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It should be stressed that O'Brien does not completely identify the peasant's position against capitalism with that of the worker. In particular, he points out that the peasant, being formally independent, will become a complete wage labourer once this (remnant ofjindependence ceases to exist. To this he adds that filere are manyintermei:Hate varieties (Ibidem: 171). And that is exactly the point. One may, as O'Brien does, belittle the peasant's independence as being only 'formal', but this does not do away with the fact that, between the capitalist farmer and the farm labourer, there are many shades of 'independence'. For the present at least, a realization of this situation is important for an understanding of the peasant condition and of what is happening to it in the world of national planning and project development (and, of course, of 'integrated rural development'). We find it more pressing, therefore, to characterize the differences between 'peasant' and 'wage labourer' and to examine what differentiates one variety of peasant from another. In doing so, we shall have to analyse what O'Brien calls the 'formal' independence of the peasant. In other words, we shall need to discover what distinguishes capitalist control over wagelabour from its control over the peasantry. 34
IV AKAN LAND TENURE ARRANGEMENTS: AN OUTLINE 1. All <strong>View</strong>s of Akan Land Tenure are Mediated through the Conditions of Colonialism and the Legal Concepts of English Common Law When writing about Akan land tenure it is impossible to give a straightforward account of customary rules concerning the control and allocation, usufruct and alienation, custody and administration of land and ofthe conditions under which these apply. All major accounts of Akan land tenure date from colonial or post-colonial times and, with few exceptions, have been written by legal experts trained in English common law. This holds for some of the early members of the new Ghanaian elite, now revered as heroes of Akan culture and repositories of traditional law, such as John Mensah Sarbah (1897)1 and J.B. Danquah (1928); it also holds for more recent attempts at scientific reconstruction of customary land law as a coherent pattern, notably those by Ollennu (1962) and Bentsi Enchill (1964). Apart from a brief but highly effective chapter on Akim Abuakwaland sales by Polly Hill (1963: Ch.V) and a concise but very incisive essay by Gordon Woodman (1976), no other sources attempt an empirical study of the role of customary law as only one, and possibly not a very decisive, component of social and economic practice. Without exception, all other authors have been preoccupied with the need to codify, categorize and systematize the black -letter rules of law. 2This also holds for Rattray, . one-time government anthropologist, whose first sketch of Ashanti land tenure (1923, Ch.XXI) was an endorsement of the 1912 Belfield Report which, on the whole, he followed in its application of common law terminology and only criticized for 'sins of omission' (Ibidem: 213). To this we hasten to add that Rattray's empirical materials and his presentation thereof remain of great value and that in his second account of customary land law (1929: Ch.xXXIII) he re-examined the issue in the light of new data, thereby, as he himself puts it, 'rolling back some of the fog which seemed persistently to obscure the question' (Ibidem: 340). But even where the anthropologist Rattray based himself on indisputable facts free of common law interpretations, he could only record practices with regard to ownership and alienation ofland as they occurred in a colonially-controlled Ashanti. In other words, to understand how land 35
Page 1: · 1\\m\I~\II~~\IIII~\i!~\\\! t~~es
Page 4 and 5: The views expressed in this publica
Page 7 and 8: ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This research coul
Page 9 and 10: INTRODUCTORY NOTE When Emile Vercru
Page 11 and 12: I A BRIEF INTRODUCTION 10 THE PROBL
Page 13 and 14: agricultural productivity has reach
Page 15: Notes 1. Keith Griffin (1979) has c
Page 18 and 19: Most fallow land around Abura-Dunkw
Page 20 and 21: field which has been reaped; in the
Page 22 and 23: shelled pail by pail whenever it is
Page 24 and 25: Notes I. Quotations in this paragra
Page 27 and 28: HI ON THE SOClIAL RELATIONS OF PEAS
Page 29 and 30: - whether or not they have control
Page 31 and 32: tion was transformed into the tribu
Page 33 and 34: ges in exploitation and exploiters
Page 35 and 36: of a state government, both involve
Page 37 and 38: other words, exploitation is now in
Page 39 and 40: There is now fairly general recogni
Page 41 and 42: must now move to a much more concre
Page 43: 12. According to Christensen (1954:
Page 47 and 48: most if not all accounts of customa
Page 49 and 50: person (usually, but not always, a
Page 51 and 52: land. This intervening role ofthe e
Page 53 and 54: deemed abandoned after non-occupati
Page 55 and 56: Ch.III; Reindorf 1895; Kimble 1963)
Page 57 and 58: ered in that it had nearly brought
Page 59 and 60: purposes, and to subjects of other
Page 61 and 62: Notes 1. The first edition of Mensa
Page 63 and 64: v THEABURA-DUNKWA FAMILY LANDS AND
Page 65 and 66: anyone to acquire a right to farmla
Page 67 and 68: Equally, the land held (or claimed)
Page 69 and 70: eiterated that, consequent on their
Page 71 and 72: admitting that Nana Quansah was the
Page 73 and 74: emotions than anything else because
Page 75 and 76: Cape Coast where the case was down
Page 77 and 78: for him must be cancelled: It must
Page 79 and 80: Adwenadze: present-day descendants
Page 81 and 82: TableS: The Nnamfodo Lands and Thei
Page 83 and 84: It may be useful to point out that
Page 85 and 86: land (specifically: Kukubir 1 and 2
Page 87 and 88: 6 . Swearing an oath to an Akan mea
Page 89: 20. As we have explained in Ch.I1,
Page 92 and 93: homogeneous in terms of quality (gr
Page 94 and 95:
tion of sample cases over the four
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(Dawurampon) is all there is availa
Page 98 and 99:
4. Auxiliary Rules for Allocating F
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Table 11: Farmers on Family Land of
Page 102 and 103:
portion oftheir own family land may
Page 104 and 105:
From Table 14 we see that apart fro
Page 106 and 107:
together with annual tenancies at l
Page 108 and 109:
- a proportionally larger part of t
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Hypothesis 4: Ignoring the uncultiv
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in the part played in the allocatio
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approval and cooperation of the oth
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7. 'Total Acreage' in Thble 17 refe
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APPENDIX A SOME NOTES ON MFANTSE PO
Page 121 and 122:
1944 - and by then Ghana, or rather
Page 123 and 124:
APPENDIXB OVERVIEW OF THE ARUBA-DUN
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NSONAMBUSUA 30. Kodju Dadzie Ekrofu
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APPENDIXC RANK CORRELATION BETWEEN
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RANK CORRELATION: Calculation rho =
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TnbleA.l Allocation of Farming Righ
Page 135 and 136:
APPENDIXE THE FIELDWORK AND ITS IMP
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extent to which they were under cul
Page 139 and 140:
people could not acquire land throu
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2. Results of the farm operations q
Page 144 and 145:
Casely Hayford, J.E. (1903) Gold Co
Page 146 and 147:
O'Brien, J. (1979) The Political Ec
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