LABOUR M I GRATION AND STRUCTURAL HETEROGENEITY IN WEST AFRICA by A1fred Schmidt

This paper1 undertakes a critica1 analysis of some views on modern migration in West Africa which have been developed on the basis of dua1istic theories of de­ velopment. Labour migration is interpreted, simi1ar to Amin ( 1 974)2, as a mechanism which connects different structura1 elements of periphery capita1ist societies. In order to avoid misunderstandings it seems necessary to clarify a few concepts used 1ater. The concept oE mode oE production does not limit itse1E to the technica1 and organisationa1 side oE material production or to "economic" pheno­ mena. It denotes a total structure including not on1y economic but also other phenomena which, considered a10ne, appear as "po1itics" or "ideo10gy" . Used as an abstract concept, socia1 formation signifies a combination of elements bel on ging to different modes of production into one structure. One mode of production can thereby be interpreted as dominant in so far as it determines the 1inkage between different elements and their collaboration. In the case of the so­ called deve10ping societies the dominance of the capitalist mode of production is characterized by its instabi1ity3. The relative autonomy of non-capita1ist elements prevents therefore a tendency towards homogeneity of the total structure. Such elements are not simp1y traditiona1 relics doomed for decline. They constitute an inherent component of the structure of periphery capitalist socia1 formations. In spite of this imp1icit claim to a total analysis the presentation in this paper is very much partial. Economic phenomena are given the centra1 attention whereas socia1 and po1itica1 phenomena get mere1y an occasiona1 100k. Moreover, the em­ pirica1 studies this paper is based upon limit themselves to a few countries in West AErica, especially Ghana, Ivory Co ast, Senegal and Upper Volta. Therefore attention shou1d be drawn to the fact that the problems ana1ysed in a specific regional context cannot be necessari1y transferred to other regions of the periphery4.

This paper1 undertakes a critica1 analysis of some views on modern migration in West Africa which have been developed on the basis of dua1istic theories of de velopment.Labour migration is interpreted, simi1ar to Amin (1974)2, as a mechanism which connects different structura1 elements of periphery capita1ist societies.In order to avoid misunderstandings it seems necessary to clarify a few concepts used 1ater.The concept oE mode oE production does not limit itse1E to the technica1 and organisationa1 side oE material production or to "economic " pheno mena.It denotes a total structure including not on1y economic but also other phenomena which, considered a10ne, appear as "po1itics " or "ideo10gy " .Used as an abstract concept, socia1 formation signifies a combination of elements bel on ging to different modes of production into one structure.One mode of production can thereby be interpreted as dominant in so far as it determines the 1inkage between different elements and their collaboration.In the case of the so called deve10ping societies the dominance of the capitalist mode of production is characterized by its instabi1ity3.The relative autonomy of non-capita1ist elements prevents therefore a tendency towards homogeneity of the total structure.Such elements are not simp1y traditiona1 relics doomed for decline.They constitute an inherent component of the structure of periphery capitalist socia1 formations.In spite of this imp1icit claim to a total analysis the presentation in this paper is very much partial.Economic phenomena are given the centra1 attention whereas socia1 and po1itica1 phenomena get mere1y an occasiona1 100k.Moreover, the em pirica1 studies this paper is based upon limit themselves to a few countries in West AErica, especially Ghana, Ivory Co ast, Senegal and Upper Volta.Therefore attention shou1d be drawn to the fact that the problems ana1ysed in a specific regional context cannot be necessari1y transferred to other regions of the periphery4.

The economic structure of West African countries
Societies at the periphery of the capita1ist world distinguish themse1ves from the metropoles with regard to their economic structure.A conspicuous feature of the periphera1 economies is their incomp1eteness and incoherence.Since most of the capita1 goods used in modern industries5 are not produced by themselves, the export sector serves as a substitute for a domestic production of capital goods.Modern industries which produce substitutes for consumption goods imported earlier possess only weak linkages with the remaining sectors.Their growth depends on the export sector where the final demand for their products, the surplus available for investment and the foreign exchange necessary for the import of raw materials, intermediate goods and machines mainly originate.The remaining modern activities in urban areas serve either the state's administration and infra structural services or the conduct of foreign trade.Besides these modern sectors there exist extensive "traditional " sectors, both in urban and rural areas, which are however of marginal significance for the dynamic of reproduction.In rural areas they constitute subsistence economies which supply partly migratory labour for the modern sectors.The migrants in urban areas, who cannot be absorbed in the modern sector, make an opening for their existence through offering multi farious types of services.An important connecting link for the distribution of goods among all these sectors are the numerous sm all traders who cannot replace, however, the missing relationships among the production structures of various sectors.These sectors, characterized by different modes of production, are, however, interdependent in so far as their development is determined by the production for exports and the partial integration brought about thereby into the world market.Their structural heterogeneity and inadequate integration prohibit that the growth impulses could be transmitted from one sector to the other and thereby gain strength6• This general characterization of peripheral economies applies also to West Africa7• Agricultural production for exports emerged as a leading sector for economic growth already in the 19th century.Individual countries specialized in various agricultural products, such as groundnuts and cocoa, according to their given geographical conditions.Even after independence these products constitute two third of West African exports concentrating on one ar a few products.They are almost entirely grown by African farmers, partly with the help of employed labour.The most important field of investment for foreign capital is the extractive sector, especially minerals and timber meant for exports.The Africans in this sector participated until recently only as wage labour.With a very few excep tions there existed before the second world war neither industries for consumption and capital goods nor for processing raw materials for exports.The development of material and cultural infrastructure by colonial administrations served the purpose to secure political dominance and production for exports.Those areas were given a special attention whose development was attractive for foreign capital.Whereas the export-oriented economic sectors have made considerable growth strides since the beginning of this century, the expansion and commercialisation of indigenous food production lags far behind the increased demand resulting from population increase and urbanization.The governments have formulated develop ment plans after independence to push forward the so far neglected industries and to diversify agriculture, but the success is confined mainly to the field of infrastructure.In addition to the provision of infrastructure the governments are trying to attract foreign investments through financial incentives like protection duties, tax reliefs and financial participation.As a result, import-substitution industries have emerged side by side of new investment in the extractive sector.The result has been a strong tendency towards urban agglomerations without creating any connecting links neither between sectors and regions within individual economies nor any advance in the field of interregional division of labour.On the contrary, the protective walls everywhere have facilitated the emergence of identical industries which are too large for the internal market because of their foreign technology and orientation towards the demand structure characterized by existing inequalities in the distribution of income.Such structural mutuality is combined with differences among African countries8• The limits of growth, which is carried by agricultural production for exports and import-substitution in the field of light-industry, are clearly shown by Senegal and Ghana.The outward-oriented development of these countries began already before the first world war as compared to that of Ivory Co ast -the economic wonderland of today -whose capitalist penetration really started first after the second world war.Finally, the big differences between the development levels of these coastal lands and the land-locked countries like Mali and Upper Volta cannot be overlooked as well.They were practically excluded from a development of agricultural production for exports du ring the colonial period.Above all, as exporters of labour force they participate in the export-oriented development of their neighbouring countries.
3. The making of a migrating labour force during the colonial period A major section of the African wage-earners du ring the colonial period is characterized by high rates of fluctuations, unsteady labour supply and low qualification.These "semiproletarian " workers "are setting, so to speak, one foot in the industrial system while the other remains in rural society " 9.This puts a serious obstacle to the development of modern industry.It does not simply mean an innate inefficiency of the African labour.These characteristics reflect much more the manner in which the labour force was mobilized for modern activities during the colonial period.Most important determinants of this development regarding the wage-earners are explained in the following subsections.

The expansion of agrarian export production
The taking up of agricultural production for exports begins in West Africa around the middle of 19th century, just before the colonial period10• Partly, its extension presupposes a destruction of traditional modes of production.Partly, it proceeds in the first instance from unaltered relations of production.That shows itself through the different development of peanut cultivation in Senegal and cocoa in Ghanall.
The extension of peanut cultivation in Senegal, advancing from west to east, is linked with fundamental changes in the relations of production.This is reflected primarily in the fact that ownership relations emerge with regard to land, and the land ownership goes increasingly into private hands.With labour and production relations getting increasingly individual the prevailing collective system is under mined.Social relations at the village level regulated so far on a non-economic basis are commercialized.In expanding production the labour force produces bottlenecks, to begin with.That is overcome through the seasonal labour especially from Mali, which is related to the institution of paid labour.The application of improved working implements and fertilizers be comes necessary first in the 1950's.The concentration of land ownership proceeds with the modernization of produc tion, to which corresponds a release of labour force due to higher per capita production.The migration flow of new labour force from Mali exhausts therewith.The tradition al system of land ownership in southern Ghana, which the British colonial administration tries to fix up legally, remains apparently valid.However, the regulations like prohibition of outright sale of land belonging to the tribe were evaded.Thus an accumulation process proceeds along the spatial expansion through which an individual farmer succeeds in acquiring a considerable property of scattered cocoa farms.A part of the cocoa farmers distinguishes itself as capitalist farmers also through the employment of labour paid in cash or kind.The depen dent employment extends from tenancy system -in which the land owner gets a fixed share of the crops -to the daily wages.The additionally required labour force is provided by the migratory labour from the northern hinterland and the neighbouring states.The hidden proletarianizing which accompanies the accumula tion process in the production of agricultural exports does not affect primarily the indigenous population but the immigrant labour from the north and the east.The final result in both cases is similar: the agricultural production is not only subjected indirectly to the capitalist mode of productioll, viz.through the sphere of circulation and the integration in the world market.Capitalist productiorl relations permeate also directly the labour process of the sectors concerned.

The connection between subsistence economies and modern activities
Working as a wage-earner implies a separation of the direct producers from the means of production.This problem becomes evident du ring the first decades of the colonial period when the colonial powers think to have taped considerable labour force reserves in the West African hinterland.Because of the communal land ownership there exists no landless "proletariat " which could be simply transplanted in the modern sectors12• Positive inccntivcs such as thc supply of importcd consumcr goods purchasablc with money do not completely achicve thcir purposc.PoIl taxes in terms of money offer effective means in areas separated from those producing agricuitural exports."Traditional rulers " who are trans formed or established ad hoc as agents for colonial administration were drawn into the recruitment of labourers for "public worb " .Such compulsory labour was employed even in the private economic sector13• Nevertheless, migratory labourers can seek favourable working conditions and wage-rates if they cannot avoid the necessity of wage labour at all.For example, many residents of Upper Volta avoid the recruitment for employment in Ivory Coast through the emigration to the neighbouring Ghana.The demand of the cocoa farmers for labour force there affects the "concerted action " of private and state employers in the nonagricultural sector who try to dictate the working conditions and wage rates14• Compulsory measures and other interventions of colonial administrations possess, of course, only the function to initiate the process of labour migration.Then the concerned population itself keeps it going.Some economists take a system of seasonal labour migration between the subsistence economies and agricultural export sectors as an efficient reallocation of labour as a factor of production and as an optimum adjustment of production to the "natural " conditions15• Young men who do traditionally the hardest work in particular participate in the seasonal migration.The village communities can lose in this way the manpower for community work.Whether the consumption possibilities of the remaining population renuin preserved or impaired depends on the degree of solidarity within the family units and the village communities, since that would influence the length and timing of labour migration.The traditional subsistence economies become in any case dependent on the migrant wage-earners, even when the food production does not decline.On the one hand, money income and the commodities brought with replace the non-agricultural goods which the mi grants have produced formerly du ring the slack period.On the other hand, work done on reciprocal basis within the communities is regulated on a monetary basis and the social relations are commercialised16• Since the returning mi grants bring new ideas, production techniques and instruments, the labour migration appears in the long run as a medium of social change in the countryside.The transfer of commodities and money, however, and the new attitudes which migrants bring with them from the capitalist environment, are not adequate in themselves to initiate a process of structural changes towards "modernization " of the subsistence economies.If consumption patterns and value systems which induce further migration are transferred, but not innovations for production, then the result of labour migration is rather a further deepening of unequal development between the partial regions of West Africa and a further consolidation of structural he terogeneity17.Under the existing conditions in West Africa this result can also be deduced exact1y from orthodox models of regional growth which usually serve to underpin the thesis of integration between tradition al and modern sectors18•

The consequences of migration for wage labour in non-agrarian activities
The interventions of colonial administrations which ren der the people of subsistence economies as migratory labour benefit the agricultural production for exports only secondarily.The dominant problem of recruiting the labour force du ring the colonial period lies in directing it into the sectors predetermined by Europeans and to discipline this labour force according to the organization and technical requirements of the capitalist process of production.Compulsory measures have shown to be less efficient to overcome the attractiveness of the traditional land ownership system.The short-term labour migration does not thus limit itself to migration movements between subsistence economies and zones of agricultural exports, but also extends to the non-agricultural activities.The employers take into account the basis for remuneration consciously which the immigrant labour gets in village communities.This restrictive wage policy is based on the assumption that the immigrants would work more through lower wages as "target workers " because they would achieve at every cost their income goals19• That hinders the proletarianizing process because the labour migrants are only partially engaged in the modern sector.The combination of capitalist structures with non-capitalist elements makes an economic system viable where the paid wages alone would not be sufficient for the reproduction of the labour ' force, because certain important functions in this system, such as rearing and maintenance of labour in sickness and old age, can be shoven off to the subsistence economies20• The problems related to this connection of heterogeneous structural elements through the labour migration are already evident during the colonial period.The demand for African technical hands and qualified workers can not be met inspite of the almost missing indus trialization.For this situation a lack of training facilities is not much responsible Low wages and bad working conditions appear to be more decisive.They do not offer any incentive for the qualification of African labour21• Another important result of labour migration is the weak position of the dependent labourers in the labour market.It appears in so far as paradoxical that the related conditions -as usually quoted in capitalist societies, i. e. the "double freedom " of wage-earnersdo not exist in general in West Africa at the beginning of colonial period.The administrations undertake the role of price leadership from the demand side of the labour market, since they are themselves the most important individual employers.Equipped with the compulsion means of state power they can create conditions under which the labour market is glutted with casual labour and where trade unions are very difficult to organize even without legal prevention.The weakness of organized presentation of interests of the workers relates significantly to the integration of migrant labour in the non-capitalist structures.Voluntary associations outside the traditional kinship relations can be partially traced back in West Africa through hundreds of years of tradition.However, these are as much inadequate to regulate new kinds of conflict as the heads of clans who mediate in the customary disputes.The majority of migrant labour is especially obstructive against joint action outside the tradition al paths.One's own tri bai headman is trusted more to represent the interests than a trade unionist stranger.Tendencies for trade union organization are therefore available especially in those places where a regularly employed labour force dominates, as in case of public service.In the remaining spheres such as mining the trade union members are found only among the regular employed22• The colonial administrations believe still to overcome the inefficiency of their recruitment of labour force through compulsory measures or through employing non-Africans.The potential of conflict, which the structures of periphery capitalism contain, remains largely latent.The contradictory character of this structure becomes apparent first after formal decolonization.

Rural-urban migration and urban unemployment
The accelerated urbanization in West Africa, which concentrates after the second world war on a few big cities with more than 100 000 inhabitants, is not so much due to a natural increase in population but is a result of rural-urban migration.Big cities, and not the rural export-zones, are the major attractors of migrating labour, who come not only from economically backward areas but also from agricultural exporting zones23• The impetus has come from the increasing impor tance of these cities as political and cultural centres of independent states and as industrial centres of import substitution following decolonization.However, the increase in jobs for wage and salary earners does not keep pace with the increase in active population in urban centres.This is reflected in the important unemploy ment figures during the last two decades, which certainly represent only a part of the urban unemployment24• Institutionally fixed wages in modern urban sectorsapparently higher than warranted by the relative scarcities of capital and labourare cited as a reason for the rural-urban migration and the resultant employment problems.If the differences in real income between rural and urban areas are considerable, it pays for a migrant to undertake the risk of a temporary unemploy ment in the town.On the other side, high er wage rates are held responsible for the choice of capital intensive technologies, with the result that investments carry low employment effects in spite of higher increases in production25• The hypothesis of behaviour based on these considerations regarding rural-urban migration has been empirically tested for Ghana.In spite of dissatisfying data and considerably defective sources, these tests do not support the hypothesis of behaviour.They point out especially to the low efficacy of restrictive wage policy which has been persued in Ghana since 196026.Not only empirie al studies but also theoretical considerations speak against economic hypotheses of migration as explanations for urban unemployment, with wage rate as a strategie variable.The decisive influence of wage rates in the choice of techniques depends upon restrictive premises, especially the possibility of substitution between labour and capital as factors of production, not only with regard to investment decisions before taking up production, but also during production.Further, it is overlooked that the capital goods produced and available in the world market are meant for the needs of developed industrialized countries and that these prefer capital intensive rather than labour intensive methods of production.The choice of techniques is therefore subject to a bias because labour and capital intensive technologies differentiate qualitatively in the applied means of production.In case of labour intensive methods of production technically outdated machines must be used27.Finally, the qualitative composition of the African labour supply must be taken into account while judging the relative scarcity of capital and labour.Skilled worl,ers present a decisive bottleneck.Semiskilled workers can be much easily trained for capital intensive processes whereas a few highly qualified employees can be initially imported by the foreign firms and later replaced by "elite " Africans28.The low qualification of African labour, which go es back to the recruitment and wage policy during the colonial period, shows thus as one reason for the actual employment problems in modern urban centres.The apparently high wage rates are also related to this colonial "heritage " 29.As a result of the minimum wage legislation after independence the nominal wages are rising rapidly.This legislation takes the fact into account that the wage labour in modern sectors cannot be subsidized any more by the non-capitalist subsistence economies.Migration to big cities is primarily a long-term phenomenon for which seasonal migration or other short-term stay in the cities simply precede.Migrants do not only consist of single workers but also their near families.Through the dissolution of rural subsistence economies and decreasing links of the absent migrants with their villages, the kinship bonds also lose their role as a substitute for so ci al insurance.The wages must now be raised to a level that the reproduction of capitalist workers as a group is secured.Of course, the development of money wages and the cost of living strongly goes asunder.Only the wages of a small minority of qualified and weIl organized workers lie considerably above the subsist ence level.The employment problem cannot, of course, be traced back alone due to the predominance of capital intensive techniques applied in industrialization through import-substitution.An analysis of the composition of wage and salary earners reveals that the major share go es to trade and service activities, construction, transport and small handicrafts.There is a meagre scope for further labour 26 Cf. Godfrey, 1973, Knight, 1972. 27 Cf.Arrighi, 1970, pp.243-251; StewartlStreeten, 1971 ; for a less peSSlffilStIC view on the growth � hl � mma of output vs . .empl c;> yment Ewus � , 1977.M � reover, the ch ?ice of capital-intensive techniques IS mfluenced by state mcentlves for forelgn duect Investments Wh lCh relatively cheapen capital as a factor of production.28 Cf. Arrighi, 1970, p p. 22819 ;Darkoh, 1975, p. 115;IMF, 1973, p. 261 ;Joshi et. al., 1975, p. 292. 29 For empirie al evidence and different views on the rising wage level after independence cf.Amin 1971 pp. 4819 ;Arrighi, 1970, pp. 23112;DAMACHI, 1974, pp. 5718 ;Frank, 1968, pp. 263-265 ;Hart, 1971, p. 32;Hopkins, 1973, pp. 27314 ;IMF, 1973 , pp. 550-553, 707-711;IMF, 1975, pp. 118-121 ;JeHries, 1975, pp. 61-63 ;Knight, 1972, pp. 20516 ;Lloyd, 1972, pp. 12213, 206.See also above note 20.
intensive technologies within the given economlC structure30• In Vlew of the financial crisis of the state whose expenditure is almost absorbed by wages and salaries, the expansion of employment opportunities in the public sector offers no scope as a solution31• This problem explains the high importance which is assumed by the "informal " urban sector in recent studies.The possibilities of a relief from temporary unemployment offered by this sector seem plausible when we consider that in spite of considerable unemployment a regular influx of labour into the urban areas continues further.Moreover, these sources of income seem even to offer incentives for migration32• Not a single isolated factor such as rural-urban migration can be held responsible for urban unemployment.Equally, the manipulation of a single strategic variable such as wage rate cannot be taken as an adequate solution.This problem is much more to be seen from the background of structures from which originate "outward looking " models of development33•

Socio-political consequences of structural heterogeneity
Economic analyses cannot elucidate what effects labour migration has on non economic aspects of social integration.If one is not satisfied to see considerable horizontal mobility34 as an indice for modernization, its influence on the struc ture and behaviour of population must be analysed.The stratification of West African societies exhibits certain features which are typical in capitalist societies.The deciding criterion for a classification of "elites " and "rnasses " in urban population are the differences in income which are reflected in the different levels of consumption and ways of living.However, a differentiation between the "old " and the "new elite " shows that the stratifica tion scheme relates to rather amorphous categories.This distinction is based on quite different, modern and tradition al value systems which are not even sharply demarcated and very often overlap35.In spite of its inadequacy this stratification scheme is justified by the supposition that the scheme of a capitalist class society for West Africa is much less relevant.Classes could not be defined with ownership of means of production because most of the "elites " are themselves employees and communal land tenure systems predominate36• Considering not so much the ownership but the power of disposition over means of production and the distribu tion and utilization of products, the following polarization appears : On the one side are such groups which as owners or employees direct the production and circulation processes, carrying weight in the economy.On the other side exist workers, peasants, small traders and artisans as weH as marginalized groups of un and underemployed37.So far contradictions have been pointed out which are inherent in the structure of periphery capitalism.In order that these latent conflicts become open and mani fest, political organizations must be built which could articulate politically the dass interests against the ruling "elites " ."The consciousness of the conflicting interests may be reduced through the acceptance of ideologies stressing unity or through the cross-cutting of other divisions within society -... , especially, of ethnic divisions which, in stressing primordial loyalties, counter national unity but also obscure national distinctions of wealth and privilege " 38.
The li fe in cities and the employment in modern activities can, of course, function as "melting pot " which wipes out sociocultural differences and liberates the mi grants from the compulsion of traditional ties.It cannot, however, be overlooked that connections with family, relatives or friends from the native village and the relationships with ethnic groups possess a considerable importance for the labour migrants and their stay in the modern sector.In many cases this prolongation of traditional ties implies that members of an ethnic group live together in "exile communities " and have headmen who play a role similar to chiefs du ring their residence in towns.It is not adequate to interpret this merely as a prolongation of traditional relations into the modern sector.The relations are not only adapted to new demands of an urban environment, they also go beyond that: "Tribal " identity emerges even among communities which originally are not organized in complex structures like tribes39.The belonging to a distinct ethnic group and the socio-cultural differences between various groups are stressed by the fact that labour migration is regulated by these ethnic relations and that furthers a regional and occupational specialization of various groups40.Relations and organizations on an ethnic basis provide the newcomers and temporarily unemployed with a "net work of social security " .If this mutual hilp is demanded for longer time it becomes gradually a one-way transfer and loses thereby its reciprocal value for the donor.
Thus new networks of social relations emerge between long-term unemployed of different ethnic origin : "They are the first significant manifestation ... of incipient economic, social and political stratification along dass lines " 41.
At the lower end of each stratification scheme three groups are supposed to articulate conflicts of interest with positions at the top : Firstly, manual workers in town who live dose to the subsistence level are disappointed, particularly by the contrast between their actual situation and their aspirations as they migrated to towns.Secondly, the increasing number of school-leavers and drop-outs from institutions of higher education is frustrated even more, since it cannot approach "elite " and "subelite " positions it aspired for.Thirdly, unemployed city-dwellers who cannot or don't want to return to the countryside form a kind of "sub-proletariat " 42.One should not underrate the importance of the second group which is easy to mobilize for multifarious political demands.It appears, however, more as a vehicle used by other groups in order to point open conflicts.
We have seen that the organizational strength of trade-unions was impaired by high proportions of labour mi grants among the wage earners.Its weakness is furthered through institution al dispersion even when trade-unions have been recognized by the colonial administrations since the 1930's.Therefore, the potential of conflict inherent in wage labour relations is revealed not so much in open actions, but in hidden forms of resistence such as "absenteeism " and high rates of turnover.The organizational strength of trade-unions increases after independence.This must not imply that trade-unions become more efficient to attend to workers' interests.In many cases they are subjected to the political goals of government.
Strikes are suppressed, since they seem to sabotage the national task of develop ment.N evertheless, they remain the most efficient articulation of protest and turn increasingly against the government43• The segmentation of the labour market along ethnic lines implies that the prospects to get employed in urban areas and in particular occupations are different for various ethnic groups.Thus the competi tion among wage-earners and their weak position in the labour market transform themselves into disputes between ethnic groups and particularistic demands on ethnic or regional basis44• The potential of conflict inherent in long-term unemployment is revealed by attempts to develop associations of unemployed into political movements for protest.Neither existing voluntary associations organized along ethnic lines, nor trade-unions provide efficient channels to stress the urgency of their demands.For example, trade-unions must be afraid that their bargaining position is impaired by the unemployed45• Even manifestations of conflict which intensify ethnic divisions have consequences.The meaning of such "tribalist " forms of revealing conflicts is ambivalent.On the one hand, it under mines the cohesion of the state's organization, and on the other, political leaders and the state's apparatus can use them to play different ethnic groups against each other.Furthermore, a diverting tactic of conflict resolution is to shift potential conflicts to neighbouring African states.In addition this outlet promotes national unity, at least in so far as it raises chauvinist emotions46• Modernization theories often presuppose that social change brings about an "achieving society " which provides "vertical mobility " by me ans of competition between its members.This model is mainly of ideological significance even for "developed" capitalist class societies ; much more so for periphery capitalist societies where inequalities of modern and traditional origin are intersecting.The structural heterogeneity relates also to the manifestation of conflicts and their political articulation.Thus another characteristic feature of these societies is that uniform rules for conflict resolution do not emerge.
society " and pro vi des "vertical mobility " .A few of these questions are discussed in this paper which is based upon studies on West African countries, especially Ghana, Ivory Coast, Senegal, and Upper Volta.One characteristic of these countries is their low degree of internal and intra regional integration which is combined with their partial integration in the world market.Under these conditions it can be deduced from models of regional eco nomic growth that the result of labour migration is rather a further deepening of unequal development between immigration zones (urban agglomerations, rural export sectors) and emigration zones (mainly subsistence economies).
After labour migration has been established as a self-sustaining process during the colonial period, the changes thereby induced in the subsistence economies swell the stream of migration.After formal decolonization the increasing number of migrants meets modern urban sectors which possess only a limited absorptive capacity due to the bottlenecks of the industrialization by import substitution.Rural-urban income differences which seem responsible for the resulting urban unemployment are, however, not the primary cause of this migration process.
As well, the manipulation of a single strategic variable such as urban wage rate cannot be taken as an adequate solution.
The relations of mi grants with their horne region extend also to the apparent "melting pot " of urban immigration areas."Traditional " ties of this kind cross "modern " patterns of stratification.Thereby conflicts are manifested in a par ticularistic, e.g."tribalist " way which hinders thorough structural changes.All together, labour migration seems to reproduce the existing structure of West African societies and even to deepen its heterogeneity.This applies to the economic as weH as to the socio-political level.
Benjamin Constant and the Doctrinaire Liberal Influence in Hispanic America By O. CARLOS STOETZER Among the Liberal influences of the early nineteenth century, Doctrinaire Liberalism was a most important movement which shaped the Romantic mind of Hispanic America.Benjamin Constant was not strictly speaking linked to the Doctrinaires of Royer-Collard and to the ecdecticism of Cousin, but was nonetheless quite dose to them.Both the Doctrinaires and the more indepen dent mind of Constant were aristocratic : they tried to apply the Hegelian syn thesis to the eternal problems of liberty and authority, and thus reflected the spirit of the industrial revolution, of the rising bourgeosie and oft the Rechts staat.Constant's ideal was constitutional monarchy with the fourth power, equally opposed to the enlightened despotism of the ancien regime, the totali tarian democracy of Rousseau and the French Revolution, and the democratic caesarism of Bonaparte.Constant shaped the Liberalism of Rivadavia and the Generaci6n de 1837 in the River Plate as well as the conservative governments of Chile (Portales and the Constitution of 1833); he influenced the Imperial Constitution of Brazil with its Poder Moderador, and he had a significant impact on BolIvar (Constitution of 1826).Furthermore, Mexico's conservative Constitution of 1835 with its