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Periodical article | Leiden University catalogue | WorldCat |
Title: | Who's for Work? The Management of Labour in the Process of Accumulation in Three Adja Villages, Benin |
Author: | Ouden, Jan H.B. den |
Year: | 1995 |
Periodical: | Africa: Journal of the International African Institute |
Volume: | 65 |
Issue: | 1 |
Pages: | 1-35 |
Language: | English |
Geographic term: | Benin |
Subjects: | Aja labour Labor and Employment Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups) |
External link: | https://www.jstor.org/stable/1160905 |
Abstract: | The world of the Adja in southwest Benin is strongly influenced by processes of commercialization, by the monetization of goods and services and by incorporation into the State. At the same time the cultural and structural past is still very much a part of the present. Both old and new patterns of labour management play an important role in the ways enterprises expand or decline. In this article, which is based on research carried out in three villages - Houé, Komihoué, and Adjòhoué - near the regional centre of Dogbo Tota in 1986, 1989 and 1991, the author analyses the styles and strategies used by the Adja in the process of accumulation, focusing especially on the management of labour and the problems of mobilizing and keeping labour that costs less than the value of what it produces. Two styles of labour management are identified, the 'traditional' and the 'modern' style, which are related to two distinct types of 'ewa adoku' (blessed people or big men), viz. the 'alo-su amè dji' - those mainly interested in investing in and dominating people, and the 'eho wu amè' - people to whom wealth is much more important than a big following. The first use mainly domestic labour, while the latter prefer to work with hired labour. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum. in English and French. |