A different end of the peasants

Abstract

This article, which refers to Henri Mendras's once much discussed proclamation of the end of the peasants in France, analyses the changes which have been taking place in family farms in Poland in 1988-2002. It portrays the dynamics of these changes, highlighting those elements which are specifically Polish: reduction of the number of farms and their diversification into farms absorbed by the capitalist economy (enterprises, family enterprises) and households functioning according to a quasi-peasant rationale (peasant/subsistence and transitional farms). When the peasant rationale declines, the peasantry itself declines but in post-communist Poland this process has its own specific dynamic. This involves low tempo of change and large and still increasing numbers of quasi-peasant farm households which function according to a specific rationale and provide the basis for a large social collective with a specific identity of its own.