Land, Law and Politics in Africa


Book Description

This book offers a series of new studies on the dynamics of political and legal culture as well as of conflict management in contemporary Africa, taking inspiration from and honoring the scholarly contributions and impact of Prof. Gerti Hesseling (1946-2009) in African Studies.




The Politics of Land Reform in Africa


Book Description

Across Africa land is being commodified: private ownership is replacing communal and customary tenure; Farms are turned into collateral for rural credit markets. Law reform is at the heart of this revolution. The Politics of Land Reform in Africa casts a critical spotlight on this profound change in African land economy. The book illuminates the key role of legislators, legal consultants and academics in tenure reform. These players exert their influence by translating the economic and regulatory interests of the World Bank, civil society groups and commercial lenders in to questions of law. Drawing on political economy and actor-network theory The Politics of Land Reform in Africa is an indispensable contribution to the study of agrarian change in developing countries.




Local Politics and the Dynamics of Property in Africa


Book Description

Access to land and property is vital to people's livelihoods in rural, peri-urban, and urban areas in Africa. People exert tremendous energy and imagination to have land claims recognized as rights with a variety of political, administrative, and legal institutions. This book is dedicated to a detailed analysis of how public authority and the state are formed through debates and struggles over property in the Upper East Region of Ghana. While scarcity may indeed promote exclusivity, the evidence from this book shows that when there are many institutions competing for the right to authorize claims to land, the result of an effort to unify and clarify the law is to intensify competition among them and weaken their legitimacy. The book particularly explores how state divestiture of land in 1979 encouraged competition between customary authorities and how the institution of the earthpriest was revived. Such processes are key to understanding property and authority in Africa.




Property and Political Order in Africa


Book Description

In sub-Saharan Africa, property relationships around land and access to natural resources vary across localities, districts and farming regions. These differences produce patterned variations in relationships between individuals, communities and the state. This book captures these patterns in an analysis of structure and variation in rural land tenure regimes. In most farming areas, state authority is deeply embedded in land regimes, drawing farmers, ethnic insiders and outsiders, lineages, villages and communities into direct and indirect relationships with political authorities at different levels of the state apparatus. The analysis shows how property institutions - institutions that define political authority and hierarchy around land - shape dynamics of great interest to scholars of politics, including the dynamics of land-related competition and conflict, territorial conflict, patron-client relations, electoral cleavage and mobilization, ethnic politics, rural rebellion, and the localization and 'nationalization' of political competition.




Essays in African Land Law


Book Description




Land Law Reform in Eastern Africa : Traditional Or Transformative?


Book Description

"Introduction: The conceptual framework of the paper; PART 1: From c.1961 to c.1990:Chapter 1: An overview of the land laws at independence; Chapter 2: 1961 - c.1990: The lack of any land reform; Chapter 3: Two case studies from this era; PART 2: The era of land law reform c.1990 onwards; Chapter 4: The global intellectual climate for land law reform; Chapter 5: Zanzibar; Chapter 6: Mozambique; Chapter 7: Uganda; Chapter 8: Tanzania; Chapter 9: Somaliland; Chapter 10: Rwanda; Chapter 11: Kenya; Chapter 12: Urban planning law reform in the region; Chapter 13: Gender and land law in the region; Chapter 14:Transformational, traditional or political: the reforms assessed; Appendix; Table of principal land laws 1961- 2012; References"--




Land Law Reform in Eastern Africa: Traditional or Transformative?


Book Description

Land Law Reform in East Africa reviews development and changes in the statutory land laws of 7 countries in Eastern Africa over the period 1961 – 2011. The book is divided into two parts. Part 1 sets up the conceptual framework for consideration of the reforms, and pursues a contrast between transformational and traditional developments; where the former aim at change designed to ensure social justice in land laws, and the latter aim to continue the overall thrust of colonial approaches to land laws and land administration. Part 2 provides an in-depth and critical survey of the land law reforms introduced into each country during the era of land law reform which commenced around 1990. The overall effect of the reforms has, Patrick McAuslan argues, been traditional: it was colonial policy to move towards land markets, individualisation of land tenure and the demise of customary tenure, all of which characterise the post 1990 reforms. The culmination of over 50 years of working in this area, Land Law Reform in East Africa will be invaluable reading for scholars of land law, and of law and development more generally.




Where There is No Government


Book Description

This book discusses property rights enforcement in sub-Saharan African countries including Ghana, Kenya, and Uganda.




The Politics of Property Rights Institutions in Africa


Book Description

This book provides unique insight into the relationship of institutions that govern land rights to local and national politics in African countries.




The Politics of Land Reform in Africa


Book Description

1.Introduction --2.Contemporary land reform in Africa --3.Paying for law : the World Bank and bilateral donors --4.Making law : inside the 'law laboratory' --5.Contesting law? : gender progressive' groups and rural movements.