Land and Dispossession

In this postscript the author revisits the place of land in the capitalist development process generally and in late developers such as India. Primitive accumulation has been the modus operandi for reducing surplus labor, by separating the peasants from their land, and a source of agrarian dynamism, leading to the rise of a wage-dependent proletariat. However, in India this process has been shown to be incomplete. In the absence of a classical capitalist transition India’s transformation remains muted with the formation of a persistent petty commodity producer sector. This concluding set of remarks reflects broadly on the nature of impending politics such as the ability of the state to politically manage those that are outside the formal orbits of capital or when jobs disappear and self-employment become routine in an expanding economy but without dissolving the PCP. Instead, when land and livelihoods are contested and dispossession becomes inevitable.