Abstract
Large-scale land investment projects in sub-Saharan African have received substantial criticism for their negative local impacts, but few studies discuss specifically their application of corporate power on the ground. This paper provides an examination of such application in rural Sierra Leone. The paper describes how one corporation both directly and indirectly co-opted authority and privatized force in order to wield power over the land and people. The data illustrates how local authorities and security actors were incentivized to defend the interests of the corporation as opposed to the local communities they supposedly represent and protect. Such processes ensured corporate power not only over the land, but also over the local population. The findings, therefore, demand more robust and multidimensional accountability mechanisms to avoid the corporate acquisition of power in rural Africa. Such mechanisms would demand: a) that investing corporations be more informed about local socio-cultural, economic and political dynamics on the ground, b) that funders and local governments fund, report on and enforce more regular, culturally sensitive, and independent assessments of project impacts, and c) that funders, governments, corporations, and customary elites be held accountable for the negative impacts of such projects by international and national civil society organizations.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 749-771 |
Number of pages | 23 |
Journal | Rural Sociology |
Volume | 83 |
Issue number | 4 |
Early online date | 10 Jan 2018 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 7 Dec 2018 |
Bibliographical note
Funded by Radboud University Nijmegen and the Carnegie Trust for the Universities of ScotlandI would like to thank Radboud University Nijmegen for supporting the initial six months of fieldwork for this project with a faculty fieldwork grant in 2012, and the Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland for supporting the follow‐up field trip in November−December 2013 with a Carnegie research grant.
Keywords
- Development
- Africa
- Political Sociology and Political Economy
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