Paper short abstract:

Detailed analysis of the social relations of coca production in one of the country’s most important coca-producing municipalities shows that capitalist market imperatives are weak within this economy.

Paper long abstract:

The illicit coca economy has become a bulwark for smallholder farming in Colombia. This article helps explain why. Detailed analysis of the social relations of coca production in one of the country’s most important coca-producing municipalities shows that capitalist market imperatives are weak within this economy. The constant pressure to increase productivity is muted by, among other factors, fluid access to land, non-interest-bearing debts, and the lack of price competition between producers. Coca-growers are ‘improving’ production, but they mostly respond to opportunities rather than imperatives, as indicated by enormous variations in yields and haphazard accounting and cost-cutting. In the context of multiple agrarian crises, the coca economy allows even less well-off producers to survive.