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This paper examines the variety of agrarian classes of labour and the challenges they face in organizing and pursuing their interests. By taking the cotton sector in Burkina Faso as a case study, it analyses how various 'classes of labour' organize and mobilize for collective action to raise their claims: poor cotton farmers and workers in the cotton factories. Poor and middle farmers recently came to the fore when they boycotted cotton production in large numbers. The study focusses on the boycott campaign, and more broadly on class struggle and collective action by farmers and workers, on interclass alliances, and on capital's attempts to play the classes of labour against one another. The boycott campaign provides an outstanding case to analyse the interests of the various classes of labour and of opportunities for rural–urban mobilization and alliances across classes of labour. I argue that poor farmers and factory workers along the chain of cotton production can be considered as various classes of labour that are not necessarily antagonistic to one another but, first and foremost, to capital. In order to achieve radical transformation in the agrarian context, what is needed are networks and organizations to establish interclass solidarity and alliances. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The briefing explores the dynamics underpinning the coup d'état in Burkina Faso that took place on 24 to 25 January 2022. It does so by discussing the putschists' justification to fight threats by non-state armed groups and situates the coup in the history of Burkina Faso. Since formal independence the country has been characterised by strikes, military coups and constitutional referendums. In contrast to 2015, however, when broad popular resistance forced a group of military putschists out of office after only a few days, the trade unions and mass organisations this time do not mobilise active resistance, though in principle they oppose military coups. The briefing raises questions regarding whether the 'transition phase' will deliver any substantial change, what might be seen as legitimate forms of regime change, and what the character of political authority is in Burkina Faso, how it might be delivered and by whom. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The political history of Burkina Faso since the formal end of its colonisation is characterised by vibrant mass mobilisation by largely Marxistoriented labour unions and their allies, namely organisations from the human rights, student, and youth movements. This article traces the development of social mobilisation and protest in Burkina Faso through six historical phases since 1960, including the recent regime change in 2014 that has frequently been referred to as a 'revolution'. It is argued that the relative success of mass mobilisation in Burkina Faso can be explained through the concept of the unity of the popular classes, building on the basic idea that organised labour and other segments of exploited classes are not distinct from one another. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Zeitschrift für Internationale Beziehungen (ZIB) is the property of Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft mbH & Co. KG and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Canadian Journal of Development Studies is the property of Routledge and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The global food price crisis that began in late 2007 has seen large numbers of people come out into the streets in protest, especially in the cities of the global South. These spontaneous "food riots" are marches and strikes against price increases of 50 per cent or more for cereals, cooking oil and other staple goods. This article analyses the case of "food riots" and struggles against the high cost of living in Burkina Faso. It focuses on riots as a specific form of contentious collective action, arguing that different social actors draw on different protest repertoires. Unorganised youth, which are barely represented in labour unions and other influential civil society organisations, are the protagonists of the "food riots". It is argued, however, that riots and institutionalised protests are mutually related. Trade union and social movement mobilisation preceded the "food riots" and the riots were used as a discursive point of reference by protest organisations in their efforts for continuous mobilisation against the high cost of living and in their dealings with state authorities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article seeks to investigate how scales are constructed and referred to in conflicts over mining. In an empirical analysis of conflicts over gold mining in Burkina Faso—a paramount example of the recent commodity boom and its pervasive socio-economic effects—the relevance of scalar constructions, particularly of the 'local', is explored. It starts from an understanding of the global and the local as constitutively related to one another. The principal question, therefore, is not whether global processes such as the commodity boom result in contentious political action, but rather how they are related to collective social action on various scales. Based on an empirical study, this article seeks to contribute to research on 'glocal' conflicts; that is, the ways in which 'global' structures and processes relate to 'local' collective action. The paper intervenes in the debate on scale in the study of contentious politics by suggesting that global–local relations are not restricted to scale-jumping and re-scaling by actors in socio-political conflicts. Drawing on Georg Towers' (2000) conceptual differentiation between 'scales of regulation' and 'scales of meaning', it is argued that scalar ascriptions and discourses as such are already an integral part of contestation and conflict. This applies also when conflicts are not specifically characterized by shifts between different scales of political power and institutional arrangements. In the case study, it is demonstrated that the construction of the scale of meaning—what is discursively ascribed to the 'local'—it intertwined with the struggle over the scales of regulation. The latter, at the same time, are however not fixed and self-evident but are created and contested in social and political struggles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Global crises -- the financial crisis, the energy crisis, the food crisis -- have numerous social, political, and ecological impacts at the local level. This article examines the relationship of global crises and local conflicts using protests against the high cost of living in Burkina Faso as an example. Burkina Faso was among the states that witnessed particularly intense confrontations related to the global food price crisis of 2007/2008. How are global crises mediated so that they lead to conflicts and collective action at the national and local level? This question is dealt with referring to the analytical concepts of scale and framing. Global crises result in political protest, when oppositional actors successfully frame them in a way that links them to existing conflicts and claims, thus mobilizing protest potentials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]