A farmer whose activities are dominated by the family group. The family provides all the labour and the produce is for the family as a whole; occasional surpluses are sold in the open market. Landholdings are small, sometimes owned by the family, but often leased; see Kull (2006) AAAG 96, 3 on the perceived rights of peasants versus state control. ‘Peasants are not a declining class but rather are undergoing a variety of transformations. In some settings they will indeed disappear, in others experience stresses that lead to their semi-proletarianization and, in yet others, peasants were, and still are, being created by capitalism’ (Johnson et al. (2005) Antipode 37, 5). Although peasants have been characterized as backward and resistant to change, peasant strategies can be highly rational in a society where there is little margin for error; see Faminow et al. (1999) World Animal Rev. 93. See Murray (2006) J. Peasant Studs 33, 4 on neo-feudalism in Chile.