ABSTRACT
Algeria's decolonisation problems were more massive yet more clear-cut than Tunisia's. Algerian land reform is intimately linked with the nationalist revolution. Land reform Algerian-style was approved by most Algerians: it seemed a logical way to offset the exodus of the European owner-managers, and it appealed to their sense of social justice, which, after eight years of bitter strife, was all-pervasive. The state, which buys most of the socialist sector output, may be the most efficient organ in the Algerian situation, but state monopsony generates problems of quality, incentive and pricing. The socialist sector constitutes a privileged class of 1 million people, distinguished by extra wealth, improved living conditions and better security of employment; it contrasts sharply with the brooding, impoverished 6 million Algerian fellahin unaffected by autogestion. Inland, the bled, the home of most fellahin, remains disinherited, and a huge denuded wasteland where rain is scarce and the wind can erode a hundred hectares of soil a day.
