Labour's geography and geography's labour: california as an (anti‐) revolutionary landscape

Abstract

The California agricultural landscape seemed on the cusp of radical, maybe even revolutionary, change just before World War II. But over the next twenty years, rather than radical change, patterns of capital concentration and labour hyper‐exploitation were entrenched, in large part through growers’ ability to gain control over a programme to import indentured ‘guest workers’ – braceros – from Mexico. By examining how the California landscape did not change we can begin to understand more fully the complex relationship between landscape and revolution, which is what this article seeks to do. In the wake of the analysis made here, speculations are offered on how it behooves contemporary movements (usually urban) – and their theorists – to pay closer attention to the relationship between revolution and landscape.

Key words:

• agribusiness
• bracero programme
• California
• landscape
• revolution