The saga of the commons in Kuttanad: appropriations, contests, developments

Abstract

The paper argues that the mutually enforcing processes of enclosure of land and entanglement of labour have been central to the development of state and capitalism in Kuttanad, a protected Ramsar site in the south Indian state of Kerala. The driving force of epochal changes in Kuttanad was the transformations of the commons; different regimes that ruled Kuttanad have actively engaged in the appropriation, distribution and production of commons along with and for the dominant sections in the region. Reclamation and re-reclamation of backwater lands, spanning over one and half centuries, are thus carried out by the distributive state apparatus in collaboration with its constituent class sections. The resultant shifts in land, crop, labour, technology and resources are what define the crisis of commons in the region.