OVER-EMBEDDEDNESS IN AGRICULTURAL MODERNIZATION: POWER DYNAMICS AND THE EROSION OF FARMER AUTONOMY IN RURAL CHINA

Zijian Bai; Qizhen Zhu

Todos os Trabalhos

Trabalho

DOI

10.29327/9786527226680.1440659

Título do Trabalho

OVER-EMBEDDEDNESS IN AGRICULTURAL MODERNIZATION: POWER DYNAMICS AND THE EROSION OF FARMER AUTONOMY IN RURAL CHINA

Autores

Zijian Bai
Qizhen Zhu

Modalidade

IRSA - Congresso Mundial de Sociologia Rural (01/10/2025 a 20/01/2026)

Área temática

IRSA 34 - Diverse Transitions of Farming and Peasantries

Data de Publicação

06/08/2026

País da Publicação

Brasil

Idioma da Publicação

pt-BR

Página do Trabalho

https://www.even3.com.br/anais/sober-irsa2026/1440659-over-embeddedness-in-agricultural-modernization--power-dynamics-and-the-erosion-of-farmer-autonomy-in-rural-chin

ISBN

978-65-272-2668-0

Palavras-Chave

over-embeddedness; agricultural modernization; farmer autonomy; governance; rural China

Resumo

State-led agricultural modernization has increasingly relied on subsidy-driven service expansion, yet how these interventions (such as subsidies through a program) reshape rural social relations and affect farmer autonomy once they become institutionalized. This study develops the concept of over-embeddedness to analyze how state intervention transforms cooperative, community-based service arrangements into administratively institutionalized structures that generate asymmetric power relations. Drawing on a case study of Agricultural Production Outsourcing (APOS) in Z town, China, the paper traces a shift from market-based embeddedness to policy-induced reinforcement and ultimately administrative consolidation. Originally emerging from mutual aid organizations based on relational contracts and reciprocal cooperation, APOS expanded as subsidies and performance incentives enabled organizational elites to leverage external networks and capture state resources. The recognition of output generality as a positive externality justified scaling-up policies that concentrated support on dominant actors, disrupting the internal logic of embedded cooperation. Meanwhile, in pursuit of accelerated development, actors with richer social networks actively seek external support to enable rapid scale expansion. Together, these forces disrupted the internal logic of embedded cooperation. Through renewed contracting cycles, policy-backed service providers entered asymmetric pre-contractual relationships with fragmented farmers, embedding administrative objectives into production services and gradually transforming cooperation into dependency. While expansion initially improved efficiency, over-embeddedness generated long-term governance risks: distorted incentive structures, substitution of farmers in core production decisions, loss of production capability, rising dependency, and declining autonomy. Agricultural production thus became contingent on organizational stability and continuous fiscal transfers, creating vulnerabilities and reducing system resilience. These findings offer comparative insights into contested transitions of farming and peasantries globally, highlighting the need to reconsider the balance between state intervention, market competition, and farmer agency.

Título do Evento: 16th World Congress of Rural Sociology and 64th Congress of the Brazilian Society of Rural Economics, Management and Sociology
Cidade do Evento: Porto Alegre
Título dos Anais do Evento: Anais do 64º Congresso da SOBER e XVI Congresso Mundial de Sociologia Rural (IRSA)
Nome da Editora: Even3
Meio de Divulgação: Meio Digital
DOI

Como citar

BAI, Zijian; ZHU, Qizhen. OVER-EMBEDDEDNESS IN AGRICULTURAL MODERNIZATION: POWER DYNAMICS AND THE EROSION OF FARMER AUTONOMY IN RURAL CHINA.. In: Anais do 64º Congresso da SOBER e XVI Congresso Mundial de Sociologia Rural (IRSA). Anais...Porto Alegre(RS) UFRGS, 2026. Disponível em: https//www.even3.com.br/anais/sober-irsa2026/1440659-OVER-EMBEDDEDNESS-IN-AGRICULTURAL-MODERNIZATION--POWER-DYNAMICS-AND-THE-EROSION-OF-FARMER-AUTONOMY-IN-RURAL-CHIN. Acesso em: 16/09/2026