Mais um importante pólo acadêmico no Sul

A publicação de uma revista com 3 edições anuais em inglês e 1 edição em espanhol abre um caminho importante de divulgação do trabalho de pesquisa de uma equipe bastante consolidada de estudos sobre a questão agrária orientada para os interesses e questões colocadas pelos países e povos do sul. Paris Yeros, professor de nacionalidade grega, da PUC de Minas, nos convida para participar de seu conselho editor o que aceitamos com muito prazer apesar de nossos problemas de tempo. O projeto de trabalho do grupo é muito interessante e eles têm o apoio de Samir Amin que se dedica fortemente sobre estas questões. É importante também que estejam associados à SAGE que coordena a edição de centenas de “journals” em todo o mundo garantindo um excelente trabalho de edição e divulgação. Se você quer conhecer mais de perto o grupo leia as informações sobre o mesmo que me fizeram chegar.

Agrarian South: Journal of Political Economy

a periodical publication of SAGE and CARES in partnership with AIAS and SONAQ

I. Editorial Aims and Scope of the Journal

Agrarian South: Journal of Political Economy is a periodical publication of SAGE India and the Center for Agrarian Research and Education for the South (CARES, India), in partnership with the African Institute of Agrarian Studies (AIAS, Zimbabwe), and the South-South Research Network on the Agrarian Question (SONAQ, Brazil). Agrarian South is a tri-continental initiative of researchers and activists based in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, seeking to promote research and teaching on the agrarian question.

The aims of Agrarian South are to promote research on the political economy of agrarian change and global agriculture from a Southern perspective. The ongoing transformations in the world economy have brought to the fore a series of historic challenges, linked to the food, energy, climate, and economic crises, which will definitively mark the whole of the twenty-first century. As the period of neoliberal globalisation comes to a close, there is a profound need to rethink the agrarian question in innovative ways, and especially what it means to the peoples of the South.

The journal intends to provide an outlet for innovative thinking on the agrarian question and give priority to thematic areas which it deems fundamental, namely: the role of rural and land movements in democratic, national, and global struggles; the unequal integration of Southern societies and agricultures in the world system; and the construction of alternative development strategies towards a multipolar world.

The intended readership includes undergraduate and postgraduate students, junior and senior researchers, activists, and policy-makers, in both South and North. The journal is located in the Development Studies discipline, bringing together such sub-disciplines as Agrarian Studies, Labour Studies, Gender Studies, Environmental Studies, Urban Studies, and International Political Economy. The perspective of the journal, while supportive of diverse theoretical approaches, is grounded in critical political economy, which it recognises as the historical matrix of the social sciences. The objective of the journal is to cultivate a political economy which rises to the multi-faceted challenges of the twenty-first century.

The journal will have balanced international representation, which includes an Editorial Board drawn from Africa, Asia and Latin America, and an International Advisory Board with recognised scholars from both North and South. The journal will publish articles in English, and will undertake to translate articles from Spanish, Portuguese, and French. An annual compilation of each volume will also be published in Spanish by SONAQ.

The journal will publish articles that emerge from the research and teaching activities of its partner organisations. Its research agenda revolves around the following issues, in accordance with the thematic areas identified above:

Rural Movements, Democracy and National Sovereignty

• Rural Movements in Africa, Asia and Latin America
• Trade Unions, Political Parties and the Agrarian Question
• Gender and the Agrarian Question
• Building Rural-Urban Unity in Africa, Asia and Latin America
• The National Question in the Present Crisis

The Capitalist World System and the Present Crisis

• The New Scramble for Land and Natural Resources
• Finance Capital, MNCs and the Global Agro-Food System
• International Organisations and the Global Agro-Food System
• The Climate-Energy Crisis and the Bio-fuels Industry
• Global Commodity Chains in Agriculture

Alternative Development Strategies for a Multipolar World

• Land Reform, Re-peasantisation and Cooperativism
• The Urban Land Question in Africa, Asia and Latin America
• Sustainable Agro-Industrial Development
• Regionalism and the Agrarian Question
• Re-posing the Agrarian Question in Europe and North America

II. Rationale for the Journal

Agrarian South is the product of a long cross-fertilisation of various initiatives in South-South research collaboration, with such partners as CODESRIA (Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa), the Third World Forum, the World Forum for Alternatives, CLACSO (Latin American Council of the Social Sciences), IDEAS (International Development Economics Associates), and ActionAid India.

In recent years, there has been renewed interest in the agrarian question, especially as a result of the escalating food, energy, climate, and economic crises, but also due to the emergence of strong rural movements in the South, in opposition to land concentration and the dominant model of corporate-industrial agriculture. It is our view that existing publication outlets with an international vocation, namely Journal of Agrarian Change and Journal of Peasant Studies, both based in the North, have generally been unable to formulate a research agenda which would give adequate expression to the emerging social struggles and associated research in the South. Moreover, the alternative intellectual concerns and originality of many researchers, especially those based in the South, do not easily find acceptance among the editorial boards of established Northern journals and peer-review networks. It is for this reason the partner organisations resolved to create an alternative platform for the regular publication of scientific research in this burgeoning field.

More generally, the objectives of the partner organisations are to:

• promote an autonomous Southern debate and perspective on the agrarian question;
• facilitate collaborative tri-continental research, as well as socially-rooted research by means of systematic dialogue between researchers and activists;
• develop research capacity to intervene systematically in national and global debates on the agrarian question and influence public policy;
• provide advanced training on the theory and history of the agrarian question to young researchers, activists, and policy-makers;
• establish an autonomous capacity to publish research on the agrarian question.

In addition to Agrarian South, the partner organisations have a number of activities, some already in progress, others in the planning stage, all of which will synergise with Agrarian South. Existing activities include the AIAS Annual Agrarian Summer School, which, since 2009, meets every January and brings together researchers and activists from Africa, Asia, and Latin America; its purpose is to sustain socially relevant research and theoretically informed political practice. The partner organisations also organise ad hoc seminars and conferences in the three continents, for the purpose of launching specific research projects.

The activities under planning include the Agrarian Studies Training Institute, whose purpose is to provide a periodic, three-week training course on the agrarian question for young researchers, activists, and policy-makers; as well as a Book Series, which will publish collaborative tri-continental research. Several collectively organised books are in progress, including:

• Reclaiming Africa: Scramble and Resistance in the Global Crisis, edited by Sam Moyo, Paris Yeros and Praveen Jha;
• Rural Social Movements: Responses to the Global Crisis in Africa, Asia and Latin America, edited by Marcelo Rosa, Antonádia Borges, Ng´wanza Kamata, Sandeep Chachra;
• Rural-Urban Unity: Building Mass Movements in Africa, Asia and Latin America, edited by Paris Yeros, Antonádia Borges, Praveen Jha, Ng’wanza Kamata;
• Agrarian Transitions in Africa: The Challenge of South-South Cooperation in Agriculture, edited by Sam Moyo, Paris Yeros, Marcelo Rosa, Dzodzi Tsikata.

Also, book projects which have already been published by the network include:

• Sam Moyo and Paris Yeros (eds), Reclaiming the Land: The Resurgence of Rural Movements in Africa, Asia and Latin America, London and Cape Town, Zed Books and David Philip, 2005; republished in Spanish by CLACSO, Buenos Aires, 2008.
• Sam Moyo and Paris Yeros (eds), Reclaiming the Nation: The Return of the National Question in Africa, Asia and Latin America, London, Pluto Press, 2011.

Our partnership is emerging as a key research hub on the agrarian question, with a distinct, and globally recognised, research agenda and perspective. Its diverse activities have consolidated a unique, and highly productive, tri-continental network of junior and senior researchers, which is fully capable of sustaining a regular and high-quality scientific publication.

III. Editorial Board and Administration

The Editorial Board will include seven members − two from Africa, two from Asia, and three from Latin America. The academic background of the board members represents the full range of traditional social science disciplines, including Economics, Sociology, Anthropology, Geography, Political Science, and International Relations. Moreover, while the board members all share expertise in Agrarian Studies, each also contributes expertise in a specific sub-discipline, including Labour Studies, Gender Studies, Environmental Studies, Urban Studies, and International Political Economy. This makes for a robust Editorial Board, capable of administering an interdisciplinary journal of this kind.

The members of the Editorial Board include the following:

• Sam Moyo (Editor in Chief), AIAS, Zimbabwe
• Sandeep Chachra (Managing Editor), ActionAid India / CARES
• Praveen Jha, Jawaharlal Nehru University, India / CARES
• Dzodzi Tsikata, University of Ghana
• Paris Yeros, Catholic University of Minas Gerais, Brazil / SONAQ
• Marcelo Rosa, University of Brasília, Brazil / SONAQ
• Antonádia Borges, University of Brasília, Brazil / SONAQ

The journal will also have a balanced International Advisory Board, composed of senior and well-respected scholars, including the following (highlighted names are to be confirmed):

• Kojo Amanor, University of Ghana, Ghana
• Samir Amin, Third World Forum, Senegal
• Armando Bartra, Instituto Maia, Mexico
• C.P. Chandrasekhar, Jawaharlal Nehru University, India
• Jayati Ghosh, Jawaharlal Nehru University, India
• Mammadou Goita, Affiliation?, Mali
• Yao Graham, Third World Network Africa, Ghana
• Fred Hendricks, Rhodes University, South Africa
• Norma Jiarraca, Argentina
• Jomo K.S., Affiliation?, Malaysia
• Mahmood Mamdani, Makerere Institute, Uganda
• Marjorie Mbilinyi, University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
• Thandika Mkandawire, London School of Economics, UK
• Reginaldo C. Moraes, University of Campinas, Brazil
• Lungisile Ntzebeza, University of Cape Town, South Africa
• Prabhat Patnaik, Jawaharlal Nehru University, India
• Utsa Patnaik, Jawaharlal Nehru University, India
• Ebrima Sall, CODESRIA, Senegal
• Henry Saragih, Via Campesina, Indonesia
• Theotonio dos Santos, REGGEN, Brazil
• Issa Shivji, University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
• Wen Teijun, Affiliation(?), China

The ideal would be to have a total of twenty members on the International Advisory Board. The role of this board will be strictly advisory, with no responsibility for the day-to-day management of the journal.

The management of the journal will be shared among the members of the Editorial Board. Each member will have responsibility for specific articles, in accordance with one’s regional and disciplinary expertise, while the responsibility for liaison with the publisher will rotate among the members of the board from issue to issue.

IV. Format of the Journal and Timing

The journal will appear trimesterly and will seek to have a fair balance between theoretical and empirical research. The journal’s features will include the following:

• articles;
• book reviews and review essays;
• briefings on current affairs, events, and social movements;
• one special thematic issue per year (the final issue of each volume).

V. Inaugural Issue

The inaugural issue will be published in April 2012. Its contents include the following:

• Editorial, Their Agrarian Question and Ours

• Samir Amin, Contemporary Imperialism and the Agrarian Question

• Prabhat Patnaik, The Peasant Question and Contemporary Capitalism: Some Reflections with Reference to India

• Jayati Ghosh, Accumulation Strategies and Livelihood Possibilities in India

• Reginaldo C. Moraes, Reclaiming the Land, Reclaiming the Nation: Parallel or Twin Questions?

• Sergio Sauer, Land Struggles and Land Markets: The Increasing World Demand for Land and the Landless Peasants in Brazil