Jan Breman

Jan Breman takes dispossession as his central theme in this ambitious analysis of labour bondage in India's changing political economy from 1962 to 2017. When, in a remote past, tribal and low-caste communities were attached to landowning households, their lack of freedom was framed as subsistence-oriented dependency. Breman argues that with colonial rule came the intrusion of capitalism into India's agrarian economy, leading to a decline in the idea of patronage in the relationship between bonded labour and landowner. Instead, servitude was reshaped as indebtedness. As labour became transformed into a commodity, peasant workers were increasingly pushed out of agriculture and the village but remained adrift in the wider economy. This footloose workforce is subjected to exploitation when their labour power is required and is left in a state of exclusion when it is surplus to demand. The outcome is progressive inequality that is thoroughly capitalist in nature.

Jan Breman takes dispossession as his central theme in this ambitious analysis of labour bondage in India's changing political economy from 1962 to 2017. When, in a remote past, tribal and low-caste communities were attached to landowning households, their lack of freedom was framed as subsistence-oriented dependency. Breman argues that with colonial rule came the intrusion of capitalism into India's agrarian economy, leading to a decline in the idea of patronage in the relationship between bonded labour and landowner. Instead, servitude was reshaped as indebtedness. As labour became transformed into a commodity, peasant workers were increasingly pushed out of agriculture and the village but remained adrift in the wider economy. This footloose workforce is subjected to exploitation when their labour power is required and is left in a state of exclusion when it is surplus to demand. The outcome is progressive inequality that is thoroughly capitalist in nature.

With labour being pushed out of agriculture, Jan Breman analyses why, when, and how the massive shift in production and employment came about. The book is divided into two parts. The first part discus

Pauperism and pauperization are two of the most persistent and widespread phenomena in India. While a fierce debate rages on the line separating the poor from the non-poor, there is scant discussion o

Coffee has been grown on Java for the commercial market since the early eighteenth century, when the Dutch East India Company began buying from peasant producers in the Priangan highlands. What began

Written from 1999 onwards, these essays focus on labour at the bottom of the rural economy, lacking social, economic, and political wherewithal, and their struggles to find a foothold in the urban eco

Utilizing his fieldwork done in south Gujarat between 2004 and 2006, Jan Breman critically analyses the historical roots of the ongoing subordination of the rural poor in what has come to be recognize

In a penetrating anthropological study of the working poor in India, Jan Breman examines the lives of those who, pushed out of the agrarian labour market, depend on casual work. Beginning his local-level research in two villages in south Gujarat, the author discusses the mobilisation of casual labour, which is hired and fired according to the need of the moment, and transferred for the duration of the job to destinations far away from the home area. His case-study reveals that the circulation of labour is indicative of an employment pattern which dominates both the rural and urban economy of large parts of South Asia. Elaborating on the social profile of the work migrants, the author argues that their identity is shaped by both class and caste relations and, despite action by state agencies, nothing of significance has been achieved to improve their quality of life.

In a penetrating anthropological study of the working poor in India, Jan Breman examines the lives of those who, pushed out of the agrarian labour market, depend on casual work. Beginning his local-level research in two villages in south Gujarat, the author discusses the mobilisation of casual labour, which is hired and fired according to the need of the moment, and transferred for the duration of the job to destinations far away from the home area. His case-study reveals that the circulation of labour is indicative of an employment pattern which dominates both the rural and urban economy of large parts of South Asia. Elaborating on the social profile of the work migrants, the author argues that their identity is shaped by both class and caste relations and, despite action by state agencies, nothing of significance has been achieved to improve their quality of life.

The causes of the Asian economic crisis have been the subject of fierce debates among economists, yet little is known about the impact on employment and wellbeing. In Indonesia, the worst affected cou

This book is about social security, or the lack of it, for the labouring poor in India. It is a critical study of the working of two flagship national social security schemes initiated by the Governme

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'An urgent and extraordinary book. Weaving a philosophical analysis of Heidegger, Agamben and Foucault, Jan draws out the implications of their thought for a radical analysis of the ontological politi

'An urgent and extraordinary book. Weaving a philosophical analysis of Heidegger, Agamben and Foucault, Jan draws out the implications of their thought for a radical analysis of the ontological politi