Paul Richards is Emeritus Professor of Technology and Agrarian Development, Wageningen University

Wageningen University

Wageningen University and Research Centre is a Dutch public university in Wageningen, The Netherlands. It consists of Wageningen University, the Van Hall-Larenstein School of Higher Professional Education, and the former agricultural research institutes of the Dutch Ministry of Agriculture...

, The Netherlands. He was formerly a Professor in the Department of Anthropology, University College London

University College London

University College London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom and the oldest and largest constituent college of the federal University of London...

 for many years, and previously taught anthropology

Anthropology

Anthropology is the study of humanity. It has origins in the humanities, the natural sciences, and the social sciences. The term "anthropology" is from the Greek anthrōpos , "man", understood to mean mankind or humanity, and -logia , "discourse" or "study", and was first used in 1501 by German...

 and geography

Geography

Geography is the science that studies the lands, features, inhabitants, and phenomena of Earth. A literal translation would be "to describe or write about the Earth". The first person to use the word "geography" was Eratosthenes...

, at the School of African and Oriental Studies, University of London

University of London

-20th century:Shortly after 6 Burlington Gardens was vacated, the University went through a period of rapid expansion. Bedford College, Royal Holloway and the London School of Economics all joined in 1900, Regent's Park College, which had affiliated in 1841 became an official divinity school of the...

 and the University of Ibadan

University of Ibadan

The University of Ibadan is the oldest Nigerian university, and is located five miles from the centre of the major city of Ibadan in Western Nigeria...

, Nigeria

Nigeria

Nigeria , officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a federal constitutional republic comprising 36 states and its Federal Capital Territory, Abuja. The country is located in West Africa and shares land borders with the Republic of Benin in the west, Chad and Cameroon in the east, and Niger in...

.

Richards is an anthropological commentator and researcher on agricultural technology and African farming systems. He has worked in Sierra Leone

Sierra Leone

Sierra Leone , officially the Republic of Sierra Leone, is a country in West Africa. It is bordered by Guinea to the north and east, Liberia to the southeast, and the Atlantic Ocean to the west and southwest. Sierra Leone covers a total area of and has an estimated population between 5.4 and 6.4...

 for over thirty years, conducting ethnographic studies of Mende village rice farming systems and forest conservation on the Liberian border. After the region

Region

Region is most commonly found as a term used in terrestrial and astrophysics sciences also an area, notably among the different sub-disciplines of geography, studied by regional geographers. Regions consist of subregions that contain clusters of like areas that are distinctive by their uniformity...

 became affected by the Sierra Leonean civil war (1992-2002), he turned to analysis of that conflict

War

War is a state of organized, armed, and often prolonged conflict carried on between states, nations, or other parties typified by extreme aggression, social disruption, and usually high mortality. War should be understood as an actual, intentional and widespread armed conflict between political...

 and has written more widely on the anthropology of armed conflicts.

Work on agriculture

Richards argues, following Durkheim, that human technique and skill underpins human action and institutional change. He began by examining everyday livelihood activities like farming. He coined the term "agriculture as performance" based on years of observing the reflexivity of African farmers and their responses to stress and risks, and drawing on his own skills and interest in music and musical performance. His populist

Populism

Populism can be defined as an ideology, political philosophy, or type of discourse. Generally, a common theme compares "the people" against "the elite", and urges social and political system changes. It can also be defined as a rhetorical style employed by members of various political or social...

 faith in African farmers to survive and prosper, despite the magnitude of the risks that faced, was set out in Indigenous Agricultural Revolution (1985), a book that generated fierce debate, since it accused agronomic research and international development organisations of missing the "moving target" of peasant farming and failing to see how innovations took place outside the realm of "formal" science

Science

Science is a systematic enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe...

 and laboratories. The book

Book

A book is a set or collection of written, printed, illustrated, or blank sheets, made of hot lava, paper, parchment, or other materials, usually fastened together to hinge at one side. A single sheet within a book is called a leaf or leaflet, and each side of a leaf is called a page...

's ideas were diametrically opposed to those of more pessimistic observers that lacked detailed field knowledge, that had often accused the same farmers of environmental degradation

Degradation

Degradation may refer to;* Biodegradation, the processes by which organic substances are broken down by living organisms* Cashiering or degradation ceremony, a ritual performed when cleric is deprived of office or a knight is stripped of the honour...

. Richards has proposed the term "technography" to describe the set of detailed research skills needed by anthropologists, and others, to understand how technology is deployed and used. Technograpies have been conducted by teams including several Wageningen University

Wageningen University

Wageningen University and Research Centre is a Dutch public university in Wageningen, The Netherlands. It consists of Wageningen University, the Van Hall-Larenstein School of Higher Professional Education, and the former agricultural research institutes of the Dutch Ministry of Agriculture...

 research students and collaborators.

Work on war

Fighting for the Rain Forest (1996) showed how the involvement of youth in Sierra Leonean rebel movements had little to do with widely-perceived "Barbarism" of rebel groups in resource-rich regions. War is, also, part of a "performance" with its origins in history, social orders, and human agency. Paul Richards personally witnessed some of the fighting during the war, continuing to visit the country. The widely held "New Barbarism" theories of Robert Kaplan

Robert Kaplan

Robert Kaplan may refer to:* Robert D. Kaplan, travel writer, essayist, and international correspondent for The Atlantic* Robert S. Kaplan, business theorist and professor of accounting at Harvard Business School...

 and others had suggested abundant natural resources, like Sierra Leone's blood diamond, were a magnet for human greed and civil conflict. Instead, Richards has argued the involvement of youth in the Revolutionary United Front

Revolutionary United Front

The Revolutionary United Front was a rebel army that fought a failed eleven-year war in Sierra Leone, starting in 1991 and ending in 2002. It later developed into a political party, which existed until 2007...

 rebel movement was a form of social resistance to matriarchal rule in Sierra Leone

Sierra Leone

Sierra Leone , officially the Republic of Sierra Leone, is a country in West Africa. It is bordered by Guinea to the north and east, Liberia to the southeast, and the Atlantic Ocean to the west and southwest. Sierra Leone covers a total area of and has an estimated population between 5.4 and 6.4...

, did not appear to have a strong underlying motive of greed (for the diamond revenues), and was a considered response rather than a spontaneous, 'barbaric' movement. Grievances were partly responsible for the violence that undoubtedly did afflict Sierra Leone

Sierra Leone

Sierra Leone , officially the Republic of Sierra Leone, is a country in West Africa. It is bordered by Guinea to the north and east, Liberia to the southeast, and the Atlantic Ocean to the west and southwest. Sierra Leone covers a total area of and has an estimated population between 5.4 and 6.4...

 during its civil war and for which the Revolutionary United Front

Revolutionary United Front

The Revolutionary United Front was a rebel army that fought a failed eleven-year war in Sierra Leone, starting in 1991 and ending in 2002. It later developed into a political party, which existed until 2007...

 was partly responsible. Richards has advised aid and humanitarian agencies on African post-war reconstruction, demobilization and skills-training.

Books

• Richards, P. (ed.) 1975. African Environment. Problems and Perspectives. London: International African Institute.
• Richards, P. 1985. Indigenous Agricultural Revolution. Ecology and Food Crops in West Africa. Methuen.
• Richards, P. 1986. Coping with hunger. Hazard and Experiment in a West African Rice Farming System. London: UCL Press.
• Last, M., P. Richards, C. Fyfe. 1987. Sierra Leone, 1787-1987: two centuries of intellectual life. Manchester University Press. [Africa 57(4)]
• Richards, P. 1996. Fighting for the Rain Forest. War, Youth & Resources in Sierra Leone. Oxford: James Currey.
• Richards, P. & Ruivenkamp, G. 1997. Seeds and Survival. Crop Genetic Resources in War and Reconstruction in Africa. Rome: IPGRI.
• Richards, P. (ed.) 2005. No Peace, No War. An Anthropology of Contemporary Armed Conflicts. Oxford: James Currey.

Articles and book chapters (incomplete)

• High, C. & Richards, P. 1972. The random walk drainage simulation model as a teaching exercise, Journal of Geography 71(1), 41-51.
• Richards, P. 1972. A quantitative analysis of the relationship between language tone and melody in a Hausa song. African Language Studies 13, 137-161
• High, C., J. Oguntoyinbo and P. Richards. 1973. Rainfall, drought and food supply in South-Western Nigeria. Savanna, 2(2), 115-120.
• Richards, P. 1974. Kant’s geography and mental maps. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 61, 1-16.
• Richards, P. 1975. ‘Alternative’ strategies for the African environment: folk ecology as a basis for community oriented agricultural development. In: P. Richards, Editor, African Environment: Problems and Perspectives, IAI, London.
• Filani, M.O. and P. Richards. 1976. Periodic market systems and rural development: the Ibarapa case study. Savanna 5(2), 149–162.
• Oguntoyinbo, J.S. and P. Richards. 1977. The extent and intensity of the 1969-1973 drought in Nigeria: a provisional analysis. In: D. Dalby, R.J. Harrison Church & F. Bezzaz. Drought in Africa, International African Institute London, pp. 114–126.
• Otuntoyinbo, J., and P. Richards. 1978. Drought and the Nigerian farmer. Journal of Arid Environments 1:165-194.
• Richards, P. 1978. Problem-generating structures in Nigeria's rural development. African Affairs 77(307), 257-259.
• Richards, P. 1978. Environment, settlement and state formation in pre-colonial Nigeria. In: Green, D., Haselgrove, C. and Spriggs, M., editors, GREEN, D. R., Haselgrove, C and Spriggs, M., Eds. Social Organisation and Settlement: Contributions from Anthropology, Archaeology and Geography. British Archaeological Reports, Oxford.
• Richards, P. 1979. A Green Revolution in Africa? African Affairs 78(311), 269-272.
• Richards, P. 1979. Community Environmental Knowledge in African Rural Development. IDS Bulletin, 10 (2).
• Richards, P. 1980. Community environmental knowledge in African rural development. In Indigenous Knowledge Systems and Development, eds. D.W. Brokensha, D. M. Warren, and o. Werner, pp. 183-203. Lanham, Maryland: University Press of America.
• Richards, P. 1981. Quality and quantity in agricultural work-Sierra Leone rice farming systems. In: G.A. Harrison. Energy and Effort. London : Taylor & Francis.
• Richards, P. 1983. Farming systems and agrarian change in West Africa. Progress in Human Geography 7(1), 1–39.
• Richards, P. 1983. Ecological change and the politics of African land use. African Studies Review 26(2), 1-72.
• Richards, P. 1984. Spatial organization as a theme in African studies. Progress in Human Geography 8, 551-561.
• Richards, P. 1987. The politics of famine—Some recent literature. African Affairs 86, 111-116.
• Richards, P. 1987. Africa in the music of Samuel Coleridge-Taylor. Africa 57(4), 566-571
• Richards, P. 1987. Upland and swamp rice farming systems in Sierra Leone: an evolutionary transition? In: B.L. Turner II and S.B. Brush (Eds.). Comparative farming systems. Guilford Press. pp. 156-187.
• Richards, P. 1989. Doing what comes naturally: ecological inventiveness in African rice farming. In: R. E. Johannes (Ed.). Traditional Ecological Knowledge: A Collection of Essays, IUCN, 51-56.
• Richards, P. 1989. Agriculture as a performance. In R. Chambers, A. Pacey and L. Thrupp (Eds.), Farmer First: Farmer Innovation and Agricultural Research. London: Intermediate Technology, pp. 39-42.
• Richards, P. 1990. Local strategies for coping with hunger: central Sierra Leone and northern Nigeria compared. African Affairs 89(355), 265-275.
• Richards, P. 1992. Saving the rainforest? Contested futures in conservation. In: S. Wallman. Contemporary futures: Perspectives from Social Anthropology.
• Richards, P. 1992. Landscapes of dissent: Ikale and Ikaje country, 1870-1950. In: J.F. Aye Ayadi and J.D.Y. Peel. People and Empires in African History: Essays in Memory of Michael Crowder. Longman, London.
• Richards, P. 1993. Cultivation: knowledge or performance? In Hobart, M .(ed). An Anthropological Critique of Development: the Growth of Ignorance. London, Routledge, 61–78
• Richards, P. 1993. Natural symbols and natural history: Chimpanzees, elephants and experiments in Mende thought. In: K. Milton (ed.). Environmentalism: The View from Anthropology. Routledge.
• Richards, P. 1995. Rebellion in Liberia and Sierra Leone: a crisis of youth? In: O.W. Furley (ed.). Conflict in Africa, I.B. Tauris: London.
• Richards, P. 1995. The versatility of the poor: indigenous wetland management systems in Sierra Leone. GeoJournal 35(2), 197–203.
• Richards, P. 1995. Participatory Rural Appraisal: a quick and dirty critique. PLA Notes. 24, 13-16.
• Richards, P., Guyer, J. 1996. The invention of biodiversity: social perspectives on the management of biological variety in Africa'. Africa 66(1).
• Richards, P. 1996. Culture and community values in the selection and maintenance of African rice. In: S. Brush & Doreen Stabinsky, eds., Valuing local knowledge: indigenous people and intellectual property rights. Island Press, Washington DC.
• Richards, P. & Ruivenkamp, G. 1996. New tools for conviviality: social shaping of biotechnology. In: P. Descola & G. Palsson, eds. Nature and society: anthropological perspectives.
• Richards, P. 1996. Agrarian creolization: the ethnobiology, history, culture and politics of West African rice. In: R. Ellen and K. Fukui, Eds. Redefining nature: Ecology, culture and domestication, 291–318.
• Richards. P. 1997. Toward an African Green Revolution?: An Anthropology of Rice Research in Sierra Leone. In E. Nyerges, ed., The Ecology of Practice: Studies of Food Crop Production in Sub-Saharan West Africa. Newark: Gordon & Breach.
• Peters, K. & Richards, P. 1998. Why we fight : Voices of youth combatants in Sierra Leone. Africa 68(2), 183-210.
• Peters, K. & Richards, P. 1998. Jeunes combattants parlant de la guerre et de la paix en Sierra Leone, Cahiers d'Etudes africaines
  Cahiers d'Études africaines
  The Cahiers d'Études africaines is an international and interdisciplinary academic journal covering topics in the social sciences as relating to Africa, the West Indies, and Black Africa. The journal publishes miscellaneous issues and essays covering recent trends in research and field theory and...
  
  150-152, 581-617.
• Richards, P. 1999. New political violence in Africa: secular sectarianism in Sierra Leone. GeoJournal 47, 433-442.
• Richards, P. 1999. "Casting seeds to the four winds: a modest proposal for plant genetic diversity management", in Posey, D.A. (ed) Cultural and Spiritual Values of Biodiversity, Nairobi & London: UNEP & IT Publications.
• Richards, P. 2000. Chimpanzees as political animals in Sierra Leone. J. Knight, Natural Enemies: People-wildlife Conflicts in Anthropological Perspective. Routledge.
• Richards, P. A Pan-African Composer? Coleridge-Taylor and Africa. Black Music Research Journal 21,
• Archibald, S. & Richards, P. 2002. Converts to human rights? Popular debate about war and justice in rural central Sierra Leone. Africa 72(3), 339-367.
• Richards, P. and C. Vlassenroot. 2002. Les guerres africaines du type fleuve Mano: pour une analyse sociale. Politique Africaine 88, 13-26.
• Richards. P. 2002. “Green Book Millenarians? The Sierra Leone War from the Perspective of an Anthropology of Religion.” In Niels Kastfelt, ed., Religion and Civil War in Africa, London: C. Hurst.
• Archibald, S. & Richards, P. 2002. Seeds and rights: new approaches to post-war agricultural rehabilitation in Sierra Leone. Disasters 26(4, 356-67.
• Richards, P. 2002. Militia conscription in Sierra Leone: recruitment of young fighters in an African war. Comparative Social Research 20, 255-276.
• Richards, P. 2005. War as smoke and mirrors: Sierra Leone 1991-2, 1994-5, 1995-6. Anthropological Quarterly 78(2), 377-402.
• Richards, P. 2006. An accidental sect: How war made belief in Sierra Leone. Review of African Political Economy 33(110), 651 - 663.
• Richards, P. 2006. The history and future of African rice. Food security and survival in a West African war zone. Afrika Spectrum 41(1), 77-93.
• Richards, P. 2006. Young men and gender in war and post-war reconstruction: some comparative findings from Liberia and Sierra Leone. In I. Bannon and Maria Correia, eds., The other half of gender: men’s issues in development, Washington : World Bank, pp. 195-218.
• Richards, P. 2007. How does participation work? Deliberation and performance in African food security. IDS Bulletin 38(5), 21-35.
• Richards, P. 2007. The emotions at war: a musicological approach to understanding atrocity in Sierra Leone. In Perri 6, S. Radstone, C. Squire & A. Treacher, (eds.), Public emotions. Basingstoke: Palgrave.
• Peters, K. & Richards, P. 2007. Understanding recent African wars, Africa 77(3), 442-454.
• Richards, P. 2007. “Is a right to technology an antidote to war?” In G. Frerks & B. Goldwijk (eds.) New human security challenges: alternative discourses. Wageningen: Wageningen University Press.
• Richards, P. 2010. A Green Revolution from below? Retirement address, Wageningen University

External links

• http://www.ucl.ac.uk/anthropology/staff/p_richards/index
• http://www.tad.wur.nl/UK/People/faculty/Paul/