Women, Mobility and Rural Livelihoods in Zimbabwe: Experiences of Fast Track Land Reform (Afrika-Studiecentrum Series, 32)

This book is based on iterative multi-sited ethnography at Merrivale farm, Tavaka village, and various sites in South Africa. The author reveals how the dynamics generated by fast-track potentially offer new development opportunities – specifically for women. The findings challenge existing expert notions and opinions about women’s rural land use, livelihoods, and rural development. The book examines how negotiations and bargaining by women with family, state, and traditional actors have proved useful in accessing land in Mwenezi district, Zimbabwe. The hidden, complex, and innovative ways adopted by women to access land and shape livelihoods based on transitory mobility are examined. The role of collective action, conflicts, conflict resolution, and women’s agency in overcoming the challenges associated with trading in South Africa are examined within the ambit of the sustainable livelihoods framework, a gendered approach to land reform and social networks analysis.

Patience Mutopo, Ph.D (2012, awarded with a Magna Cum Laude), Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology, University of Cologne, Germany, is currently a Post Doctoral Researcher with the University of Cologne, Germany and the University of Wageningen, the Netherlands, under the Volkswagen Foundation funding Initiative for Social Sciences. Her research interests include land and agrarian reforms, gender, livelihoods analysis, social entrepreneurship, and the politics of policy-making processes.