The objectives of this study, first published in 1982, are to elaborate a micro-economic model which adequately explains the interrelationships among economic forces determining the distribution of income in a peasant economy in the early stages of transition to industrialization. It also examines the development of the ‘dual economy’, an economy composed of a large peasant agricultural sector with its ancillary handicraft sector, both traditional in techniques and institutions, and a small but growing modern industrial sector.