Oil palm expansion without enclosure: smallholders and environmental narratives

Abstract

Recent debates on land grabbing and biofuels tend to link oil palm expansion to rural dispossession, environmental degradation and rural resistance. In this paper, we examine to what extent ‘enclosure’, a central concept in two critiques – ‘environmentalism of the poor’ and ‘green grabbing’ – is intrinsically linked to oil palm expansion. We argue that where enclosure is absent, poor peasants may seek greater market integration over resistance to modernisation processes. We analyse how and why peasants engage in oil palm cultivation and how their involvement undermines green efforts to curb its expansion in Chiapas, Mexico. Our analysis suggests that an exclusive focus on enclosure as the main driving force behind contestation and agrarian social relationships is unable to explain agrarian dynamics and the multiple uses to which environmental narratives are put.