Local Agrarian Societies in Colonial India - Japanese Perspectives (Hardcover)

Examining agrarian societies in colonial India, the papers in this collection include analyses of late 18th-century records on South India and North Bengal, and a look at the late colonial period. Statistical examinations provide a basis for a revised understanding of social mobility and land transfer, while a study of technology and labour absorption, a demographic approach to famines and epidemics, and a socio-political perspective of tenancy acts blend history and social science. Four chapters compare the Indian experience with those of Japan and other Asian countries, which the editors use to argue for the historical presence of internal forces of change in Indian agriculture, which has not been fully recognized in either Western or nationalist historiography. They suggest the fundamental importance of an Asian comparative perspective for the understanding of Indian history.