“Rural Regeneration in Asia”

The majority of the world population lives in the rural areas. The backbone of global society is the rural poor. And, the urban poor mainly come from the countryside and the number is increasing. The concept of “rural regeneration” not only challenges the policy of development based on industrialization and urbanization, adjusts the exploitative relation between the city and the country, but also nurtures new ethics of human relation to the nature.

In the world trade of the 19^th century, peasants in Asia, Africa and Latin America were the objects of exploitation, or the bases of the primitive accumulation of capital, as Marx remarks, “the expropriation of the agricultural producer, of the peasant, from the soil is the whole basis of the process”. The next two centuries still witness the expropriation of peasants for capitalist development.

On 1 January 1994, Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN) cried out “Ya Basta” against neo-liberalist globalization, which made the indigenous people or the rural poor visible on the international stage. In 1996, the Via Campesina introduced the term of “food sovereign” and called for farmers’ alliance.

Asian financial crisis of 1997 well illustrated that our future society should not be based on “bubble” economy, but rather “on the land”. The current issues such as soaring grain price, noxious food, ecological degradation, bio-fuel, hunger, remind us again of how vulnerable the rural societies are. Yet, the rural regeneration movements in Asia are exploring new alternatives: land re-distribution, organic farming, people’s trade, resources mapping, local credit system, recognition of indigenous knowledge, and so forth. What can we learn from those challenges to the present dominant discourse? What does it mean by “Rural Regeneration” in the age of neo-liberal globalization?


“2008 Summer Regional School: Rural Regeneration in Asia” will focus on four specific themes relevant to the subject:

• Land: access to land and food security/sovereignty  
  
• Sciences: organic farming and resources planning 
  
• Gender: women’s contribution and leadership
  
• Culture: cooperatives and popular participation
  

At the end of this course students will be able to:

• Reflect on human relations to the land/nature
  

• Bring “Rural Regeneration” back into the global social movement;
  
• Develop greater insights on people’s participation;
  
• Examine the role of NGOs, the rural communities, and the civil society in mobilizing the people to act for social change.
  
• Course Structure
  

This course is 40 credit hours intensive week spread six days. It will divide into four sessions: (A) Peasants’ Knowledge and Experiences; (B) Activists’ Networking; (C)   Study Tour; and (D) Students’ Presentations. The program has been planned as follows.
Morning session  : 3 hours, 0900-1200
Afternoon session : 3 hours, 1400-1700
Evening session   : 1.5 hours, 1900-2030

1. - All facilitators will prepare a write-up on the assigned theme (roughly 2,000-4,000 words) and send a soft copy to the Coordinator.
   
2. - Copies of the papers will be compiled together and will be made available to MAINS students and other participants.
   
3. - Students go through all required readings.
   
4. - Code of ethics to be established on the first session of the semester.
   
5. - Facilitators may encourage forming smaller groups, arranging intra-group discussion and group presentation, and inter-grouping debate in respective sessions.
   
6. - Each student will reflect on the thematic discussion in each session.
   
7. - Students will be divided into five groups.
   
8. - Each group will prepare and submit a paper (3000-5000 words) on “Rural Regeneration in Asia” to the Coordinator.
   
9. - Each group will give a presentation (15-20 minutes) on “Rural Regeneration in Asia”. 
   
10.