ROAPE at 50: ROAPE and Zimbabwe: an appreciation

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Over the last 50 years, ROAPE has held a special place in the study of Africa. Combining acute analysis with solid empiricism, the journal has provided an ongoing commentary that has been highly influential over the years.

Since the mid 1980s, my work has centred on Zimbabwe. ROAPE has been a go-to source of inspiration and debate for me like many others. There are 107 articles (and reviews) that have been published focusing on Zimbabwe since 1974. The first was a 1976 editorial by Lionel Cliffe and Peter Lawrence commenting on ‘the struggle for the state in Southern Africa’ in the wake of the MPLA’s victory in Angola. The then-ongoing machinations among the liberation movements in Zimbabwe were discussed, with the hope that a progressive peasant–worker alliance would emerge. They comment:

from our perspective what urgently needs to be resolved, at least in a preliminary way, is the issue of what kind of future Zimbabwe society is to emerge. Moreover, in our assessment none of the main contenders for power shows any sign of understanding the post-independent options nor of sensitivity to the needs of the working people of Zimbabwe. (Cliffe and Lawrence 1976, 7)

Well, the future of Zimbabwe is still being debated and the political alliances of the ruling elite remain highly contentious.

Over the subsequent years, papers have been published on Zimbabwe highlighting many themes. Lionel Cliffe, sadly now late, and Peter Lawrence have been highly influential in ensuring that Zimbabwean debates have appeared in the journal. Linked to an editorial by Lionel and Barry Munslow (1980) celebrating Zimbabwe’s independence, there were a cluster of papers – including by Cliffe, Mpofu and Munslow (1980) and Yates (1980) – that discussed the prospects of a progressive, socialist future for the country. Over the subsequent decades, there have been many other contributions that have discussed the changing character of post-liberation politics, and the political alliances that exist in the region (for example, Phimister and Raftopoulos 2004). In a number of prescient pieces, the challenges for democracy have been explored by Brian Raftopoulos (1992), Lloyd Sachikonye (2003) and others. All are worth rereading today.

Another theme that saw a number of contributions, especially in the 1990s, was on the consequences of structural adjustment. ROAPE was an early critic of the adjustment programmes, seen as imposing external conditionalities and so constraining progressive policies (Stoneman 1992). Important papers were published by Nazneen Kanji and Niki Jazdowska (1993) on the consequences for women and Rob Davies and David Saunders (1987) on child health and nutrition impacts, for example, while in the aftermath of economic restructuring Paris Yeros (2013) examined the changing role of labour unions in a two-part contribution.

The papers that I have devoured ever since starting my PhD focused particularly on the changing character of the Zimbabwean countryside and its class politics. For example, there were great papers on agricultural ‘success’ (Cliffe 1988), circular migration (Simon 1985; Potts and Mutambirwa 1997), farm labour (Moyo, Rutherford and Amanor-Wilks 2000), the role of an emerging bourgeoise (Munslow 1980), post-independence resettlement (Jacobs 1983; Alexander 1994), rural social differentiation (Cousins, Weiner and Amin 1992) and agrarian transformations more generally (Bush and Cliffe 1984; Bernstein 2003). All added to an informed, nuanced debate on livelihoods and agrarian dynamics in Zimbabwe; one that was massively influential for me.

After the Fast Track Land Reform Programme from 2000, the journal has published perhaps the greatest concentration of articles on Zimbabwe in its history; now increasingly, I am glad to say, written by Zimbabweans. Together with colleagues, my three contributions to the journal have all been published in this period (Chaumba, Scoones and Wolmer 2003; Scoones 2015; Scoones et al. 2019). The special issue edited by Grasian Mkodzongi and Peter Lawrence published in 2019 is a stand-out collection (2019), but there are many other significant articles published in this period. These include the classic paper by Sam Moyo (2011), as well as several important ones from frequent contributor Lloyd Sachikonye on the fast-track programme (2003) and contract farming (2016). Together they all have added to a more critical and nuanced perspective on Zimbabwe’s land reform than too often offered elsewhere.

In the opening editorial in 1974, the editors promised that the journal would ask a set of questions: ‘why is Africa’s productive potential not realised? Why are most of its people still poor? Why is the continent still dependent, its future still controlled by outside forces?’ (ROAPE 1974, 1). This was to be done through ‘non-dogmatic’ theorisation, but an approach that would not get trapped by ‘bourgeois social science’ (ibid., 3) that deems all causes are local and ignores the wider influences of international political economy. The same questions posed half a century ago are as relevant today, and the journal continues to provide a vital platform for scholarship and wider activist debate, particularly so in its new open-access incarnation.

In the next 50 years, I hope that the journal will continue this valuable contribution to analytical debate combined with practical engagement, encouraging more African authors and, as ever, being ahead of the curve in spotting trends, suggesting alternatives and providing a progressive perspective on contemporary themes.

References

1. Alexander J. 1994. State, Peasantry and Resettlement in Zimbabwe. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 21(61):325–345. [Cross Ref]

2. Bernstein H. 2003. Land Reform in Southern Africa in World-Historical Perspective. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 30(96):203–226. [Cross Ref]

3. Bush R, Cliffe L. 1984. Agrarian Policy in Migrant Labour Societies: Reform or Transformation in Zimbabwe? Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 11(29):77–94. [Cross Ref]

4. Chaumba J, Scoones I, Wolmer W. 2003. New Politics, New Livelihoods: Agrarian Change in Zimbabwe. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 30(98):585–608. [Cross Ref]

5. Cliffe L. 1988. Zimbabwe’s Agricultural ‘Success’ and Food Security in Southern Africa. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 15(43):4–25. [Cross Ref]

6. Cliffe L, Lawrence P. 1976. Editorial. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 3(5):4–11. [Cross Ref]

7. Cliffe L, Munslow B. 1980. Editorial: The Prospects for Zimbabwe. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 7(18):1–6. [Cross Ref]

8. Cliffe L, Mpofu J, Munslow B. 1980. Nationalist Politics in Zimbabwe: The 1980 Elections and Beyond. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 7(18):44–67. [Cross Ref]

9. Cousins B, Weiner D, Amin N. 1992. Social Differentiation in the Communal Lands of Zimbabwe. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 19(53):5–24. [Cross Ref]

10. Davies R, Saunders D. 1987. Stabilisation Policies and the Effects on Child Health in Zimbabwe. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 14(38):3–23. [Cross Ref]

11. Jacobs S. 1983. Women and Land Resettlement in Zimbabwe. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 10(27–28):33–50. [Cross Ref]

12. Kanji N, Jazdowska N. 1993. Structural Adjustment and Women in Zimbabwe. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 20(56):11–26. [Cross Ref]

13. Mkodzongi G, Lawrence P. 2019. The Fast-Track Land Reform and Agrarian Change in Zimbabwe. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 46(159):1–13. [Cross Ref]

14. Moyo S. 2011. Land Concentration and Accumulation after Redistributive Reform in Post-Settler Zimbabwe. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 38(128):257–276. [Cross Ref]

15. Moyo S, Rutherford B, Amanor-Wilks D. 2000. Land Reform & Changing Social Relations for Farm Workers in Zimbabwe. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 27(84):181–202. [Cross Ref]

16. Munslow B. 1980. Zimbabwe’s Emerging African Bourgeoisie. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 7(19):63–69. [Cross Ref]

17. Phimister I, Raftopoulos B. 2004. Mugabe, Mbeki & the Politics of Anti-Imperialism. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 31(101):385–400. [Cross Ref]

18. Potts D, Mutambirwa C. 1997. ‘The Government Must Not Dictate’: Rural–Urban Migrants’ Perceptions of Zimbabwe’s Land Resettlement Programme. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 24(74):549–566. [Cross Ref]

19. Raftopoulos B. 1992. Beyond the House of Hunger: Democratic Struggle in Zimbabwe. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 19(55):57–66. [Cross Ref]

20. ROAPE. 1974. Editorial. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 1(1):1–8. [Cross Ref]

21. Sachikonye LM. 2003. From ‘Growth with Equity’ to ‘Fast-Track’ Reform: Zimbabwe’s Land Question. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 30(96):227–240. [Cross Ref]

22. Sachikonye LM. 2016. Old Wine in New Bottles? Revisiting Contract Farming after Agrarian Reform in Zimbabwe. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 43 Sup 1:86–98. [Cross Ref]

23. Scoones I. 2015. Zimbabwe’s Land Reform: New Political Dynamics in the Countryside. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 42(144):190–205. [Cross Ref]

24. Scoones I, Mavedzenge B, Murimbarimba F. 2019. Young People and Land in Zimbabwe: Livelihood Challenges after Land Reform. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 46(159):117–134. [Cross Ref]

25. Simon D. 1985. Agrarian Policy and Migration in Zimbabwe and Southern Africa: Reform or Transportation? Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 12(34):82–89. [Cross Ref]

26. Stoneman C. 1992. The World Bank Demands its Pound of Zimbabwe’s Flesh. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 19(53):94–96. [Cross Ref]

27. Yates P. 1980. The Prospects for Socialist Transition in Zimbabwe. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 7(18):68–88. [Cross Ref]

28. Yeros P. 2013. The Rise and Fall of Trade Unionism in Zimbabwe, Part I: 1990–1995. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 40(136):219–232. [Cross Ref]

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