ABSTRACT
Innumerable reasons underly peasant resistance to the state. But most immediately, peasants are a living part of ethnic reality. In the culturally untouched interior of Guinea-Bissau, cultural relations are based on ethnic precepts. The conflict that pits state against tribe is, however, spurious. It is class struggle that explains peasant attitudes, not the fact of their being Balanta or Bijago. Ethnic structures are sensitive to changes in the social system. According to Antonio Gonçalves: 'With dialectical tension between intrinsic obligations and extrinsic obligations, society constantly suffers explicit or implicit tension, which cannot be resolved by institutions devoid of content'. In forming a nation, it is essential to provide ethnic groups with the opportunity to express their aims and to incorporate them into a cohesive national ensemble. Attempts to enforce unity by ostracizing offending ethnic groups, or even to patch up the error later, have usually set back the process of forming the nation.
