Browsing by Author "Kuusela, Pekka"

This is a study of dynamics of changes in (public) modes of thinking related to value of land and of the following societal consequences. The topic is approached through the analysis of the decision-making mechanisms regarding farmland abdication of Cambodian smallholders living in an uncertain frontier on a restless move from rural to urban space. The study aims to contribute to a holistic comprehension of commonly observed inconsistency in affected social groups’ (public) reactions to land deals. The analysis is based upon Marxian, Gramscian, Bourdieusian, and Foucaultian theorisations. Yet only empirical evidence can reveal what is a case in question. This study is based on a 7,5 months ethnographic fieldwork conducted in 3 periods between 2009 and 2017 in and around Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh and by analysing several official policy documents and dozens of newspaper reports. The study seeks to question the often-presented static bipolarisations, including conventional agency/structure controversy and power/resistance confrontation. Correspondingly, to avoid shallow interpretations, this study does not explain the on-going livelihood changes in the research site towards the capitalist relations as being the residents’ voluntary and preferred choice. Nor is the change seen as an unavoidable effect of incentives and lack of alternatives, which would trigger a need for development interventions to correct the calculated deficiencies to enhance the freedom of choice as a proof of inherent win-win equilibrium of the perfect market. Rather, especially as it turns out that development interventions actually support the so-called neoliberal logic in one way or another, this study underlines the (self-)governance side of the change by concentrating on dynamic aggregation mechanisms around opportunities and constraints opened up by tolerances of a new normal. Qualitative enquiry provides fruitful instruments to understand residents’ experiences, feelings, visions, mindsets, and actions at the complexity of power relationships and ever-changing positions, strategies, and environments. The study concludes that the apolitical rationalisation of compulsion to choose selling transforms farmland sellers to individual self-made persons responsible for their own destinies. This process also makes sellers to (publicly) consider the promoted development as progress and the proper model to follow. Therefore, at the end, a land title starts to mean private exclusive ownership, life begins to mean socio-economic competition over personal utilities, living starts to mean self-responsibility, and reward starts to be based on effort and productivity.