Changing patterns of migrant labour and rural differentation in Lesotho∗

Abstract

This paper considers the changing nature of rural differentiation in Lesotho as recruitment of labour migrants becomes increasingly selective and limited and as a new system of land tenure is implemented. The operation and effect of the present labour “stabilization” policies of the South African mines is discussed as are the provisions of the Lesotho Land Act 1979. Rural differentiation in Lesotho of the mid 1970s is then analyzed in terms of the relationship between access to migrants’ remittances and arable allotments on the one hand and the domestic developmental cycle on the other. This suggests some of the implications of wider socio‐economic changes at the local level. Differentiation will become increasingly permanent and a growing number of rural households will no longer be able to depend on remitted earnings. In all likelihood many of them will also be unable to gain access to arable allotments. This will result in the exacerbation of already existing poverty which, until recently, has been cushioned by the cyclical nature of dependence on migrant earnings.