Re: Fwd(GLW): FIJI: Land reform for the rich

["Alan Bradley" <abradley1@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

From: Louis Proyect
> That's right. I tend to orient to indigenous people, because they are
> victims of genocidal colonialism. This weighs more heavily in my
> calculation than whether a sugar farmer makes a profit. In Montana and
> Alberta, I would side with the corrupt Blackfoot tribal council if it took
> some kind of stand against the Hutterite land-grabbers, even though they
> are not big capitalist farmers.

Which is fine, except that the "indigenous people" in question are the
ruling class in Fiji, and very obviously hold state power.  This is not the
case in Montana and Alberta.

The Fijian "chiefly" elite (landowners and capitalists) are not analogous to
indigenous people in the US, Canada, or Australia.  Rather, they are akin to
the "Big Men" in Papua New Guinea, or the nobility in Tonga - a ruling
class.

The latter is quite an interesting question, by the way.  The deal by which
the nobility maintained their political monopoly for so long involved
guaranteeing commoners (male commoners?) a minimum level of access to land.
There is an obvious danger there, that breaking the political monopoly risks
breaking the guaranteed access to land.  Obviously, then, we should support
the continued rule of the nobility, shouldn't we?

Well, no.  Nor should we support the effective political monopoly the Fijian
nobility have established for themselves through the coups, or the scams
which result from this.

And of course, the only land-grabbers in Fiji are the chiefs, and in the
past the British.

Alan Bradley
abradley1@xxxxxxxxxxx










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