Skip to main content
University of California Press

Agricultural Involution

The Processes of Ecological Change in Indonesia
by Clifford Geertz (Author)
Paperback eBook
Price: $39.95 / £34.00
Publication Date: Nov 2023
Edition: 1st Edition
Title Details:
Rights: World
Pages: 196
ISBN: 9780520341821
Trim Size: 5.5 x 8.25
Recommend to your Library (PDF)(opens in new window)Rights and Permissions

About the Book

Agricultural Involution: The Processes of Ecological Change in Indonesia is one of the most famous of the early works of Clifford Geertz. It principal thesis is that many centuries of intensifying wet-rice cultivation in Indonesia had produced greater social complexity without significant technological or political change, a process Geertz terms "involution".Written for a US-funded project on the local developments and following the modernization theory of Walt Whitman Rostow, Geertz examines in this book the agricultural system in Indonesia and its two dominant forms of agriculture, swidden and sawah. In addition to researching its agricultural systems, the book turns to an examination of their historical development. Of particular note is Geertz's discussion of what he famously describes as the process of "agricultural involution" in Java, where both the external economic demands of the Dutch rulers and the internal pressures due to population growth led to intensification rather than change.


Agricultural Involution: The Processes of Ecological Change in Indonesia is one of the most famous of the early works of Clifford Geertz. It principal thesis is that many centuries of intensifying wet-rice cultivation in Indonesia had produced greater soc

About the Author

Clifford James Geertz (August 23, 1926 – October 30, 2006) was an American anthropologist who is remembered mostly for his strong support for and influence on the practice of symbolic anthropology, and who was considered "for three decades...the single most influential cultural anthropologist in the United States." He served until his death as professor emeritus at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton.
 

Table of Contents

I: Starting points, theoretical and factual -- The ecological approach in anthropology -- The limitation of traditional approaches -- Cultural ecology -- Two types of ecosystem -- Inner vs. outer Indonesia -- Swidden -- Sawah -- II: The crystallization of the pattern -- The classical period -- The colonial period: foundations -- The company -- The culture system -- The colonial period: Florescence -- The corporate plantation system -- The development of outer Indonesia -- III: The outcome -- Comparisons and prospects -- The present situation -- Java and Japan -- The outline of the future
 

Reviews

"Although Geertz composed Agricultural Involution some fifty years ago, it remains relevant to this day. . . .a comprehensive inquiry into the relationship between culture and nature."
— International Journal of Anthropology and Ethnology
"A remarkably interesting account of Indonesian agricultural history, primarily covering the period of Dutch control, from 1619 to 1942. Drawing on ecology, sociology, and economics, Geertz...provides an insightful and persuasive analysis."
— The Annals
"If colonial geography ever succeeds in establishing itself as a discrete and integral focus of inquiry, it may well date its majority to the publication of Agricultural Involution."
— Geographical Record
"A brilliant and superbly written study...an incisive, even frightening description of the most crucial dilemma in contemporary Indonesia."
— Agricultural History
"A valuable and important study...in which source materials from history, economics, soil science, geography and other fields are brilliantly marshalled and interrelated. But besides being an exemplary study in the interaction of history, physical environment and agricultural technology, this book represents a watershed between narrowly conceived ethnographies and the flood of verbose and ill digested post-war 'technology-and-social-change' monographs that are wont to aim high and hit wide...A model of comparative analytical writing."
— Man
"[A]head of its time."
— International Journal of Anthropology and Ethnology
"Although Geertz composed Agricultural Involution some fifty years ago, it remains relevant to this day. . . . it is difficult not to draw parallels to current political ecology issues across the globe. How the land is used, and at what social and environmental costs, is material to the whole of humanity and the ramifications are at a tipping point. In that sense, Agricultural Involution was ahead of its time."
— International Journal of Anthropology and Ethnology