Scott Resistance

8/9/2019 Scott Resistance

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302 . BEYOND THE WAR OF WORDSmaintain themselves and their hausehalds. Much af what they'da, as we haveseen, is ta be understaad as campliance, however grudgingly. Su!1jv:t1as Qettycon:m~ p~ad

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ucers ar lab,

arers may imp~l same ta sa",ethemselv,

es at theexpense af thef .:.c;:..ews., e ,po' s a aref1vhu"s't'emtpaadyTrOi~aotherpaar man ar whaautbids h~m'far,l ,athancy is surv iving, but he is surely natresisting in the sensedefined,~beJ;e. One af the key questians.~ihatmust be, asKed':i lbaut any ~ystem bf daminatian is' "the extent ro-wli lc Il itSi, .eds in reducingS",

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~y;!j",(,"ta " , ' Inatl ans a atamlZatlan , terr ar, represslO an , r ng m'atenlneeds" c~i jl ev e ~~~~ drea~ ~q?2E~he in~teO: exp alt each ather.~Ano~T~g".F~tanly thasesurvival,~trategies;thatdeny ar miti~ate claims fromaPR~apriatingclassescan be calledresistance, wc;.~areeverthelessleftwith a-:vastr~~ af .actia~.D$ider. Their variety canceaILil,l' .tt~~~Qn~nuj~...Thatcant~.in-.:~ .: h~tary a~the,per~~tent 1[9~Lr~,*~ut~m?uspetty commadlty proctcer~.to


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300 .BEYOND THE WAR OF WORDSconcept of coordination derived from formaland bureaucratic settings is oflittleassistance in understanding actions in small communities with dense informalnetworks and rich, and historically deep, subcultures of resistance to outsideclaims.1O9t is, forexample, no exaggerationto saythat much ofthe folk cultureof the peasant "little tradition" amounts to a legitimation en a e ration,ofprecisely t e inds of evasivean rmso f resistance I haveexamined.In Malay society 'this tradition is captured in the SangKancil, or mouse deertales familiar to all peasants. The mouse deer is the stereotypical "trickster"figure: a small and weak but agile creature who survivesand triumphs overtarmore powerful beasts by his wits, his deceit, and his cunning. It takes noliterary legerdemain to recognize SangKancil as a popular metaphor for thenecessary survival skills of the antry. They h'Weot course tleir curtUralequivaents in t e popu ar traditions of other historically subordinate grollPs-Til Eulenspiegeland Brer Rabbit, to name only two. At the very least , theyencourage the kind .ofresistance celebrated in this South Carolina slavesaying:"De bukrah (white) hab scheme, en de nigger hab trick, en ebery time thebukrah scheme once, the nigger trick twice."l1OIn this and in other ways (for example, tales of bandits , peasant heroes,religious myths) the peasant subculture helps to underwritc~issimulation,poaching, theft ,' tax evasion,aVOldanceOfconscr~nd so o; 'While folkculture is not coor lOatl0n lOthe orma sense, lt often achievesa "climate of( -, -opinion" which, in other more institutionalized societies,w'QUid~ire ~blicrel~-;:;~ (].mpaigff.lll l 'fie strikini0higa600tpe~ societyis the extent toicha wholerange ofcomplef'activities-from laborexchangeto housemovingtowedding preparations to teasts- arecoordinated bynetworksof understanding,.,..-"'-~ _. ' ~and practice. It is the same with boycotts, wage "negotiations," the refusal ofcenants to compete with one another, or the conseiracy~nce surrounding

soul of direct action by the working class. Their erosion by midcentury was the key,he believes , to the "domesticat ion" of the working class . " In aU societ ies , formalorganizations which significantly threaten the stability of the existing arrangementsare, if not direct ly banned, subject to legal sanctions which res tr ict the scope oftheir act ivity. . . . For this reason the informal, often opague , s tructures and inst i-tutions of the viable community are indispensable to sustained collective action."Domination, Legitimation, and Resistance:The Interpretationofthe 19th Century EnglishW0rkingClass, Contributions in Labor History, No. 3 (Westport: Greenwood, 1978).109. For an extended argument along these lines, see Scott, "Protest and Profan-ation," and "Hegemony and the Peasantry," Politicsand Society7, no. 3 (1977): 267-96.1l O. Levine, Black Culture and Black Consciousness,81.111. For a suggestive and detailed analysis of how folk beliefs and ritual may bcmobilized to serve political and social class objectives, sce the fi,ncdiscussion inMauricc Agulhon, La Rpubliqueau village: Lespopulationsdu \,f,r de la Rvolfltiolldla Se.ondeRllllbliqm (Paris: Plon. 1970).

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BEYONDTHE WAROFWORDS. 301thefts. No formal organizations are created because none are re9,uired; and yeta,form of coofOation1~,ac~e'yed t~at alrts ustria't-wb;t is ~., notjust individualaction:' . _.~ -,- - ~...InTiglror these Cnsiderations,then, let us return briefiy to the question ofintention. For many forms ofpeasant resistance, we have everyreason to e;q;ec:toat acrotS'will remain mute about their intentions. Their safety may de.J2endo~ sile~ce and an,jy; th:fin~~sta~~~.2pen~Joiiti effec-tlveness on the appearance of cotOrm1ty; tl1elr lOtentlOns mayr;e' so embeddedin the peaSatS5cuftureana-in"the routi;;:-tak~granted scruggletoprovideforthesubSiSt'nceaclsiVivalftoel1o5ehoraas'roTtai~ulatc.ThefishciOOt'tai'kaboutthewater. --------In one sense, ofcourse, their intentions are insqibe~in the acts themselvcs.A peasant soldier who desert'Sthe army is i effect';s~yi~g~Ts-acttllat rhe")purposesofthis institutionandthe risksandhardshipsit entailswillnot prevail 1over his family or personal needs. A harvest laborer who steals paddy from his

employer is "saying" that hi~__needfor rice t~k~rece4.c:~~~v:r the formalproperty xjghts of his boss.When it comes tothOse socialsettings where the material interests ofappro-priating classes are~... lq, co' lfl ti~~il i~..} ';.e~lrnts, wages, cm-ploymenCfaxes;ronscription, the divisionof the harvest), wecan, I think, infcr

something of i~~i~~.Jmm. fhC.,JJ.,tw;e...of..th~t.i,~em~roes. This is e~.pecially the casewhen there is a systematic pattero of actions that mitigatc 01'deny a claim on the easant surplus, Evidenceabout intentions is, ofsalirse,always we come, ut we s not expec o muc. or t 1Sreason, rh,'de~ance given earlier places particular emphasis on rhe cffim tOthwart materialarursv . laims from dominant class-es. 1fie ti.f, iLTter1111.off e gr u ofpeasant resistance i s not ired; tooverthrow or transforma system of domination but rather ~today, this week, this seasoo.within it. The usual goal of peasants, as Hobsbawm has so aptly put it, is"workinKlheslstemlo theirvnnimurrdisadvanttJl!.!.112 Theirpersistentattemptsto"nibble away"maybackfire, theymaymarginal1ya~iate ex~loitation, they mayforcea ren~~ot~h.e..lim.:s ofaPQropri~ion, they may change the courSeof subsequent development, and they mf more rarelz..b.elp-J?Ei.!l~he sysrcmclown. These are rossible corsequences. heir intenton, by contrast, Tsi1earlyalwayssurvival and persistnce. 'l' pursuit of that end may, depending 00circumstances, require either the petty resistancewe haveseenor more dramllricactions ofself-defense.In any event, most oftheir effortswill be seen by apl,ro-priating classesas trucl.l!ence,dec:~it,shirking, pilfering,"arrogance--in short.!lBrhe labels intendeclto -(fei";'igratel1emany tacesoemlsuma:.. It shoula15eapj3iI7(!rr(-milr-rc~""'i'S'm""StmstyWh'ltt'eVcrpeasnots do to

11'2. Eric Hobsbnwm, "PCIlMIII IU IInd POl1l 'kN, " .!rll/rl/ftl rfPM.i'rllll Sll/(;~,I 1, 110, I(1973): 7. '


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29,8. BEYONDTHE WAROFWORDSstt;ucture that can be co-opied 01.' ,.eutralized. What is lacking in terms ofcentr~ coo mation mar e com en .' orby flexibilit:yand persistence.",Theseform~,ofr~sistanc~will,,~~n"no set-pie~e'battles i.,but"the;~ admirably ~};laptedto .long-mn campaigp.s of ~ttrition. . ~

If we were,to copfine out s~arch~for p~~ans re~jstadcelito formally organizedac~iyity;'we"'would search largely in vain, for ip,Malaysia as in many othe;,ThirdWorld coul1tfies, such organizations are either" absent or the creations.Qf officialsalld.ruraI.elites,. We would simply miss much of what is happenirg. The historyq ", ., 1'" "'"or Malay peasant resistance to th~, state, for,example,.h~~!et q) be written.When, and.,~if,it is written, howve~,"it will not be a hist9ry,Jn V;;pichopenebellion01.'ormalorg~nizationsplay",-ignificntrole.T~e.~ccou'?-tofrestgtancein the precolonial era woulq perhaps be dO'minated by flight ari.~avoidnce ofcryel\iborand"ahost,oftolls and taxes."Resist colontlml~ was markedfat~ by o12en co11frontations ,thanby willf ll~I .afld massive nonco '. ith"i.tsIlMtthreateni '. pe~e~ample, fli-e:;plfsi~cii;"tlr([erfeportmg:ofland-Ih ings aI.1dC[OPyields t() miriimize taxes",the relentless disregard for allregulatioflsde.signed to restrict smallholders'nlbber, planting and marketing,the unabated'pion~J settl~lmentof new la~d despire' a"ho'st of law~forbiddingit. Much of this continues today. There is"~mpleevidencefor this reslstance inthe archives,1O5hit, inasmuch as its goal was to eyaderl,thestate and he egalo~t-!?~k "them, it has receiye' al.' ~ss historical,tttention than thequite rare alJd sma1rrevoits that had far~les~impact on the cou~seof coloniali,rule.,Even,inadvanced capitalist nations, the "movements" of the I2Q9rJake1"", ,~-place ~_Q.lJ.tsidvhe sphere ~f formal poli~ical aCfVitY:],96F followsthat, if-.., , ,11

105. Tax evasion"isevident from the steadiireports of land ta:Xam,;ar~from Kedahana from indications pf systematic misreporting of'yields. Thus, Unfederated MalayStates, Annual Repo'rt.rfthe,Advisor toWth,"Kedqh!rr:;overnment.921 (Alor Setar: Gov-ernment Printer,1I1922), 38, n?tes'I,"The padj plantel.',;fegards with, suspicion thecoNection ofstatistics as a possible ba~i,~for furt~,er taxation and"minimizes hisharvest." The ReportforMay 1930 toMay 1931 puts the underreporting between,' ],5and 18percent (p. 8), in s()medistricts at nearly 50 percent (p. ~.5). For evasionofithe rubber restriction schemes fram 1913~imtil World W:r n, see Lim Teck Ghee,Peasantsnd TheirAgriculturalEconomyn ColonialMalaya, 1874-194[(J(d~la"'Lum-pftJ;:Oxford Univ. Press, 1977), and Donald M. Nonini"iPauLDiener, and E\tgeneE.RdQkin, "Ecology and Evolution: Population, Primitive Accumuladon, and the MalayPeasantry" (TY,l?escript,1979).1:06. "Whatever the intellectuai' sourceslof error, the effectof equating ~ovementswith, movement organizat ions-and thus requiri :1g that protests have a leader, aconsci1uoion,a Jegislative program, 01.'at least a banner before the,y are recognizedas such-is to diver t: at tendon from man.yforms of politicaihunrest and to consi~nthcm by definition tO .1!be.\Tloreshadowy rea.lms of' social problems and devianr

'111

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BEYOND THE WAR dF WORDS . 29a persuasive case can be rnadeJor such[orms"o\;politicalactivity",amqngr;the pOin highly,industrialized, urban economies with high rates of'ireracy andw ~elat ively open poli tical system, the ca~,ewould be far s tronger for the peasantry

W! in ~grarian economy where open poli tical activi t{is sharply restricted. FOJ;mpolitical, activity may be the nrm[o;,the elites, the intelligentsia, and~1hmiddle classes.,which,in the Third 'World as'~ellfls in theWes.t ' have,a '"ne. ." ..+monopoly'of institution~l s/(illsanq access, Bu!:it would be naiveto expect thatpeasant resistance can, 01.'will~'hoifually take the same fqr.lJ}Nor~should wef~rget that"the~~s10f ~~~~1!.t:~nce af~not"just a pro~':lctof""the'isocial e~010gY~8,fthe peasantry~ The parametersolresist~~in "~t1tutins 'otrep;ession. To the extent that such institutions

do their ~ork e ectlve y,t ~ymaya lit J;?te.ctpde",flf1f


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296 . BEYOND THE WAR OF WORDSdenying the state cannon fodder. When such acts are rare and isolated, they areof little interest; but when they become a consistent pattern (even though un-coordinated, let alone organized) we are dealing with resistance. The intrinsicnature and, in one sense, the "beauty" of much peasant resistance is that itoftenconfersimmediate and concreteadvantages,whileat the same time denyingresources to the appropriating classes, and th~t it requires little or no manifestorganization. The stubbornness and force of such resistance fIowdirecdy framthe fact that it is so firmly rooted in the shared material struggle experiencedby a class. .

To rquire of lower-classresistance that it someho be" rinci led" or "self-less"is not onlyutoP1anan aslander onthemoral status of fundamental materialneeds; i~s",more fundamentally, a m~onstruct~n oft~basis of classstruggle,which is, first and foremost, a sr?-le overd le appra ri~wofk, praduc-tio. o e ~nd taxe~'Bread-and-butter" lssuesare the es er-c asspo~~ Consu~ioI1, trom ~rspectIVZ is botI111'1eioaland the result of resistance and counterresistence. As Utsa Patnaik has noted,"Consumption is nothin but the historically 'necessarylabor,' the share of netoutput a owe to e retainedby the petty ro e t e me of .rheirs rugg W1t the sur lus~appr 1atl ,."102This is then the self-inter-es e "coreo routine classstruggle: the often defensiveeffortto mitigate or defeatappropriation. 103 Petty thefts of grain or pilferingon the threshing fIoormayseem like trivial "coping'::f'mechanisms from one vantage point, but, from abraader view of class relations, how the harves t is actually divided be longs atthe center.

A furrher advantage of a concept of resistance that begins with self-interestedmaterial needs is that it is far more in keeping with how "class" is first expe-rienced by the his torical actors themse lves . Here 1 subs~wholeheartedly tothe jUd~IIlt:ll( 1'cI.edby E. P. Thompson on the bas is of his own fine analysisof working-class history:

In my view, far too much theoretical attention (much of it plainly102. Utsa Patnaik, "Neo-Populism and Marxism: The Chayanovian View of the

Agrarian Question and lts Fundamental Fallacy," journal 01PeasantStudies 6, no. 4(July 1979): 398-99.

103. In a factory or in "state farms" the "self- interested core of class struggle"may involve the reappropriation of time for one's own use in forms that appear quitetrivial. Thus, Alf Ludke and Shelby Cullam argue that "horse-play" in the Germanfactory and other examples of "the articulation and assertion of individual needs"ought to be seen as "poltical behavior." They add that the resistance to disciplineand hierarchy found expression not only on the factory floor but in resistance to thesocialist paity itself "corresponding to a massive dis-interest in any sort of formaland state-centered politics." "Cash, Coffee-Breaks, Horse-Rlay:Eigens'inn and Poli-eics among Faceory Workers in Laee t .9ch and Eavly 20th Century," Davis CenccrSeminar, 'Princceon Univcrsiey, April 2, 1:982, mimao,

BEYOND THE WAROF WORDS . 297ahistorical) has been paid to 'class' and far toa littIe to 'class-struggle.'Indeed, class struggle is the prior, aswell asthe more universal, conceptoTo put it bluntIy, classesdo not exist as separateentities, look around, findan enemy class, and then start to struggle. On the contrary, people findthems v. in a society structured in determined ways (cr~l, but notexclusively, in pra uct1V rhtt~~r' "ex.p!!fi~~explOltitIon(or~theneeam mamtam p~wer.~i,~!]i~;hom dleV!pl~.:2' ~tsof antagofilstis'\pJ.!fest,;~~~mmee.s~.!.o stru~@'e~~u2.~.~~~s~~~ andi~s of struggling they discoverthemseIvsasda ses the cometO asscconSc S.Class and class-consciousnessare alwaysthe last, not the first, stage in the real historical process.104

I/~It isimpossible, ofcourse,to divorcethe material basis ofthe stru le ram thest;.ruggleover valll~s-the ideo oglCa strugg e. o resist a c a1mor an appropri-ation is to resist, as well, the justificat1on;nd rationale behind that particularclaim. In Sedaka, this ideologicalresistance is generally"'keptfram public view,but it forms a vital art of the normative subculture amon the poor.The inclination to dismiss m iV1ua actsof resiStanceas insignificant and

to reservethe term "resistance"for collective or organizedaction is as misguidedas the emphasison "principled" action. The privileged status accordedorganizedmovements, 1 suspect, fIowsfrom either of two political orientations: the one,essentially Leninist, which regards the only viable class action as one led by avanguard party serving as a "general staff," the other more straightforwardlyderived fram a familiarity and preferencefor open, institutionalized politics asconducted in capitalist democracies. In either case, however,there is a misap-prehension of the social and political circumstances of peasant resistance.The individual and often anonymous quality of much peasant resistance is of

course eminentIy suited to the sociologyot the class[ram wnlCh1tarises. Binga c~w clS~lessnessscatterecttn small communihes andgeneJ;'Jlylackingthe institutional means to act collectivel it i likel to em loy those means ofresistafi'tetarare1oca an . require littIe coordination. Under speCla lstorical\.circuni~tancesofoverwfei~ingrWiterial deprivation"the)eAAlpratection ofQpen.~political action, or a breakdownm tl1e.institutions of repression(more rarely,allthre~;asantry can~and.has become an ~~gani~d, political, mass move-mentoSuc Clrcumstancesare, however,extre . re and ~rt-lived-even if they contribure toa revolution. In most places at most times tki.s...politicalopti~d. The penchant forlorms of resistance that arei'di~ untrus1ve a.re nOt' nly what a Marxist might expect fram pettycommodity producers and rurallaborers, but have cer tain advantages. Unl ikebierarchical formal organizations, there is no center, no leadership, no identifiable

104. "Eighter:nuh.Cc:nuuryngHsl'ISocir:ey,"149.


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294' BEYONDTHE WAROFWORDSby unorganized masses of "self-demobilized" peasant soldiers that made therevolutionpossible.97 .The disintegration of the Russian army is but one of many instances wherethe aggregation of a host of petty, self-interested acts of insubordination ordesertion, with no revolutionary intent, have created a revolutionary situation.The dissolution of the N" . . . ek in 1948 and ofSaigon' could no doubt be analyzed along similar lines. And101}.before thefinal debacle, acts of"insubordination~andnoncompliance in eacharmy-in the U.S. Army serving in Vietnam aswell, itshould be added.-hadset sharp limits onwhat the counterrevolutionaryforcescould expect and require1,of their own rank and file.98Resistance of this kind is of course not a monopolyof the counterrevolution, as George Washington and Erililiano Zapata, amongothers, discovered. We can imagine that the eminently personallogic of PedroMartinez, a sometime soldier with the Zapatista forces, was not markedly dif-ferent from that of the tsarist troops leaving the front.

That's where (battle ofTizapan} I final1yhad it. The battle was somethingawful: The shooting was tremendous! It was a completely bloody batde,three days and three 'hights . But I raok it for one day and then I left. Iquit the army . . . I saidtO!'!ffiyself,'!t's time nowI got back to mywife,to my litde children. I'm getting out." . . . I said to myself, "No, IIlYfamily comes first and they are starving. Now I'm leaving."99The refreshing candor of Pedro Martinez seryestOremind us that, t~~re is no,necessaryrelationship between the banality ofthe~t of self-preservationand-of-f~ily ObITgat1~ils:-nhe ooe hand, and tIre EanlTtf'ofCte'conSqri6itlof~ ~ orh, -., , ",.~ ~suCh:crs,Qtl.J;.n!: er.hile the consequences of peasant self-serving are essential to any largeranalysis of class relations or ofthe,state, I do not wish to argue that \ 'f '~isrance!. ..------..-97: E. H. Carr, TheBolshevikRevolution:191i-1923, vol. 1 (l-Iarmondsworth:Penguin, 1966), 103. If we wished eoextend this account of Russian peasant "self-demobilization" back ineo hiseory, we might plausibly include the massiv


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292 . BEYOND THE WAR OF WORDStheir persistent aets of attrition against erops and stores, and cooperativenighttime robberies that sustained the blaekma-tk~-were more "poli ti-cal" in their consequencesnd represented resistanee to slavery itself.93

Al though Eugene Genovese' s position on this i ssue differs in some importantparticulars, he to~ in~ist~ishing bet,:,een prepolitieal form~ o~ re~is-~c.e and mQre slgmfieant reslstanee to the regmp-Qf s]mpty-The dlstmetlonfor him, as the follo~ing quotation indieates, l ies in both tlJ,S r~conse-uenees a I ~\..~ -~~~~==.,.;=~"~

Combining i:heseoverlapping perspeetives, the result is something of a diehot-omy between real resistanee, on the one hand, and token, incidental, or evenepiphenomenal aetivities, on the other; Real resistanee, it is argued, is(a) organized, systematie, and eooperative, (b) principled or selfless, (e) has rev-olutionary eonsequenees,and/or (d) embodies ideasor intentions that negate thebasis of domination itselL Token, incidental, or epiphenomenal aetivities, byeontrast, are (a)unorgani~ed, unsystematie, and individual, (b) opportunistieand self-indulgent, (e) have no revolutionary consequenees,and/or (d) imply,intheir intention or meaning, an aeeommodation with the system of domination.These distinetions are important for any analysis that has as its objeetive theattempt to delineate the various forms of resistanee and to show how they arerelated to one another and to the form of domination .in whieh they oeeur. Myquarr 1 is with the eontention that the latter forms are ultimately trivial orineonse uentia, w 1e on y 1 ute rea reslstanee.T 's position, in my view, un amenta y m e ver' of theeeono ie and politieal strug le dueted y subordinate classes-notonlyslaves, ut peasants and workers as well-in repressivesettings. It is basedon~ic combination of both Leninist and bourgeois assumptions"'"6'f'Wl1ateonstitut . . ~hree of the paired eompansons will bea ressed here while the final, and vital issue, ofwhether intentions are aeeom-

93. MuHin, Flight and Rcbel/ion,35, emphasis added.94. Genovese, RoU,jordan, RoU, 598.

BEYOND THE WAR OF WORDS . 293modationist or revolutionarywill be touehed on only briefly and examined inmore"detail in the next ehapter.Let us begin with the question ofaetionsthat are "self-indulgent," individual,

and unorganized. Embedded in the logieofGenoveseano, espeially,ofMullins,is the assumption that sueh aetsintrinsieally laek revolutionar consequences.Thismay often be the case, but it is also the case that there is har ernrevolutionthat can be slJ.eeessfullyexplame . u re erenee to preeisely suehaetswhen~~~~Qb"'a.~e, forexample,thematterOd~ army and the role it has played in revolutions.The Russian Revolutionis a striking case in point. Grawing desertionsframthe largely peasant rank and fileof the army in the summer of 1917 were amajor and indispensablepart ofthe revolutionaryproeessin at least two respeets.First, they wereresponsibleforthe eollapse of the main institution of repressionof the tsarist state , inherited by the Provisional Government-an institutionthat had earlier,in 1905, put down another revolutionaryupheaval. Seeond, thedeserters contributed direetly to the revolutionaryproeess in the"eountryside byparticipating in the seizures of land throughout the eore provinees of EuropeanRussia. And it is abundantly clear that the hemorrhage in the tsarist foreeswaslargely "self-indulgent," "unorganized," and "individual," although thousandsand thousands of individuals threw down their arms and headed home.95TheJune attaek into Austria had been erushed with huge lossesof troops and offieers;the ration of bread had been redueed and "fast days" inaugurated atthe front;the soldiersknew,moreover,that if they stayedat the front they might miss theehanee to gain from the land seizuresbreaking out in the countryside.96Deser-tion offered the peasant eonseripts the ehanee of saving their skins and of re-/turning home where bread and, now,land wereavailable.The riskswereminimalsinee discipline in the army had dissolved. One can hardly imagine a set ofmore "self-indulgent" goals. But it was just sueh self-indulgent ends, aeted on95. See Allan Wildman, "The February Revolution in the Russian Army," SovietStudies 22, no. 1 (July 1970): 3-23; Mare Ferro, "The Russian Soldier in 1917:

mUndisc~plined, Patriotic, and Revolutionary," Slavic Review 30, no. 3 (September1971): 483-512; Barrington Moore, Jr., Injustice, 364, and Theda Skoepol, Statesand Social Revolutions(Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1979), 135-38. There isa consensus that Bolshevik propaganda at the front was not instrumental in provokingthese desertions.96. One may wish to cal l the land seizures and sacking of gent ry property a

revolutionary act, and it was certainly revolutionary in its consequences in 19'17.But it was a largely spontaneous affair. o ut of the control of any party, and it isextremely unlikely that those seizing uhe !Iand se,.f-consciouslysaw chemselvcs asbringing about a revolutionary govl.\J,mment.,et alone aBol'snev.k one. Sce Skocpol,States, iE3S, 138.

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,).: ;Eyo'Rm THE WAR 61


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288 .BEYOND THE WAR OF WORDSThe public transcript of the powerful is l ikely to be rather more in accordwith their total transcript than is the casewith the weak. After all, they arefreer,by virtue oftheir power,to speak their mind with relative impunity. Razak

can be safelyand publidy insulted in a way that Haji Kadir or Bashir cannotbe. And yet the powerful are also somewhat constrained both by a due regardror their reputation-a commodity of dedining but real value-and, by thedesire to uphold the "theater" of power. Thus they will excoriate many of thevillage poor in the privacy of their own homes but rarely to their face. This isalso not surprising; the transcript of the factory manager speaking with hisworkers is different from the transcript when he is in the safetyof his own dub;the transcript of the slave owner dealing with his slavesis different from hisunguarded remarks to other slaveholdersover dinner. Ir is onlywhen wecomparethe "unedited" transcript of elites with the unedited transcript of subordinatedasses that we uncover the extent ofmutual dissimulation that prevails in thecontext of power relations. In the usual day-to-day conduct of dass relations,these unedited transcripts are never in direct contactoOnlyat rare moments ofhistorical crisis are these transcripts and the actions they imply brought into adirect confrontation. When they are, it is often assumed that there has comeinto being a newconsciousness,a newanger, a newideologythat hastransrormeddass relations. Ir is far more likely, however,that this new "consciousness" wasalready there in the unedited transcript and it isthe situation that has changedin a way that allows or requires one or both parties to act on that basis.Both the rich and poor in Sedakaare, ofcourse, awarethat what takes placein the domain of power relations is not the whole story. They suspect and oftenknow that a good portion of village discourse takes place behind their backs.i 'heir knowledge is not, however,symmetrical. Here, at least, the poor haveaslight advantage-if we can call it that-in the realm of inrormation. Theyknow a good deal about what the rich think of them, as we have seen fromtheir comments. Their greater knowledge is due not only to the fact that thevillage elite is able to speak more freely,and disparagingly, of them but also tothe fact that i t is simply more important and vital ror the poor to keep theirear to the ground. The rich, bycontrast, know lessabout the unedited transcriptof the poor because the poor are more discreet and because the rich can morecasily afford not to listen. Knowing less, they are free to suspect the worst.What they do know is that they cannot easily penetrate behind the pose ofdissimulation, though they sense that behind the public routines of deferenceand respect Hecontempt and anger. They are in precisely the.situation of theeory. '! do noe, in chisanalysis, mean ror a moment to imply that the anthropologist-ouesider is privy eoehe eneire concealed transcripe ofvarious villagers. While ouesiderStl\ClISonfcrs somc advancagcs, ie slIrely blocks access eo oeher inrormacion. 1 was,li)r cxnmplc, nlwllYsawnre chae mose villagers wcre caeher reluceanc eo ealk abouehelllin~ nn'eImn~icl\llprllcticcs chileehcy ima~incd 1 mi~hc re~nrel as superscicions.

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BEYOND THE WAR OF WORDS . 289lord as described in Hegel's dialecticof lord and bondsman.9oThe very exerciseof power predudes the village elite from ever knowing what poorer villagersreally think, thereby vitiating the value to the elite of their ritual complianceand deference. Ir is perhaps for this reason that the most dominant elites havehistorically so often credited their underdasses with all manner of malevolentpowersand intentions emanating from the desire forrevenge.91The situation in- Sedakais not so extreme, but its rorm is qualitatively similar. The village elitessuspect the worst from the poor in terms of anonymous thefts, slander, ingrat-itude,\and dissimulating. Their fear, however,has a real basis in the nature oflocal power relations.92

WHAT IS RESISTANCE?We have encountered a bewildering array of resistance and compliance withinSedaka. It is no simple matter to determine just where compliance ends andresistance begins, as the circumstances lead ma o the poa o do their

, resistance in the public lan uage o co ie . If one takes t e dictionaryde nltlon o t e ver toreStSt-' to exert oneselfso as to withstand or counteractthe rorce or effect of . . . "-how is one to categorize the subtle mixture ofout~ard c0mp~ and tentative resistanceinvolvedin the attempted boycottof combine-using farmers? So far as the public record is concerned, it neverhappened and yet, at another level, it was a labor strike, albeit one that failed.There are still other problems. Can individual acts such as theft or the murderof livestockbe consideredresistanceeven though they involveno collectiveaction90. See,forexample,chapter2 ofGeorgeKelly,Hege/'sRetreatromEleusisPrince-

ton: Princeton Univ. Press, 1979); Hans-Georg Gadamer, Hege/'sDialectic (New Ha-ven:YaleUniv.Press),54-74; andG. W. F.Hegel,PhenomenologyftheSpirit,trans.A. V. Mil ler, wirh analysi s and fo reword by J. N. Findlay (Oxford: Clarendon,1977), 111-19, 520-23,91. Ir i s ar leasrplausible rhar rhere i s something ofa gui lry conscience ar workhere rhar knows rhe poor musr resent rheir marginalizarion from rhe vil lage's eco-

nomic and sociall ife. This interprerarion is very much in keeping wirh 1. M. Lewis'sanaly~is of possession by spirirs among women and low-srarus men in a variety ofculrures. In rhe conrexr of a low-casre cult among the Nayar in India, he condudes,"Thus as so ofren elsewhere, from an objecrive viewpoinr, rhese spirirs can be seento funcrion asa SOftof 'conscience of the rich. ' . . , Their malevolem power reflecrsrhe feel ings of envy and resenrmenr which people of high casre assume rhe lessfurtunare lower casres musr harbour in relarion ro rheir superiors." EcstaticReligiom:An AnthropologicalStudy of SPiritPossessionnd Shamanism(Harmondsworrh: Penguin,1971), 115.. 92. For an interesring account of chis process asapplied rOborh dass and genderrelacions, sec also Elizabceh JIII1Cway,ThePowersftheWeak(NewYork:MbrrowQuillPaperbncks, 19H1), chnps.9 10.

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Scott Resistance

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