This case study of economic life in a rice-growing village in
Surakarta region of Central Java, is based on field data obtained
in 1975 and in 1978-79. The object of this article is to present
a brief general view of village economic life, preliminary to further
study of the meaning of labor and wealth in rural Javanese daily
life. For this purpose, simple statistical approach is used here,
but, unlike that of an agro-economic survey, the method used here
focuses on an analysis of family life and inheritance customs to
elucidate the social implications of quantitative data. Based on
a study of each household's economic standing, following current
characteristics of a Javanese village emerge :
1. The right to cultivate paddy fields is commercialized
through the prevailing cash rent system, thus enabling a limited
number of rich farmers to increase their cultivated area and profits;
2. Though nearly half the paddy field owners are noncultivating
landlords, most are retired farmers who make a living
by renting out their small paddy field, sometimes even to their own
children. Some tenant farmers, on the other hand, are waiting to
inherit a paddy field at some time in the future;
3. Though the present modal size of paddy per household
is 0.5 ha, it is tending to decrease to 0.1-0.2 ha under the current
practice of equal inheritance. Besides general population pressure
several other conditions ensure a strong claim to the equal inheritance
of paddy fields, e.g. ; rising incomes from paddy agriculture
as a consequence of the Green Revolution;
4. Non-agricultural sideline jobs are pursued by almost all
households, ranging from those large scale farmers to share-cropping
tenants. Nineteen of the total of seventy-seven households earn
their living by non-agricultural jobs alone. Such households are
often wealthier than small-scale paddy field owners. Village youth
clearly dislike agricultural labor and seek non-agricultural jobs,
especially in the cities. A socio-economic study of Javanese rural
society must deal with more than just agriculture, but must include
other phenomena, such as, inter alia, the effect of pre-modern,
rural, non-agricultural jobs in the tertiary sector (trade and service) ;
rural-urban economic interaction; and psychological attraction
of city for village youth.
二者関係と経済取引 : 中部ジャワ村落経済生活の研究
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