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This study of the basis of peasant politics and rebellion begins with Tawney's metaphor describing" the position of the rural population" as" that of a man standing permanently up to the neck in water, so that even a ripple might drown him." It places the critical problem of the peasant family—a secure subsistence—at the center of the study of peasant politics, where I believe it belongs. I try to show how the fear of dearth explains many otherwise anomalous technical, social, and moral arrangements in peasant society.

The fact that subsistence-oriented peasants typically prefer to avoid economic disaster rather than take risks to maximize their average income has enormous implications for the problem of exploitation. On the basis of this principle, it is possible to deduce those systems of tenancy and taxation that are likely to have the most crushing impact on peasant life. The critical problem is not the average surplus …