Local Economv and Social Change in East Africa

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Our studies on East African pastoralists and farmers have focused on clarifying the characteristics of the societies and the complexity of the lcoal communities through an analysis of subsistence patterns, social organization, exchange of property by credit, and value systems. The past studies have helped us understand the traditional life style within the framework of ecology and culture. However, the ecological disasters in the 1970's have made governments turn to massive foreign aid to aggressively modernize the regional economy by increasing livestock, farm output and marketization. The traditional subsistence patterns of pastoralism and awidden agriculture are discouraged by such development policies.The result has been the disintegration of the autonomous local economy and taditional transaction by credit. The basic structure of the local community is at risk. This is the problem of conflict between tradition and modernization, but what is urgently needed is to understand the cha … More nge as a dynamic socio-economic process and to explore the potential for endogenous development rooted in local tradition. The following results have been aquired.1.Studying the traditional pastoral and agricultural subsistences, and analyziing social dynamics in relation to the regional economy, enabled us to understand the regional economy, consisting of producers, intermediary merchants, and the market.2.Comparison of the transformation processes of the local economy of the both spheres helped identify the socio-economic mechanisms of change with and better understand the differences in subsistence patterns, as well as present models for various endogenous development.3.The research of the agricultural societies, located in highlands, clarified the endogenous cultural responses and adaptation strategies developed by each of the societies to common problem, such as population pressure.4.Analysis of the inter-community social networks and commercial activities of the intermediary merchants unabled us to understand the complexity of the regional economy and its maintenance system as well as provide models for their incorporation into national economy. Less