Government of Development: Peasants and Politicians in Postcolonial Tanzania - Hardcover

Schneider, Leander

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0253013976 ISBN 13: 9780253013972

Publisher: Indiana University Press, 2014

Synopsis

What drives state officials to force development projects on resisting "beneficiary" populations? In his new analysis of the Tanzanian state's 1960s and 1970s campaign to settle the country's rural population in socialist villages, Leander Schneider traces the discourses and practices that authorized state officials to direct the lives of peasants - by coercive means if necessary. Government of Development shows that the practices constituting this project's mode of government far exceeded political elites' pursuit of their own narrow interests, the go-to explanation for many accounts of similar instances of authoritarian rule and developmental failures in Africa and beyond.

About this title

Review:

"All students of Africa and of development should read Leander Schneider's superb analysis of Tanzanian rural policy under Nyerere. First, it sits absolutely atop the mountain of other studies of villagisation by virtue of its empirical mastery and analytical subtlety. Second, it represents a devastating critique of the fatal methodological simplifications that plague much of contemporary social science." - James C. Scott, Yale University "Profoundly rich empirical evidence shows villagization's peculiar, personalized, and self-destructive aspects, soundly based on rare and exceptionally rigorous archival research; it alone makes this book worth reading." - James R. Brennan, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign "Cogent, persuasive, and well-researched, Schneider successfully provides a nuanced and penetrating analysis that is woven into a compelling narrative." - J. Michael Williams, University of San Diego "No one in recent decades has written with such clarity and care about Tanzania and the rise and decline of its signal "ujamaa vijijini" policy as has Leander Schneider. Here, he views Tanzanian socialism more broadly, and in a suggestive, if controversial, comparative perspective, while also exploring the country's once bold plans for transformation and their fatally flawed execution." - John S. Saul, York University and the University of Dar es Salaam

Book Description:

Finalist, 2015 African Studies Association Ogot Award

About this edition

• Publisher: Indiana University Press
• Publication date: 2014
• ISBN 10: 0253013976
• ISBN 13: 9780253013972
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 246