ABSTRACT
The first decade of the 2000s marked a new phase for agricultural development and rural protest in Africa. Mozambique was no exception. Significant foreign investments had initiated a new era of social and economic relationships towards development of the rural areas, but not without facing resistance from local programmes. The ProSavana programme was one of these that unleashed societal contention and was later cancelled by the government. But how were poor rural communities, considered passive and controllable by local institutions, able to stop this program? Using a qualitative research methodology that builds on field work research, this study examines how the Mozambican peasants perceived and exploited the structures of political opportunity to attain their goals and end ProSavana. This study demonstrates the innovative forms of action put forward by movement actors and reveals the roles of local and international alliances for success. Mozambican associations and NGOs in association with social movements in Japan and Brazil were able to influence the Japanese Parliament, inducing it to interrupt the financing flow to the ProSavana program. This was the real change deriving from the political dynamics within the Mozambican scenario, and sheds lights on rural protests elsewhere in Africa.
