Agrarian Reform And Its Repercussions On The Peasant

Agrarian reform and its repercussions on the peasant

Summary

This work has been carried out in order to publicize the repercussions of agrarian reform in all Peruvians, in the special in the peasant sector. This investigation had as reference to different sources as "Campesino and Agrarian Reform" of Valderrama, "The Agrarian Reform and Rural Development in Peru" of Eguren, "The Peruvian Agrarian Reform" of Almanza and "The Agrarian Reform" of Matos and Matos andMejía. All these sources helped us develop the ideas of this work. Throughout the exhibition, it is tried to demonstrate that the agrarian reform had as its main objective to recognize that the peasant was in an unfavorable situation before society in the economic and political aspect, in order to solve all these problems through deliveryof plots that belonged to large capitalist and semi-capitalist cooperatives. However, the effect was almost entirely counterproductive, after the delivery of the plots, they were no more support;action that generated more discontent by the proletariat, therefore, the riots, strikes and marches increased considered. However, a point that must be highlighted was the autonomy obtained by the peasant and political parties that ensure mainly for their interests.

Introduction

Currently, the farmer has debts with the banks due to the null existence of agricultural banks. After the mandate of Juan Velasco Alvarado, the following governments focused on dictating policies in favor of large companies that have once again concentrated agricultural land. Despite all this, the peasant is a free being, enjoys free will and autonomy, and that small agriculture and family agriculture provides more than 80% of the food consumed in the country, according to the Ministry of Agriculture andIrrigation. Therefore, the issue that takes place in this work is the Agrarian Reform and its repercussions in the peasant, in the government of Juan Velasco Alvarado in Peru from 1969 to 1975;originating the following question: Why reasons the agrarian reform has an impact on the peasant, in the government of Juan Velasco Alvarado in Peru from 1969 to 1975?

This response argues that the agrarian reform has an impact on the farmer, in the government of Juan Velasco Alvarado because it had a social purpose, mainly sought the autonomy of the peasant, and also favor their income increased, providing them with job stability. The land belongs to who works it, despite not knowing how to administer it.

Agrarian reform arose as a consequence to the land problems that existed, and that included the peasant sector. Author Berry defines agrarian reform as:

The pressure for a reform of the agrarian structure that arises from a combination of problems perceived, including poverty, justice, ambiguity (especially around property rights) and inefficiency. The severity of these fundamental problems and their relative importance vary according to the existing agrarian structure, culture, land scarcity and other factors. And, as is natural, also the scope of the resulting problems: discomfort, violence, political instability, etc., and the possible ‘remedies’. In situations of great scarce land, in which its distribution is very unequal and most people work as tenants in the land of others, the pressure usually adopts the form of a movement by ‘the earth for those who work it'[…]. 

Agrarian reform was an answer to problems, such as poverty, injustice, violence, political and economic instability. Also to the injustice of land in which the peasants work land of their master or owner. The agrarian reform had the fundamental concept, which consisted of the fact that the earth is from who works;This is how the landowners were expropriated from the landowners, and their servants became owners of these lands.

The agrarian reform that occurred in Peru had a great impact on agriculture. The owners of the capitalist and semi-capitalist estates were expropriated by these units to be delivered to the peasants. This measure sought to improve the country’s economy with agriculture. Borja and Valdivia indicate that:

[…] Agriculture is perhaps one of the activities that changed the course of humanity, moving from nomadism to sedentary lifestyle. It is perhaps, one of the pillars of the economy of numerous nations;It highlights its importance as the engine of development production for internal consumption and food security of the population, derived employment and the possibility of international trade with the consequent currency generation.[…] 

Agriculture, being the main source of income and support of the country, is extremely relevant to being the cause of our daily diet, as in turn, in foreigners. In spite of all this, the peasants, lacked education, therefore they could not carry out these actions that would improve the economic development of the country, which in those years was very low. In addition to this, they did not receive more support from the State, so lacking money, they could not access machinery that would facilitate their work, and only generated debts.

Agrarian reform was a set of political, economic, social and legislative measures promoted in order to modify the structure of land property and production in a given place and are during the twentieth century, they issued a significant change in conditions in thethat the peasants were. The author Chonchol argues that:

During this century, it constantly produced it in favor of the landless peasant or mifundistas, to the extent that in different countries political conditions favorable to the needs of the peasantry were created. These conditions were the result of political or social revolutions and peasant pressures in the context of these revolutions. They were also the consequence of the desire of certain political leaders in the power to gain the support of the peasant. To this favored, in several cases, an international context that pressed for the change of agricultural structures. 

Agricultural reforms were constantly produced in the region in favor of redistribution for the peasantless land and in this margin the pressure on the region began to be felt, the conditions of these were the result of several types of both political and social revolutions. Certain desires of political parties or political leaders were generated to carry out these agrarian reforms and in turn the support of this sector was achieved in future votes. The international context exerted undeniable and inevitable pressure.

The lacks suffered by the peasants to reach a dignified life, whether health, education or any others, were the most forceful reasons that led them to start local rebellions against regimes at the time, currently and gaveplace to a thought of the change in social, political, economic axis. The author Sampaio sustains the history of agrarian reform as:

The agricultural reforms that have originated in revolutions (Mexico and Bolivia) as the agricultural reforms that have caused significant alterations in the rates of concentration of land ownership (carried out in Guatemala, Chile, Peru, Nicaragua and El Salvador) have representeda substantial land transfer of large landowners to families of peasants. In these cases, a reformed agriculture was created that became an intermediate subsector within the framework of an agriculture divided between a modern commercial sector – hegemonized by agricultural business – and a traditional peasant sector dedicated to both subsistence and subsistence productionof surpluses in the market. 

The history of agrarian reform was both structural and transitional, the author argues that the reforms that originated from revolutions and those that caused important changes in the distribution of the land represented important transfer to the peasant families that were previously awarded to low educational levelsor null and to a difficulty of accessing other basic services and on the other hand it includes in its theory that being a small landless farmer was totally vulnerable to external conditions such as landowners.

Juan Velasco Alvarado, from Piura, was a Peruvian military and politician. He was the head of the Armed Forces of Peru. He was in charge of directing and executing the coup d’etat in 1968. Santisteban mentions us:

Between 1960 and 1968, Velasco crossed a phase of "accumulation of military power" that leads him to be a military added in France in 1962, (according to Mercado Jarrín here he "became a revolutionary"), general inspector of the army in 1965 and general commanderof the Army and Chief of the Joint Command in 1967, finally, with the help of a group of high -command of the Army, as president of the Government as of October 3, 1968 under the Government of the Revolution of the Armed Forces. 

Velasco Alvarado, in 1968, was appointed president of Peru. In 1969, promulgates the Agrarian Reform Law. Law that benefited the peasants mainly.

Before this reform, there was no law to protect, help them or went in search of their well -being;their rights were not recognized. They were exploited and mistreated by their masters.

The Communal Assembly, which is the main political body, has a right to supervision on the distribution of those usufruct rights. However, although the land is in usufruct, the plots are exploited in a family way. The personalization of rights of use on certain lands – especially the irrigated – is such that in practice it resembles a property right. Although the Law of Peasant Communities stipulates the absence of private property on land, in practice these can be "transferred", and there are even cases of lease. 

After this, the peasants began to have rights, since the Peruvian government began to help them with the distribution of the lands of the great landowners, so that they can improve the economy of the country.

The importance of this work lies in the reflection of the ambiguous effects of a poorly executed project as was the Agrarian Reform in Peru. Before this, the peasants were assigned to the field, their rights were not recognized and by society they were excluded;On the other hand, it was negative in the economic aspect, because these, lacking education, money and machinery, only generated debts and did not achieve the long -awaited economic development.

The following work will be explained more detailed and thoroughly through four arguments. The first one, according to Mariano Valderrama, the agrarian reform that occurred in Peru, was one of the most drastic in Latin America for the attempt of the tutelary forces of the bourgeois state for preventing mobilizations. The second argument, by the author Alfonso Chirinos argues that the agrarian reform has an impact on the farmer because it had as main objectives to increase the income of the peasant sector. The third argument, by Fernando Eguren, explains the indifference of the State with the peasants. And to culminate, the fourth argument, by José Matos Mar and José Mejía, the agrarian reform sought that the peasants rise towards their patterns, which abused them, with a Marxist inspiration.

Origin and History of Agrarian Reform:

The first argument is based on the stages prior to agrarian reform and the influences that the region had over Peru and how they resemble other reforms of different nature.

During the course of the nineteenth and early twentieth century a series of peasant uprisings had occurred in the country and this occurs as follows according to Valderrama.

The uprisings against land and oppression and abuse of gamonalism are given. However, they were spontaneous and local movements. The same peasant problem was not incorporated as a central matter of political debate. Only from the 20s a relevant place in the debate acquires this problem, but the direct participation of the same peasantry. The political representation of the peasantry was assumed by various urban sectors, such as the APRA in the case of the proletariat.

For the author these uprisings marked an important factor and it was because the peasant communities began to act against the gamonals, even were only local in nature was the beginning of what would have been a major rebellion.

Another very important aspect is the distinction of two major stages of the implementation of the agrarian reform and its development, Valderrama explains.

It can be seen in a first stage that the anti-political agrarian reform that assigns an important role to the medium agrarian bourgeoisie and maintains a closed authoritarian policy in front of the workers, denying their participation and in the second stage due to the obvious lack of support for support forPart of the agrarian bourgeoisie, the pressure of the workers and the growing influence of a radical sector within the government, a priority place is assigned to the associative-state sector, entering the agriculture of a new model of state capitalism.

In the explained paragraph the author wants to infer that in the stages they show the divisions that were given to maintain an adequate political order and thus implement the agrarian reform.

As mentioned in the previous paragraphs, the policy began to give importance to the issue of agricultural problems as can be seen from the creation of parties and strategies or divisions to achieve a better effect for reform. This is what Valderrama mentions it.

The agrarian reform implemented by the Peruvian military government raised a relationship that excluded the masses at the end of the 50s and this gender that the peasantry becomes a fundamental factor of the national political scene and was seen as a measure that “gaveThe benefit ”to the peasantry, but beyond the official intentions the same resulting social dynamics tried to articulate the peasant movement to support the regime.

The policy in our country at that time sought to be awarded that agrarian reform was exclusively for the purpose of benefiting the peasant sector, but this was a regime plan.

Main objectives of the Agrarian Reform

In this second argument, the influence of agrarian reform in the peasants will be reflected, as well as its intention to improve dependence on food, and do social justice.

One of the most important influences that this reform had was to integrate the peasant sector into society and this occurred as follows as the Indica Almanza.

This objective is achieved through the participation of the profits of the new companies among the partners. In case they are legal persons, that is, of people’s societies, workers will have a 50% participation of the company’s annual income. If these are natural persons, participation cannot be less than 20% of the same type of income. The labor stability of the labor of the properties in which there are natural persons at the head of their conduction is also sought. 

For the author this tried to give workers’ participation percentages in the companies in which they served so that they had a more important and less excluded role. It was also sought to make a stable work environment in order to improve the quality of life, this objective was clearly addressed to the peasant sector that were less benefited.

Another of the very important aspects of this reform was to favor the social interest that was required at that time and based on this the property right in the agrarian reform was accommodated, as explained by Almanza

The right of property is regulated, identifying its limitations based on social interest. Operations such as Yanaconaje, Colonato, Mediero, etc., They banished;These were systems that were still present in Peruvian agriculture. The approach in relation to this point of social justice is that every right over the product of the land originates at work. There is express abolition in the law, of any interpersonal relationship in which the offer of a free work for the use of land is raised. Likewise, the Earth will not be a symbol of status or subject of hoarding. 

What the author explains is that when the social interest in the right of property is based is that the expropriation of agricultural lands of many people was generated, and these lands were destined to the peasants who worked them, making them the owners so thatso they are independent.

As mentioned above, that it seeks to make the peasants independent, this was for a very important reason which was that our country was looking for objectives to improve food production and not depend on other countries in matters that we possessed and that only neededindependent. 

Due to the crisis in our country, groups in power should look. The concern of maintaining production is evidencealso to be able to enter currencies to the country.

What the author says is summarized in the situation in which our country was a crisis, and in which with the increase in production, the main objective of not depending on buying food from other countries was sought, since we hadsufficient ability to supply and export . That is why in the first instance the government management the production control in companies that produced in large quantity, in order to import and generate currencies to the country.

That time was very worrying, the peasants who had a fundamental work in our country were exploited since the pay they were given was miserable by their bosses and covered the expenses they had. 

The self-manager implanted for the rural sector, aims. The idea of participation and not manipulation is one of the pillars not only for new companies in the rural sector, but also in the rest of the sectors of the economy of Peru. That is, the most important decision for the approach of a new society and also, logically, the most risky. Having this scheme in mind is that the dissemination and consolidation of production cooperatives and SAIS is encouraged, as the most consistent models to the principles of participation. Also in the law, the community exploitation community systems are north. 

The author’s idea that reflects us is that workers are modified salary to a extent that they could cover with their needs and lead a dignified life for them and their families, also to not be ignored and that they realizeThe opinion that they could have, in this way a great change was generated since previously, these were violated both in their salary and in their opinion.

Rights of the peasant in the Agrarian Reform

In this third argument, before the agrarian reform, the agricultural revolutions in Peru were very scarce, so the Peruvian government decided to invest in the large hectares in the north of the country and thus obtain agreements with large exporters to generate income to thecountry. Fernando Eguren argues:

On the Peruvian coast there are more than a dozen large companies that together add up. The new large companies are modern and efficient, required by rich countries. The market is supposed to replace the offer of financial and non -financial services aimed at medium and small agriculture that was previously offered by the State, but this has not happened. On the other hand, the State should assume today an essential part of the responsibility for the increase in these problems and redefine the orientation of their policies in support of the excluded sectors.

Therefore, this is an important advance for coastal agriculture, but is restricted to a small number of producers, because it does not benefit all farmers not only on the coast but also in the Sierra del Peru, so they protested theGovernment by a law to have the same benefits as the other peasants.

During the agrarian reform in Peru, he not only affected on the coast of Peru, also affection in the Sierra in the part of Ayacucho, Huancavelica and Cusco was one of the most radical and social differences, because he only affected the coast and Sierra and notI affect the jungle.

Agrarian reform was one of the most radical in South America. In 1956 a government of social differences, formed a commission for agrarian reform and housing;In 1962 a Military Board of Government gave a law of peasants in the estates in the valleys of the Convention and Lares, in the department of Cusco];In 1964 a government approved a policy law;1969 Finally a military government issued and executed a new Agrarian Reform Law. The agrarian reform was executed mainly on the coast and mountain range of the country, the landowner was socially and economically liquidated, although the agrarian reform did not reach the Peruvian jungle. 

The Government of General Juan Velasco Alvarado culmino a cycle that ended the long period in which the haciendas organized the provincial society and economy in much of the country, generated a change in rural areas, so in 1974 the military government promulgated theNative Communities Law and Agrarian Promotion of the Jungle Regions.

Before the agrarian reform in Peru, the Chilean government promotes the other agrarian reforms and the large investors to invest in these lands, because the places for crops were of excellent services since they possessed of a good climate, irrigation and land.

The success of the Chilean agro -export sector impuls. The institutional conditions for such a turn of coastal agriculture were generated during the 1980s and 1990s. One of the most important changes was the disassembly of the legislation made by the Agrarian Reform, which imposed severe land market restrictions and corporate investments. 

The author points out that during the government of Juan Velasco Alvarado did not affect these companies on the Peruvian coast since he gave a profit to the government because they were large exporting companies that provided benefits and profits to the country since they exported to different countries in Latin America.

For this reason, the importance of peasants is very important, before the Agrarian Reform Law, the peasants had no rights to the Peruvian government, that for the peasant community was very disastrous, because it harmed us in every aspect since thePeasants give us a great benefit.

What happens to the peasant communities becomes great importance to the rural world as a whole, for their number and historical significance and makes no sense to speak of rural development in the country if they do not occupy a central place in it. Between 1920 and 1993 the successive Constitutions of the Republic have protected these rights declaring necessary from communal lands.

Finally, in 1969 during the government of Juan Velasco Alvarado the law of agrarian reform was issued where it benefited the peasants, but unfortunately, in 1993 the Constitution erased all this protection towards the peasants so that they no longer received protection or benefitsof the State, for this reason they themselves made decisions through a general assembly.

End to servitude

To culminate this work, this argument will explain about the purpose of this agrarian reform, which although it was not executed in an adequate and organized way, and did not achieve its mission, ended the servitude and slavery, although not inIts totality, which existed for centuries by the oligarchy towards the people of the proletariat.

[…] The first two essential objectives of the reform was to overcome the underdevelopment of agriculture, the other consisted of ensuring the integration of the peasant. the incorporation of the rural population into the active economic life of the country […];b. the access of indigenous sectors to nationality, overcoming barriers erected by social and cultural marginalization […];c. the reconciliation of peasant interests with that of the new dominant political sectors in order to neutralize their revolutionary potentiality. 

These three points were sought to achieve through the redistribution of land ownership and new economic and social policies. However, as I mentioned earlier, despite not having achieved the long -awaited economic development, which wanted the peasant to improve the country’s economy through the farmer, by granting them the land, and the social change that they had taken for granted that they were goingTo give, the servitude and slavery ended, and the conscience of the peasant that the land belongs to them. The peasants lived isolated and from the day the agrarian reform was initiated (June 24, 1969), they stopped having a pattern, that person who only used it for work purposes, who did not provide education and that exploited them withworks of great physical demand, until they fall from fatigue;It should be noted that to the slightest mistake they made, they were beaten, tortured or punished by them, and sometimes leading them to death.

This reform meant an annulment of the bases of the support of the traditional and common oligarchy and end the power possessed by the owners of these immense lands, and disappear to the great agrarian bourgeoisie. The agricultural proletariat, who was subject to servile relations in stately haciendas, have become independent, and their owners became owners of these capitalist and semi-capitalist units. 

With this reform the great power posted by the owners, which made part of the oligarchy, as in turn to private property was ended. In addition, the redistributing the land and providing these to the peasants who were responsible for taking advantage, immediately granted them autonomy and freedom. Although this action only worsened the economy of the country, since the State did not provide support to the peasants, that they lacked education and money for machinery that accelerated food production, and that there was no agricultural bank that offers them helpand capital to generate a better production. Likewise, the parcel sector increased in members upon receiving as members those who were subject to their owners.

“[…] Those who worked in medium or small haciendas, their situation did not change completely. They are still subject to still subject to their owners, although the law prohibits this." 

Although this reform planned to improve the condition of the entire peasantry, it is evident that it is not. Not all who possessed great power complied with the established ones, and continued with what is now prohibited. Those workers who worked in large units located on the coast and sierra of the country, were mainly favored. That is, much of those belonging to the proletariat and subject to someone of power, they stopped belonging.

A point that I would like to highlight was that after granting the lands, the peasants were totally forgotten by the government, generating, shortly after Marxist surveys in search of revenge, protests, strikes and shots of urban premises. It is for this reason, the Luminous Path Terrorist Group.

conclusion

After analyzing and explaining each argument presented at work, which helps support the hypothesis, it is necessary to affirm the importance of agrarian reform in the peasant. In the first argument, the origin of the agrarian reform was to explain the influence that the region had on Peru, by implementing the forms before and thus exercising a thought that led him to demand the creation of new lawsAnd favorable conditions, also the importance of agrarian theme begins to have relevance in politics and new political parties arise trying to favor them, such as the APRA and in its failed attempt the Alvarado Velasco regime applies the reforms the reforms apply the reforms.

In the second argument, the objectives of the agrarian reform were to benefit and recognize the rights to the violated sector that was the peasantry, thus giving them importance to their opinion, granting them agricultural land, and in this way it was sought to increase the production of the land andget the country out of the crisis in which it was that it was food . With the increase in production, the country was able to supply the entire population, and import other countries, thus generating currencies to the country .

In the third argument, after the Agrarian Reform Law is given in 1969, the Peruvian Government began to recognize their rights, began to support them and this originated that the peasant communities have more benefits, since agricultural investments were improving,Exports with large companies such as in the north of the country, agrarian reform was revolutionizing. Until in 1993 the Constitution eliminated the Agrarian Reform Law.

In the last argument, it can be affirmed that although the agrarian reform, when not executing properly and not having an organization that facilitates the process of this to meet its objectives, brought, in an unexpected way, the abolition of slavery inThe peasants who worked in large capitalist and semi-capitalist farms, but did not occur in those estates. However, this reform that in principle received great acceptance, only generated more disturbances and more discontent by the proletariat.

In conclusion, we reaffirm our hypothesis about agrarian reform and its repercussions on the peasant, because its main objectives were designed around the condition of the peasant at that time and its needs. Therefore, it is concluded that through the delivery of estates, the majority of peasants subject to a master were granted autonomy and recognized their rights, thus generating the creation of leftist political parties. However, they received no more support, and this only generated the discontent of the majority of peasants. That is why Luminous Path manages to gain fame in the country, when trying to solve the problems he presented.

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