Informations et ressources scientifiques
sur le développement des zones arides et semi-arides

Titre : On the move : mobility, land use and livelihood practices on the Central Plateau in Burkina Faso

Auteur : Breusers, M. 

Université de soutenance : Wageningen Universiteit

Grade : PhD thesis 1998

Présentation
Chapter 2 situates the scene by presenting the historical background to the research area. First, a brief outline of the research village’s history is provided. The main part of the chapter is devoted to the elaboration of case material relating to a number of conflicts over land, along the border between the kingdom of Ratenga and the kombere of Piugtenga and in which the village of Ziinoogo has been involved. The purpose is to bring to the fore the diverse motivations which encourage people to move and occupy land ’elsewhere’ and to demonstrate how different processes of geographic mobility interlock and imbricate. After having outlined tentatively the history of Pullo presence in the region, the chapter concludes with some observations concerning the dichotomy between ’traditional’ and ’modern’ processes of geographic mobility.
The next two chapters focus on land tenure arrangements and the interplay between geographic mobility, on the one hand, and the securing and extension of rights to land on the other hand. The land use pattern within which land use practices are enacted is described in chapter 3. This pattern is conceived of as a structuring spatial structure, i.e. both constitutive of and constituted by social practice and social organization.
First, it is attempted to establish what territorial entity might be understood to constitute a ’village territory’. It is concluded that, for the present research, the village territory can be conceived of as an aggregation of lineage lands. However, there is no consensus among actors on the meaning of ’lineage land’ ( yaab ziiga ), which allows for the co-existence of different interpretations of the village territory’s land use pattern. The shifting meanings of ’lineage land’ appeared to be correlated with the shifting meanings of the categories ’strangers’ and ’people of the village’. It is, then, concluded that the measure in which actors control land is closely related to the date of arrival of the lineage segment to which they belong. Finally, Saaba and Fulbe are shown to

Mots clés : social mobility / migration / land use / agricultural land / households / decision making / farm management / burkina faso

Résumé

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