Gender and Witchcraft in Agrarian Transition: The Case of Kenyan Horticulture

Abstract

This article examines the social effects of contract farming of export horticulture among smallholders in Meru District, Kenya. During the 1980s and 1990s, contracting was popularized by donors and governments alike as a way to reduce poverty and increase opportunities for self-employment in rural areas. Considerable research has documented the tensions in social relations that emerge in such cases, giving rise to gendered struggles over land, labour, and income in the face of new commodity systems. This article highlights similar tendencies. It suggests that men's failure to compensate their wives for horticulture production has given rise to a string of witchcraft allegations and acts, as the wealth engendered by horticultural commodities comes up against cultural norms of marital obligation. While witchcraft accusations can expose women to risks of social alienation and financial deprivation, witchcraft nevertheless remains a powerful weapon through which women can level intra-household disparities and, more broadly, challenge the legitimacy of social practice. In Meru, witchcraft discourses are a vehicle through which gendered struggles over contract income are articulated and contested, and through which the social costs of agrarian transition become apparent.

Pathways to empowerment?: dynamics of women's participation in Global Value Chains

“…Looking at studies on Kenyan women workers, with the notable exception of Dolan (2001Dolan ( , 2002 and also Kenya Human Rights Commission (KHRC) (2012), analysis concentrates within the workplace rather than household dynamics and how participation within GVCs interacts with this. The word 'empowerment' is surprisingly absent, exceptions being Riisgaard who talks of 'empowerment' as 'worker self-representation' within trade unions (Riisgaard, 2009a, b:33) and the KHRC which uses the word once when stating that "patriarchal systems…inhibit the empowerment of women" (KHRC, 2008:39).…”

The gender implications of large-scale land deals

“…This situation led to large disputes within the community because women were not often properly compensated for their work by the men who held the contracts. Dolan (2002) documents the introduction of a French bean contract farming scheme in Kenya. As the beans -traditionally a women's product -became increasingly profitable, men began to lay claim to land allocated for, and income derived from, the production of beans, thereby challenging women's traditional spheres of control and causing conflict within the community.…”

Towards a Gendered Agro-Commodity Approach

“…Traditions, customary law and (world) religions may hamper the access of women to property rights, capital ownership, and employment and stimulate gender inequitable attitudes in general (Joireman 2008;Seguino 2010). Nevertheless there are also experiences where traditions are useful to reduce the disparities of formal regulations, like the cases of witchcraft in Kenyan contract horticulture (Dolan 2002), the customary gender rights on trees and crops of the Buganda in Uganda (Howard and Nabanoga 2007) and the historical women dominance of shea nut chains in Ghana (Wardell and Fold 2013).…”