SOAS Research Online

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to examine the precise nature of the relationship between ecology and class structure and to see how and to what extent the ecological setting affects the class relations of a rural community. It is both an empirical and a theoretical study. The theoretical analysis covers the question of the influence of the environment in the development of human society and the circumstances under which ecology may play a role in production relations. This analysis also involves an investigation of the relations of production themselves in trying to identify the various classes in a Bangladesh social formation. The empirical study, on the other hand, carried out in three ecologically different areas of southern Bangladesh, was designed to test relevant hypotheses. It is a two fold study. First, to analyse the extent to which the relations of production in the three villages differ and to establish whether this difference could be construed as evidence of different modes of production in the villages. Secondly, to ascertain to what extent these differences are due to the ecological settings of the three villages. The findings are positive in that it is possible to establish direct relationships between two ecological variables and individual class relation variables and to predict modes of production corresponding to these ecological variables. However, when indirect relationships between variables as well as direct relationships are taken into account, the complexity of the relations between ecology and class structure does not allow simple generalizations to emerge.