Chapter IV. Village Organisation and the Sociology of Production and Consumption

H1a consists of the headman, Tamu’, his wife, their daughter, her husband Gwa and their two children. H1b consists of Tamu”s son, Nae’ Kha, his wife and their four children. The economically active people in these two households were Tamu’, his daughter Poeloe, Gwa and Nae’ Kha. Tamu”s wife was too infirm for the more arduous tasks in agricultural work while Nae’ Kha’s wife was for much of 1981 house-bound as she was nursing a new-born son.

Nae’ Kha married his wife in 1975 and went to live with her in her parents’ house at Huai Dua, following the customary rule on uxorilocal residence. In Huai Dua, he worked his father-in-law’s wet-rice field but, at the same time, opened up a plot of wet-rice terraces by himself. After three years, however, he returned to Palokhi with his wife and, at that time, their two children. The wet-rice field that he opened was left for his father-in-law to use. There were two reasons why he returned to Palokhi. The principal reason was the expectation that he would eventually succeed his father as headman. For this, residence in Palokhi was mandatory. He also needed to familiarise himself with the various ritual performances and prayers required of a headman, although in the years when he was resident in Huai Dua he returned to participate in the Head Rite described in Chapter II. The second reason was that he found much of the burden of agricultural work fell upon him at Huai Dua because his father-in-law, an opium addict, left most of it to him.

Upon his return to Palokhi, he built a house next to Tamu”s and a number of arrangements between the two households came into being which, in 1981–82, were still in the process of working themselves out. Prior to Nae’ Kha’s return, H1a cultivated swiddens and a wet-rice field owned by Tamu’.^[2] When Nae’ Kha returned to Palokhi, Tamu’ and Gwa assumed responsibility for cultivating the swiddens of their household, whilst Tamu’ and Nae’ Kha were, on the other hand, responsible for cultivating Tamu”s wet-rice field. However, in early 1981 Nae’ Kha also rented a plot of wet-rice terraces from Chwi’ (one of the former co-founders of Palokhi with Tamu’) who had moved to Huai Dua in 1977 after divorcing his wife. The field was rented on a share-cropping basis. When Chwi’ died later in the year, Nae’ Kha exchanged his field in Huai Dua for Chwi”s field in Palokhi with Chwi”s second wife at Huai Dua. In addition, a small sum of money was paid over to her because Chwi”s field was a little larger than Nae’ Kha’s. At the same time, he also began to open up his own plot of terraces near Tamu”s wet-rice field. This marked the establishment of a certain independence in subsistence farming for Nae’ Kha and his family. Although they were not under any undue pressure to do so, there was nevertheless a general expectation that they would eventually cultivate fields of their own whether they were swiddens or wet-rice terraces.

It may be noted here that the separation of responsibilities in working Tamu”s swiddens and wet-rice fields between the two brothers-in-law was essentially dictated by ritual considerations (see Chapter VI).^[3] As far as the sharing of labour in Tamu”s swiddens and wet-rice field were concerned, there was in fact no real division of labour, at least in theory. In practice, however, Nae’ Kha was unable to contribute substantially to the cultivation of Tamu”s swiddens because he was committed to working his rented field and opening the plot of terraces for his family’s use. Gwa, however, assisted Nae’ Kha in cultivating the latter’s rented field and, occasionally, in the work on the new terraces.

Certain distinctions, however, were made in the sharing of the rice from the fields of H1a and H1b. While the crops from Tamu”s swidden and wet-rice field were shared between the two households, the harvest from Nae’ Kha’s rented field was retained by him for his family’s use in 1982.

The somewhat fluid arrangements in the sharing of labour and rice between the two households undoubtedly reflected the fact that the situation was a transitional one for H1b. There are, however, two important points to note about these arrangements. First, the expectation that Nae’ Kha would eventually farm his own fields (which he was determined to do); second, the “non-accountable” nature of labour between the two households where it was provided freely (instead of being on strict reciprocal terms) subject to the exigencies faced by the two households. The farming of independently owned fields is significant because it reflects a general attitude that households should have their own fields. The generally free exchange of labour, on the other hand, reflected the inability of both households to provide all the labour necessary for the cultivation of their own fields. It also shows the importance of primary kin ties and male affinal ties in such “non-accountable” labour exchanges.

In non-agricultural spheres, however, the separation of economic functions and the management of domestic budgets between the two households were decidedly marked. For example, the earnings of the two households from the sale of tea leaves collected in Tamu”s garden were managed independently. Thus, although both households had free access to the garden, the incomes from the sale of leaves were earned according to the labour that each expended instead of being pooled for common use. The use of money incomes were similarly decided upon separately. In other words, as far as cash incomes and expenditures were concerned, the two households operated quite independently. The only exception to this were rice purchases when rice stocks were near depletion in late 1981. Both households contributed to the purchase of rice but there was no strict accounting of their contributions. They also made additional purchases on their own from time to time according to their respective immediate needs.

The households which are of immediate interest here are H13a and H13b, but I have included H2 and H13c to illustrate other related features of domestic economic organisation which are not fully apparent from H13a and H13b.

H13a consists of Toeloe, his wife, four children and a grandchild. The grandchild is the daughter of Toeloe’s eldest daughter, Gwa Chi’, who was not married. There were only three members of the household who were economically active, namely, Toeloe, his wife and Gwa Chi’. Cha Pghe, the eldest after Gwa Chi’, was fifteen years old (in 1981) and did a considerable amount of agricultural work but according to technical definitions may not be properly regarded as being part of the labour force.

The household cultivated only swiddens and did not own any wet-rice fields in 1981. A variable cash income was also earned by Toeloe who was Palokhi’s blacksmith and gunsmith. The main source of this income came from gunsmithing for which Toeloe had a considerable reputation even beyond Palokhi and, indeed, a great many of his customers were Northern Thai from surrounding settlements. Toeloe, however, was an opium addict and much of this income was spent on opium. Because of his addiction and smithing work, Toeloe was rarely involved in swidden cultivation, his participation being confined more often than not to agrarian rites. Most of the agricultural work was done by his wife, Gwa Chi’ and Cha Pghe. At various times, prior to 1981, Toeloe’s eldest sons (Nu’ and Pi No’) who had moved away when they married came to assist in the more labour intensive tasks of swiddening, namely, planting and harvesting.

Early in 1981, however, Pi No’ returned to Palokhi with his wife and children from the Flower Plantation of the Royal Forestry Department’s Watershed Development Unit 1, where he had been working for about three years.^[4] Their intention was to settle permanently in Palokhi. Throughout 1981, they lived in Toeloe’s house (their sleeping quarters being the outer verandah) and during this time Pi No’ assisted the household in cultivating their swidden. This assistance, however, was only partial because he devoted a considerable amount of time to wage work in the Northern Thai settlement of Ban Mae Lao, the picking and sale of miang and tea leaves as well as other forest products. He also used Toeloe’s smithy for work of his own of a similar nature such as making and repairing muzzle-loading caplock guns, bush knives, and so on.

For the most part of 1981, Toeloe’s family and that of his son formed, for all practical purposes, a single household. This was particularly evident where the consumption of rice was concerned. The two families shared the rice from the previous agricultural season. The harvest from 1980, however, was small (as it was in 1981 as well) because the family had insufficient domestic supplies of labour to farm larger swiddens which would have been more appropriate to their needs. Thus, for most of 1981, they had to rely on rice purchased with money earned in the cash sector. Both families contributed to the purchase of rice which was pooled for common consumption.

Notwithstanding these arrangements in the sharing of rice, certain distinctions were nonetheless made in the management of the domestic budgets of the two families. The incomes earned by them in the cash sector were used to purchase items other than rice on the basis of quite independent decisions. Although these expenditures (on consumer durables, clothing, footwear, and so on) were small, they were distinctly separate reflecting the separate needs of the two families.

Despite the fact that H13a and H13b functioned more or less as a single household, it was clear in the latter part of 1981 that Pi No’ had every intention of setting up his own household. He began to open up a plot of wet-rice terraces for his family’s use in 1982. It is interesting to note that in doing so, he entered into a specific short-term labour exchange arrangement with Nae’ Kha who was also opening a plot of terraces nearby. One reason why he did not seek any assistance from H13a was that the parental household was constrained by limited supplies of domestic labour. An equally important reason was the fact that he and Nae’ Kha were in essentially the same situation. Both were able-bodied men who were the only full-time workers in their families; the arrangement, therefore, was to their mutual advantage. It is important point to note, however, that despite their on-going association with their parental households, both were acting to establish an independent subsistence base for themselves.

H13c consists of Nu’ and Lo’ (whose marriage was regarded as a “crooked” union as discussed in Chapter III) and their two children. In September 1981, they returned to Palokhi from the sub-unit of the Royal Forestry Department where they had eloped, with the intention of settling permanently in the village. Between September 1981 and February 1982 (when Nu’ built a house for the family), the couple stayed with Toeloe with Lo’ assisting H13a in various agricultural tasks. Nu’, on the other hand, occasionally assisted H12, his parental household (see Case 4), but contributed little to the subsistence activities of H13a. Nu’, who was an opium addict, spent most of his time picking and selling miang in order to earn money for buying opium. Some of his income was spent on the purchase of rice, but the rice was given to his mother in H12 where he took most of his meals. The reason why Nu’ and Lo’ took their meals in their respective parental homes was simply that H13a had insufficient rice to meet the needs of everyone. After Nu’ and his family moved into their new house in 1982, Nu”s declared intention was to cultivate a swidden to meet, if not all, then part of his family’s needs for the following year.

The case of H13c is, again, a transitional one but it shows that considerable flexibility is possible within the framework of domestic economic arrangements in Palokhi. The relative poverty of all the three households undoubtedly demanded various accommodations if they were to meet their very minimal consumption requirements in the transitional periods that they were going through. What is important, however, is that such accommodations are possible in the context of Palokhi kinship, familial sociology and their concomitant economic arrangements.

H2 is included, in this case, as an example of how households of siblings tend to assume a high degree of independence in economic functions especially when they are in the later stages of their domestic life cycle. That the the households of the two siblings, Toeloe and Poeloe’, were well advanced in their developmental cycle is, of course, evident from the fact that they had married daughters and sons. H2 cultivated swiddens and owned two plots of wet-rice fields and, in 1981, had the largest surpluses from agricultural production. Although Toeloe “borrowed” rice from Poeloe’ (which was never repayed) on one occasion in 1981, the two households were for all practical purposes quite independent of each other in subsistence production and other economic activities. H2 was, perhaps, the wealthiest household in Palokhi but there was no feeling of obligation, nor was there any expectation, that the household should assist H13a with rice or labour although Toeloe and Poeloe’ were brother and sister.

Case 3 illustrates a variety of domestic arrangements which may come into existence over a long period of time. Some of these arrangements are described in the two cases above, but this particular case shows the further directions that they may take as domestic groups proceed further along their developmental cycle. It also illustrates how choice is a factor in whether or not kin links are activated in domestic economic functions as the network of kin becomes extended.

As the genealogical relations between households in the figure above show, Di and Ci, both full brothers, have a half-sister Pi’ ‘O by the same mother. When their mother and the father of the two brothers died, the three of them went to live with ‘Ae’, the sister of their mother (see Case 4) at Huai Khon Kha. When Su Ghau married Pi’ ‘O, in 1955, he moved into ‘Ae”s house for a short period of time, after which he, Pi’ ‘O and Ci moved to Pang Ung where they lived as a single household cultivating only swiddens.

Di later married Le Thu Pho and went to live with her family at Mae Lak. For twelve years, apart from occasional visits, Di had little to do with his brother and half-sister’s family. In 1969, Su Ghau, Pi’ ‘O, their children and Ci settled in Palokhi, followed later by Di and his family. Di’s decision to do so was guided by the availability of the wet-rice fields in Palokhi (news of which he had learnt from ‘Ae’ and Su Ghau), as it was in the case of Su Ghau. By the time Di arrived in Palokhi, both his family and that of Pi’ ‘O were fully independent and functioned quite autonomously of each other. Although they assisted each other in agricultural tasks, this did not entail cultivating the same fields or the sharing of rice.

Ci married Phy Pho in 1970 and moved into her parents’ house, her father (Lauj) being the former headman of Palokhi. When Ci married Phy Pho, her elder sister Pae’ was already married to Nu’. Pae’ and Nu’, therefore, had to move out of Lauj’s house into a house of their own, following the custom on the succession of married daughters being co-resident with their parental families.

In the time that Nu’ was living in Lauj’s house, he assisted Lauj in the cultivation of Lauj’s wet-rice field together with Cae Wau, Lauj’s son. When he and his family lived on their own, however, he commenced swiddening on his own, although the rice from the two households was occasionally shared in times of need. Lauj, as I noted in Chapter I, was an opium addict and as he became older, eventually lost interest in farming leaving the work to Cae Wau and Ci. The two brothers-in-law, who began smoking opium with Lauj, became addicted in turn, so that the burden of cultivating Lauj’s wet-rice field finally fell upon Nu’, despite the fact that he was no longer a part of Lauj’s household.

When Lauj’s wife died in 1979, the family house was destroyed according to custom. Lauj and Cae Wau built a hut for themselves, while Ci (who preferred to disengage himself entirely from farming) built another house for his family. From then on, Ci committed himself to wage work in Northern Thai settlements and at sub-units of the Royal Forestry Department. Lauj and Cae Wau cooked and ate together, drawing upon rice from Lauj’s wet-rice field which was stored in Nu”s house.

In early 1981, however, when Nu’ built a new house, Lauj and Cae Wau moved into that house and, for all practical purposes lived as dependents of Nu’ and his wife. Ci’s household was virtually independent although his wife, Phy Pho, often obtained rice from Pae’ of which no account was kept.

It will be recalled, from Chapter II, that Thi Pghe of H5 died in 1978 thus leaving behind his aged father-in-law, wife and three young children. As a result of Thi Pghe’s death, the family encountered difficulties in cultivating their wet-rice fields primarily because of a shortage of labour and they rented out the field.^[5] The mainstay of their subsistence activities was tea and miang picking for a Northern Thai from Ban Mae Lao from which they derived a cash as well as rice income to meet their needs. Although they received some assistance within Palokhi, it is interesting to note, however, that this came from Su Ghau (H4) rather than Tamu’ (H1a) who was Thi Pghe’s brother. The assistance from Su Ghau consisted of a work arrangement between him and Chi Choe (Thi Pghe’s son) in which Chi Choe assisted Su Ghau in working his swidden; in return for this, Chi Choe was allowed to share in part of the harvest from the swidden. While the arrangement was mutually advantageous (though it perhaps worked out rather more in Su Ghau’s favour than Chi Choe’s), what is significant here is that Tamu’ and his family felt no obligation to assist H5. It might be added, on the other hand, that no one in H5 expected H1 to assist them either.

This very clearly illustrates that collateral kin links are, by no means, necessarily important in guiding the sociological arrangements in the subsistence activities of related households. Indeed, if anything, it serves to show that very pragmatic — if not calculated — considerations of mutual advantage inform the decisions on the basis of which such arrangements come into being. More generally, it also shows that as households of siblings (or, in this case, siblings and step-siblings) assume a greater autonomy as they get older, this may be matched by other forms of organising subsistence activities which are not predicated on kin links. The possibility of this happening is related, of course, to the growth of the village and hence the availability of a wider range of related and unrelated households for co-operation in which choice then becomes a significant factor.

H11a consists of only two people, a sixty-three year old woman, ‘Ae’, and her fourth husband, Sa Pae’, a Yunnanese Chinese deserter from a Kuomintang garrison in Chiengrai. ‘Ae’ first settled in Palokhi in 1955 with her second husband. When they came to Palokhi, they bought a wet-rice field which became ‘Ae”s when her second husband died. ‘Ae’ subsequently married Chwi’ but they were divorced in 1976, the grounds allegedly being adultery between ‘Ae’ and Sa Pae’. Sa Pae’, who came to Palokhi in 1974, had been taken in by the couple as part of the household which meant, in effect, that they provided him with board and lodging in exchange for help in their fields.

H11b consists of Chi’ (‘Ae”s only son), his wife Chi Ka and their seven children. H12 (see Case 2) consists of an eighty year old widow Nja La (Chi Ka’s mother) and her two unmarried children, Kau’ and Gwa.

The association of these households over a period of approximately nineteen years is interesting because it illustrates how the patterns in domestic economic arrangements may change through time, and how general statements about Karen kinship and residential patterns can often disguise the variety, complexity and fluidity in such arrangements among related households.

Chi’ married Chi Ka in 1953, when his mother ‘Ae’ was still living in Huai Sai Luang. He went to live with Chi Ka and her family (at Huai Khon Kha) and, thereafter, had little to do with his mother apart from occasional visits. When Chi Ka’s younger sister married, he and Chi Ka set up house of their own and continued to remain in Huai Khon Kha for a number of years after which they moved to various other places. After ‘Ae’ settled in Palokhi, however, he also moved to Palokhi in 1959 with the intention of opening up wet-rice fields for cultivation.^[6] This he failed to do; instead, he cultivated swiddens and assisted ‘Ae’ and her husbands in working the wet-rice field which was originally acquired by ‘Ae’ and her second husband, but which became her’s on his death.^[7] Three years after Chi’ moved to Palokhi (that is, in 1962), Nja La, her husband and their four children also settled in Palokhi. This, however, did not affect the arrangements which existed between H11a and H11b which consisted, essentially, of sharing in the cultivation and crops of Chi”s swiddens and ‘Ae”s wet-rice field. H12 functioned virtually independently cultivating only swiddens.

The close co-operation between H11a and H11b in agricultural cultivation existed for two main reasons. First, H11a comprised only two people and was therefore unable to provide all the labour in wet-rice cultivation which made assistance necessary. That this was provided by Chi’, his wife and two children of working age was, undoubtedly, because of the primary relationship between the two families. Second, the cultivation of fields in Palokhi, whether swiddens or wet-rice terraces, entails a series of ritual performances throughout the agricultural calendar and the role of men in these performances is of primary importance. As Sa Pae’ was unfamiliar with these rituals, the responsibility for them devolved on Chi’.^[8]

The domestic budgets of H11a and H11b, on the other hand, were managed separately following the pattern common in Palokhi. The separation of the budgets was very clear because the harvests from their fields were more than sufficient to meet their consumption needs.^[9] Thus, unlike some of the other households discussed before, H11a and H11b were under no pressure to purchase rice which could be pooled for common consumption following the arrangements in agricultural cultivation.

In terms of the residential patterns associated with marriage and the family sociology of the Palokhi Karen, what is interesting in this case is that customary practice does not preclude an out-married son (and his family) from reestablishing links in subsistence activities with his parental household after being an integral part of his wife’s parental household in accordance with the rule on uxorilocal residence at marriage. It is significant because it is not a special case — namely, succession to headmanship — in which there are institutional factors at work which require a son and his family to return creating conditions under which co-operation with the parental family might then become a necessity, albeit for an interim period. This is also significant because it once again demonstrates the importance of choice or preference (and their attendant advantages) in how kin links may be activated or ignored in the sharing of economic functions between related households.

The case studies discussed above show a great deal of variation in the way in which individual households manage domestic production. Nevertheless, some general patterns may be discerned.

First, an important factor in the variability of domestic economic arrangements is the life cycle of domestic groups and its associated processes of household formation and fission. I have shown in the preceding chapter that the features of household formation and fission in Palokhi are related to the custom of uxorilocal residence at marriage, the belief that a house should not contain more than two married couples (and their offspring), and the succession of married daughters, their spouses and children who are co-resident with their parental families as they get married. In general, the various arrangements in subsistence and other activities between households related by primary kin ties reflect adjustments which are made in response to changes which occur in their composition and residential patterns over time. Accordingly, households as production and consumption units are not organisationally fixed over time; however, at any point in time, they may consist of either stem families or nuclear families.

Second, the rule on uxorilocal residence at marriage by no means precludes the return of sons who have married out. They may, and indeed do, return to set up households of their own. In such circumstances, there exists a certain amount of sharing in agricultural tasks and crops. However, in contrast to married daughters and their families who are co-resident with their parental families, the degree of sharing is more restricted reflecting the primary importance of the household as an integral unit of production and consumption. Furthermore, there is a general expectation that sons (and indeed daughters) and their families who establish separate households should assume responsibility (at least in theory) for their own production and consumption. This is, in fact, an ideal which rarely manifests itself in practice because of the exigencies (for example, limited domestic supplies of labour) often faced by such households. The ideal is also rarely translated into practice because of attachments between such related households. Thus, the economic association between parental households and the separate households of married children is never broken off entirely. When the parents of married siblings are dead, however, there is a greater autonomy in the management of agricultural production among married siblings especially if they have enough children of working age. Nevertheless, it is also possible for brothers-in-law to establish close working relationships especially if their households are marked by limited supplies of labour.

Third, at any given stage of the developmental cycle of domestic groups (whether they consist of stem or nuclear families), the likelihood of related households working together and sharing the returns to work (on a “non-accountable” basis) is greater in agricultural production than non-agricultural production. Indeed, where the management of domestic incomes and expenditures is concerned, such sharing is very limited even within stem family households reflecting the different or specific needs of their constituent units rather than the larger domestic group. In this area of economic activity, the separation is clear with conjugal or nuclear families being the operative socio-economic unit. Exceptions, however, occur. When domestic groups suffer a shortage of rice and need to buy it, their constituent units (that is, nuclear or conjugal families) usually do not maintain strictly separate budgets.

Finally, the kinds of arrangements between related (and unrelated) domestic groups may also be guided by wholly pragmatic considerations which, as we have seen, are by no means unimportant in informing the decisions made by a household to work with a particular household rather than another. In other words, beyond primary kin links (between households), kinship is not necessarily a factor of over-riding importance in determining the way in which households co-operate in subsistence production, nor is it necessarily a significant factor in distribution.