1939 period (and as many
New York, 1918-1920) was a highly success- as 710 during 1918-1965).

Arch, europ. social. XII (1071), 289-300.

 TEODOR SHANIN

and made no impact on the explosion of sociological literature after World

War II.
The current growth of interest in peasant societies has been related to the
fact that to scholars and laymen alike the great unknown of the peasant
majority has slowly emerged as one of the major structural determinants
which make the so-called 'developing societies' into what they are. This
growth of interest in peasant societies relates also to certain developments in
anthropology. Western anthropologists have been running short of 'un-
spoiled' tribes and closed 'folk' communities. More important, Kroeber's
Redfield's re-conceptualization (see below) and U.N. sponsored "develop-
ment programs" have focused scholarly attention on peasantry. As a
result scores of students and considerable resources, especially in the U.S.,
have been drawn into studies of peasant societies, generating a wave of
monographs, a number of illuminating analytical contributions and some
amazing displays of national egotism, in rediscoveries of truths long known
outside the autarky of the English-speaking publishing world.

2. The Realism of the Concept.

In view of the large number of peasant studies already in existence,

there is something amusing, if not grotesque, in the failure of scholars to
reach general agreement even on the very existence of the topic under con-
sideration, i.e. of peasantry as a valid concept representing a real social
entity. To many scholars, the unlimited diversity of peasants in different
villages, regions, countries and continents makes any such generalisations
'spurious and misleading'. Moreover, to a large number of scholars,
peasant societies, which appear to disintegrate under the impact of the
'modernising' forces of industrialisation and urbanisation, do not seem
worthy of forward-looking scholarly attention. Already at the beginning
of the century both these issues were brought brilliantly ad absurdum by
two short pronouncements of the 'father' of Russian Marxism, Plekhanov.
He declared: "Peasantry is not a class but a notion" and "peasantry does not
exist, historically speaking"—that in a country in which 85% of the popula-
tion were peasants. Mitrany's study provides an extensive if somewhat
one-sided exposition of such powerful ideological blinds operating when
peasantry is concerned (5).
The existence of peasantry as a real and not purely semantic concept,
can be claimed for both empirical and conceptual reasons. Firstly, it is
sufficient to read concurrently a sequence of peasant studies originating in
countries as far removed in their physical and social conditions as Russia.
Hungary, Turkey, China, Japan, India, Colombia and so on, to note numer-
ous similarities. In Redfield's words, there is "something generic about
it" (6). There are, of course, important differences, but what is striking

(5) D. MITHANY, Marx against the Peas- (6) REDFEBLD, op. cit. p. 25.
ant (New York 1961).

290
 PEASANTRY

is in Erasmus' words "the persistence of certain peasant attributes" (7) in

societies so far removed.
Conceptually, a tendency to treat 'peasantry' as a bodiless notion can be
countered on grounds related to the essence of sociology—to the trivial
but often forgotten truth that a sociological generalization does not imply a
claim of homogeneity, or an attempt at uniformity. Quite to the contrary,
a comparative study implies the existence of both similarities and differences,
without which a generalization would be, of course, pointless. In pursuing
"a generalizing science" a sociologist lays himself open to the outrage of the
adherents of those disciplines in which the study of uniqueness is central,
and easily develops into a canon of faith. Many such complaints are based
on misunderstanding. Some of them illustrate the limitations of the
sociologist's trade, and of any conceptualization of an unlimitedly unique
reality. In Max Weber's words: "The science of sociology seeks to formul-
ate type concepts and generalized uniformities of empirical process". In
such study "sociological analysis both abstracts from reality and at the same
time helps us to understand it, in that it shows with what degree of approxi-
mation a concrete historical phenomenon can be subsumed under one or
more of these concepts". Consequently, "[...] the abstract character of
sociology is responsible for the fact that, compared with actual historical
reality, they [i.e. sociological concepts—T.S.] are relatively lacking in full-
ness of concrete content" (8).

3. The Main Traditions of Thought.

In the framework of thought which accepts both the brief of sociology

as "a generalizing science" and the existence of peasantry as a specific, world-
wide type of social structure, we can discern four major conceptual tradi-
tions: the Marxist class theory, "the specific economy" typology, the ethno-
graphic cultural tradition, and the Durkheimian tradition as developed by
Kroeber and allied to functionalist sociology. Each of the traditions tends
to stress a particular aspect of peasant livelihood (with a frequent tendency
to view this aspect monistically, as the determinant of all others) and adopts
a closely related approach to the analysis of social change and of disinte-
gration of peasantry in the "modern world".
The marxist tradition of class analysis, in particular when presenting
two-class models of society (i.e. in the tradition of the "Communist Mani-
festo" rather than of the '18th Brumaire' (9)), has approached peasantry
in terms of power relationships. Peasants were viewed as the suppressed and

(7) C. ERASMUS, Upper Limits of Peasant- and Economic Organisation (London 1964),
ry and Agrarian Reform: Bolivia, Venezuela pp. 109-110.
and Mexico Compared, Ethnology, XI (9) For an elaboration of the differences
(1967), p. 350. see S. OSSOWSKI, Class Structure in the Social
(8) Max WEBER, The Theory of Social Consciousness (London 1963).

291
 TEODOR SHANIN

exploited producers of pre-capitalist society. Contemporary peasantry

appears as a leftover from an earlier social formation, its original character-
istics reinforced by remaining at the bottom of the social power structure.
Powerlessness and productivity are the essential features of peasants under
such a definition. They account for peasant domination by powerful
minorities and for the expropriation of agricultural surpluses which secure
the conspicuous consumption of the ruling class and lead to the repeated
attempts at peasant revolt. The process of expropriation of agricultural
surpluses from peasantry leads on the other hand to accumulation of capital
and creation of new class structures, culminating in the disappearance of both
the ancien regime and peasantry as such (10). The influence of such analyses
can be traced in much of the current work on South East Asia, Latin America
and to an extent on Africa (i i).
The second tradition has viewed peasant social structure as being deter-
mined by a specific type of economy, the crux of which lies in the way a
family-farm operates. The roots of this approach too, can be traced to
Marx, but it was explicitly formulated by Vasilichakov in 1881 (12). The
familistic nature, the highly autonomous and consumption-based character
of the small farm enterprise determine a specific peasant economy which,
in turn, generates typical peasant social structure and a peasant/non-peasant
dualism on the national level (13). The extension of market economy,
money exchange, wage labour, cheap mass production, etc., make for the
disintegration of peasantry. A number of Western economic anthropol-
ogists such as R. Firth or M. Nash, the recently rejuvenated Chayanov and
many current East European scholars follow this line of thinking (14).
Andrew Pierce's stress on land communities can be understood as developing
the same theme (15).
The third tradition, which stems from East-European ethnography as
well as from traditional Western anthropology tends to approach peasants
as the representatives of an earlier national tradition, preserved through
"cultural lag", by the inertia typical of peasant societies. Such an analysis
focuses on the traditional obstacles to industrialization and 'modernization'
and on the gradual acculturation to 'Western' and urban standards of
rationality which operate as the major mechanisms of peasant dissolution.
In G. M. Foster's words: "It is the relationship between city and village—

(10) For an excellent presentation of the 1881).

case see E. MANDEL, Marxist Economic (13) For amplification see J. H. BOEKE,
Theory (London 1968). Economics and Economic Policy of Dual
(11) For an exemple see G. AHRIGHI and Society (New York 1953).
J. S. SAUL, Socialisms and Economic (14) R. FIRTH, Human Types (London
Development in Tropical Africa, Journal 1960); M. NASH, Primitive and Peasant
of Modern African Studies, VI (1968), 141- Economic Systems (San Francisco 1966);
196. A. V. CHAYANOV, The Theory of Peasant
(12) Karl MARX, Pre-capitalist Economic Economy (Homewood 1966).
Formation (London 1965), also volume III (15) A. PIERCE, The Latin American
of Capital; A. VASILICHAKOV, Sel'skii Byt Peasant (London 1971).
» Sel'skoe Khoxyaistvo v Rosii (St. Petersburg

292
 PEASANTRY

the cultural lag that we always find, which keeps peasants backward and
old-fashioned—that is static. Once this cultural lag disappeared, as it
increasingly does in an industrial world, peasants disappear (16)".
The fourth tradition, originating with Durkheim, has followed a
rather devious path. The basic dualism accepted by Durkheim and his
generation (Tonnies, Maine, etc.), divides societies into traditional
and modern. Those traditional are made up of social segments—auton-
omous, closed, uniform, informal and cohesive. Those modern are based
upon division of labour and necessary, 'organic' and formalized interaction
of their units (17). Kroeber later referred to peasants as "[...] definitely
rural [...] part societies with part cultures", i.e. partly open segments of a
town centred society (18). Such a definition places peasantry in an inter-
mediate position between self-sufficient segments of the 'folk' societies and
the modern societies of 'organic' interaction. Peasant part-segments were
subsequently made by Redfield the cornerstone of a conceptualization
accepted by the majority of American anthropologists, with the consequent
effect of recurrent reification as self-evident truth by the sheer volume of
monotonous repetition. An increase in societal complexity, multiplication
of institutions and the functionally necessary reintegration of social structure
are accepted in this tradition as the mechanisms of social change. This was
an essential tenet of Durkheimian theory, put in a more sophisticated form
in the contemporary functionalist theories of change (19).
The most interesting theoretical developments of the last decade are
related to attempts to broaden the analysis and conceptualization of peasant-
ry, incorporating a broader variety of aspects considered. E. Wolf, whose
work is particularly noteworthy in that sense, has transcended the initial
'Redfieldian' approach by turning attention from 'culture' to the power and
economic aspects of the peasant vs. non-peasant social duality (20). Galeski
has integrated the "specific economy" and the Marxian class analysis in his
approach (21). Barrington Moore Jr. explored the impact of different
histories of landlord-peasant relations on the character of the modern state.
Works of historians, and economists such as those of E. Hobsbawm,
D. Thorner and D. Warriner, have facilitated broadening of the outlook
of contemporary sociologists and anthropologists (22).

(16) J. POTTER, M. N. DIAZ and G. M. (21) B. GALESKI, Rural Sociology (Man-

FOSTER, Peasant Society (Boston 1967), Chester 1971).
p. 17. (22) Barrington MOORE JR., Social Origins
(17) E\ DURKHEIM, The Division of of Dictatorship and Democracy (Boston 1966);
Labour in Society (first published in 1893). E. HOBSBAWM, Primitive Rebels (Manchester
(18) A. L. KROEBER, Anthropology (New 1959); D . THORNER, Peasant Economy as a
York 1948), p. 248. Category of Economic History, II' Confi-
(19) N . J. SMELSER, Theory of Collective rence Internationale d'histoire iconomique
Behaviour (London 1962); S.N. EISENSTADT, [Aix-en-Provence], II (1962), 287-300, repr.
Modernization: Protest and Change (Engle- in Economic Weekly [Bombay] (1963),
wood Cliffs 1966). special issue : D. WARRINER, Economics of
(20) E. WOLF, Peasants (Englewood Cliffs Peasant Farming (London 1964), as well as
1966); see also fn 25 below. her studies of agrarian reform.

293
 TEODOR SHANIN

4. The Field of Study: a general type.

Sociological definitions and models resemble two-dimensional sketches of

a multi-dimensional reality. Each contains a partial truth, each reflects
only part of the characterized phenomenon. The reality is richer than any
conceptualisation, and that holds true particularly for peasant societies—
highly complex social structures with little formal organization. Yet, without
conceptual delineation of peasants and peasant societies as a type of social
structure, a sociological study of peasantry would turn into a ghost story.
A consistent definition of peasantry as a concept and a field of study is
necessary if only for the purpose of having it rejected in the process of
further analysis.
We shall attempt to delimit peasant societies by establishing a general
type with four (or five) basic facets. A definition of peasantry by a single
determining factor would be neater but too limiting for our purpose. No
doubt, a definition incorporating only some of the facets suggested may
frequently be sufficient for an analysis of specific aspects of peasant social
life. The general type proposed would include:

1) The peasant family-farm as the basic unit of multi-dimensional social

organization. The family, and nearly only the family, provides the labour
on the farm. The farm, and nearly only the farm, provides for the consump-
tion needs of the family and the payment of its duties to the holder of
political and economic power. The economic action is closely interwoven
with family relations and the motive of profit maximization in money terms
seldom appears in its explicit form. Family membership is based on total
participation in the life of the family-farm. The division of labour is
family-based and ascribed. The self-perpetuating family-farm operates
as the major unit of peasant property, status, socialization, sociability and
welfare, with the individual tending to submit to formalized family-role
behaviour. The head of the family organizes production as the patriarchal
manager of family property rather than as owner, with his rights grossly
restricted by customary duties towards his family. Of these the approach
to repetition of life cycles by the marriage of his children and the possibility
of having to provide them with a farm of their own may be the most crucial.
A peasant family unit usually consists of two to three generations living
together. A son who was "partitioned out" and set up an independent
family farm becomes an outsider while a son-in-law or adoptee who joined
the farm shares in the membership rights. In a number of peasant societies
some of the described family functions were taken over by larger kinship
networks, e.g. the Serbian 'Zadruga', or to a lesser degree the Arab
'hamula' and the old South Chinese clan or lineage.

2) Land husbandry as the main means of livelihood directly providing the

major part of the consumption needs. Traditional farming includes a specific
294
 PEASANTRY

combination of tasks on a relatively low level of specialisation. Many of

these tasks may develop into specialist occupations (e.g. carpenter or smith),
yet their specific combination defines the occupation of a peasant and is
necessary for the performance of farming in a given set of social conditions.
Such occupation necessitates, in turn, the family-bound and traditional
vocational training of the young. Food production renders the family
farm comparatively autonomous. The impact of nature is particularly
important for the livelihood of a small production unit of such limited
resources. It restricts the density of population and makes for the inter-
dependency of the deep-rooted rhythm of family life and of production on
the peasant family farm. The mainly agricultural economy with low capital
investment accounts for the crucial importance of landholding and makes it
a decisive factor of social stratification in terms of wealth, power and
prestige.

3) Specific traditional culture related to the way of life of small communi-

ties (23). Specific cultural features (in the sense of socially determined
norms and cognitions) of peasants have been noted by a variety of scholars.
To use Redfield's somewhat flamboyant expression, the peasants form a
"psycho-physiological race", i.e. they display specific cognitive paradigms,
the manifest irrationality of some of which, in the framework of a capitalist
society, makes them neither less acceptable nor necessarily less functional
to members of a peasant community (24). The predominance of traditional
and conventional attitudes^ i.e. the justification of individual action in terms
of past experience and the will of the community, may be here used as an
example.
Much of the cultural patterns typical of peasant communities may be
deduced from the character of any small village community. The latter
can be treated as an additional basic characteristic of peasantry. Within
the village community peasants reach levels of self-sufficiency unobtainable
in the individual household. Activities such as the exchange of marriage
partners and at least rudimentary economic co-operation at tasks too big to
be handled by one family are in many cases carried out at the community
level. A small community in a relatively stable society is generally charac-
terized by habitual personal contact, by a lack of anonymity, a high level of
homogeneity and a tendency towards endogamy. Such conditions are
reflected both in the typical personalities of village members and in the
accepted "world view" in which communal identification, ideological solidar-

(23) Culture is here used not in its fullest Peasant Society and the Image of Limited
anthropological sense (i.e. as the opposite of Good, American Anthropologist, LXVII
Nature), but as "the lens [...] through which (1965), 293-315; F. G. BAILEY, The Peasant
men see; the medium by which they interpret View a Bad Life, Advancement of Science,
and report what they see". Cf. WRIGHT XII (1966), 399-409. For a different view
MILLS, Power, Politics and People (New see S. ORTIZ, The Structure of Decision-
York 1962). Making, in R. FIRTH, Themes in Economic
(24) See for example G.F. FOSTER, Anthropology (London 1967).

295
 TEODOR SHANIN

ity and egalitarianism form an important part. The agro-towns of

Southern Italy or of Yaruba should be approached here as an analytically
marginal case (see below).
4) The 'underdog' position. The domination of peasantry by outsiders.
Peasants, as a rule, habe been kept at arm's length from the social sources
of power. Political organization, educational superiority, mastery of the
means of suppression and communication give to powerful outsiders an
almost unchallenged hold over the village communities. Political subjection
interlinks with economic exploitation and cultural subordination. Land
tenure, political power and market cartelization operate here as the major
mechanisms of exploitation. The political economy of peasant society has
been, generally speaking, based on expropriation of its 'surpluses' by power-
ful outsiders, through corvee, tax, rent, interest and terms of trade. The
doctrinal and bureaucratic centres of the basic networks of socialization
which penetrate rural areas (e.g. the church, the state education, the mass
media etc.), generally lie in the town.
The social structure of peasantry is reflected in a number of character-
istics specific to its political life. "Vertical segments" (e.g. households,
villages, patron-client pyramidal networks) are most important in the
political sociology of such societies and the outsider/insider division in such
segments may prove politically much more meaningful than national
socio-economic stratification. The characteristics of peasant society render
mediating outsiders, which operate on the borderlines between peasant
society and its social counterparts, particularly important. The broadly
accepted Steward-Wolf term of power-brokers is suggestive of such social
groups but may give an incorrect image of neutral intermediaries operating
between those in power and those without it. Plenipotentiaries of the
powerful national bureaucracies may be a more realistic term (25). Finally,
all this explains the critical significance of those conditions in which peasant-
ry (usually under the influence of specific external 'catalyst' groups) unites
or is united, into a political force which sweeps the countryside shaking
societies and regimes (26).

5. The Analytically Marginal Groups of Peasantry.

The suggested general type incorporates the major characteristics of
peasantry and pinpoints the most significant units of peasant interaction:
the peasant family farms and the peasant village community, while taking
account of the broader power structures in which peasantry operates. This
general type also makes clear the low degree of institutional differentiation
(as) See E. WOLF, Aspects of Group (26) For elaboration see E. WOLF, On
Relations in a Complex Society, American Peasant Rebellions, International Social
Anthropologist, LVIII (1956), 1065-1078; Science Journal, XXI (1969); also T. SHANIN,
also T. SHANIN, The Awkward Class (Oxford Peasantry as a Political Factor, Sociological
1971), part III. Review, XIV (1966), 5-27.

296
 PEASANTRY

and the close overlapping of family, polity, economy, culture and socializa-
tion patterns in peasantry. Having defined such a general type must lead
to a further delineation of analytically marginal groups which share with the
"hard core" or peasants most, but not all, of their characteristics (27). (In
general, such differences can be presented on quantitative scales of more/less).
Analytical marginality so defined does not in any sense imply numerical
insignificance or some particular lack of stability.
The major marginal groups can be classified consistently in reference to
the proposed general type by the basic characteristics which they do not
share with it:
1) Agricultural labourers who lack a family farm (though who in many
cases may hold a small plot of land) and who draw their main means of
livelihood from working on a large estate, e.g. a Latin-American peon.
2) Rural inhabitants who draw their main means of livelihood from crafts
and trades, but who live in peasant environments and often work some land,
e.g. rural craftsmen.
3) Some of the frontier squatters and Latin American Gauchos with a
specific non-village individualist culture, at times showing common charac-
teristics with the next marginal group. The inhabitants of agro-towns,
already mentioned, may be also for a number of reasons meaningfully
classified into this category.
4) The free armed peasantry who managed to hold its own (and its land)
and to escape, especially along frontiers and in the mountains, centuries
of domination and oppression by 'outsiders', e.g. the Swiss, the Cossacks
or the Kurds. The tribesmen, who match in all other ways the general
type of the peasantry suggested, but who participate more fully in such
political organizations as their tribes provide (especially in Africa), may be
in many ways considered under this heading.
Analytically marginal groups may also be either a product of different
stages of economic development or, alternatively, of contemporary State
policies towards agriculture. (Such categories would partly overlap with
those above).
5) Pastoral tribal peoples who may combine some peasant characteristics
with a nomadic type of life and appear to be a transitional form somewhere
on the borderline between the pre-peasant and the peasant types of social
organization At the other end of the historical scale:
6) Peasant-workers—commuters who represent one form of industrial
penetration from the cities into the countryside (at times they may represent
their mutual inter-penetration). The peasant-worker increasingly keeps his
farm merely for consumption purposes and as a place to live while drawing
the greater part of his income from town-based wages (28).
7) Members of Kolkhozes and communes. The large-scale production units

(27) Redfield (op. cit. p. 20) seemed to (28) See, for example, the evidence collect-
refer to some of such groups as 'edges' of ed in S. FRANKLIN, The European Peasantry
the peasantry. (London 1969).

297
 TEODOR SHANIN

created under the impact of urban socialist political elites are usually
combined with small family plots. In spite of the large scale changes
involved, these societies retain many typically peasant characteristics.

6. Peasantry as a Process.

Analytical typologies come, at times, to be regarded statically, i.e. as an

implicit declaration of social stability/stagnation. In actual fact, such
typologies present but an analytical dimension of reality, "a history of
present" in Sweeze's celebrated phrase. In an attempt to grasp the issue,
use of such typologies must be interlinked with the study of the basic pro-
cesses involved. For example, the regional differences among peasants
can be understood to a great extent in terms of diverse histories. However,
strict historical analysis will concentrate on unique sequences of events,
while a sociologist will ex qfficio come to explore the general patterns of
change.
Comprehensive discussion of the dynamics of peasant societies would
have to include non-structural changes which, on the whole, get a poor
hearing from social scientists. In such processes quantitative changes and
changes in personnel leave the basic patterns of social interaction and
interdependence essentially intact. For example the cycles of nature and
family life form an important part of peasant social existence, and seem to be
reflected in patterns of social mobility in which changes in the position of
the family units involved do not lead to wholesale change in the character
of the social structure and may even support its stability. Geographical
mobility, in which the most active members of the community emigrate,
may act likewise (29).
However, the attention of analysts was understandably focused on
structural change. Such changes in peasantry usually have been deter-
mined (or at least triggered off) by the impact of non-peasant sections of
society, a situation which can be explained both by the character of the
peasant social structure discussed above and by the very fact of peasant
domination by powerful outsiders. The spread of industrialization,
urbanization, market economy, mass media etc. play their role in the gradual
disintegration of the peasant society as a specific social structure and in
integration of its members into new and nation-wide networks of social
interaction. Delineation and classification of the major factors of structural
change based once again on the four-facet typology suggested above may
prove useful. Those factors would be:
1) The spread of market relations, the advent of a money economy and
new technology, gradually transferring the peasant family-farm into an
enterprise of a capitalist nature. Increase in exchange, introduction of
planning of farm production in generalized terms of money and profit and
the growing importance of capital formation in agriculture, lead to the
(29) SHANIN, The Awkward Class, op. the Irish Peasant Communities (1968) [an
cit. part II; S. ROBERTSHAW, Emigration in unpublished manuscript].

298
 PEASANTRY

integration of farms into an all-embracing national capitalist economy and

to the 'individualization' of their members. Introduction of specific
"cash crops" or wage labour is an important stage in such development.
The spread of market relations may lead to proletarianization of peasantry
and growth of agricultural estates. At times, however, the major processes
of concentration and accumulation of capital taking place in towns seem
to influence agriculture through the market of goods and capital rather than
through production. (Such development does not exclude possibilities
of extensive exploitation of farming by merchant capital). At the same time
some technical advantages of small-scale farming (e.g. breeding), as well as
the draining of the countryside of the richest and the poorest of its inhabi-
tants in the process of urbanization, may lead to the establishment and
stabilisation of middle-sized capitalist family farms within the contemporary
industrial society.
2) Some division of labour has existed in every peasant community
and was generally made rigid by tradition reaching its climax and sanctifica-
tion in the Indian caste. The rapid increase in division of labour, inter-
related with the spread of a market economy has lead to rapid development in
professional specialization in the villages. More and more tasks are taken
over by specialized agencies which also undertake responsibility for profes-
sional training. On the other hand, the functions of the farmer have become
narrowly agricultural and increasingly skilled. Peasantry as a specific social
class and a way of life develops into farming as an occupation (30).
3) The word acculturation, formerly used to depict the cultural impact
of the colonisers on the colonial population, can be validly applied to the
process of disintegration of traditional and specific peasant cultures under
the impact of mass communication. The mass media, the national educa-
tional system, military service and the temporary migration of labour, all
exercise powerful influences by spreading new cultural patterns into the
countryside. Improvement of the means of communication and increasing
geographical mobility facilitate and gradually establish a town-village
continuum. Peasant workers as a new social stratum come to symbolize
this process.
4) Radical political change by non-peasant power-holders and occasio-
nally by a successful peasant revolution may lead to some basic changes in
the structure of peasant society. The two major instances of such change
in our century are agricultural reform and collectivization. Egalitarian
agrarian reform has aimed at land redivision and improvement in agriculture
within typical peasant social structures. Collectivization has attempted to
replace peasant agriculture by modernized and state controlled big enter-
prises manned by semi-cottagers. The establishment of agricultural
cooperatives was the declared aim of both those developments (31).

(30) For discussion see B. GALESKI, (31) For current discussion see P. WORS-
Sociological Problems of the Occupation of LEY (ed.), Two Blades of Grass (Manchester
a Farmer, The Annals of Rural Sociology 1971).
(1968), special issue, pp. 9-26.

299
 TEODOR SHANIN

The discussion of patterns of change should not result in a, so to speak,

'dynamist' bias in which the existence or even the accomplishment of social
processes are assumed on the sheer strength of evidence of dynamic factors.
A tendency or a trend may after all be blocked by culturally reinforced inertia
or by powerful groups interested in maintaining status quo. Moreover,
the impact of factors of change may be limited to, or even reversed by,
social mechanisms sustaining the existing structure. Peasant societies,
especially at early stages of development, display a variety of such social
mechanisms, e.g. social mobility and selective emigration of the most active
members, mentioned above. Finally, some structural change may reestab-
lish, at least in part, typical peasant patterns of social structure, e.g. an
egalitarian agrarian reform. However, all this being said, there is little
doubt that the major patterns of change in the contemporary world lead
it away from encompassing typical peasant social structures. In this sense,
the definitions of peasantry which view it as representing an aspect of the
past surviving in the modern world, seems, on the whole, valid. Yet,
to discard peasantry as a social group and a specific social structure remains
manifestly wrong. Even in our 'dynamic' times we live not in future but
in a present rooted in the past, and that is where our future is shaped. And
in the present as in the past, peasants are the majority of mankind *.
T E O D O R S H A N I N

* A partial and much abbreviated version of the above discussion is used in

the Introduction to Peasants and Peasant Societies, a reader in the Penguin Modern
Sociology Series. A paper along these lines was discussed in 1969 by the Sociology of
Developing Societies Group of the British Sociological Association.

3OO