Gender and land dispossession: a comparative analysis

Abstract

This paper seeks to advance our understanding of the gendered implications of land dispossession. It does so through a comparative analysis of five cases of rural land dispossession driven by different economic purposes in diverse agrarian contexts: the English enclosures; colonial and post-colonial rice irrigation projects in The Gambia; large dams in India; oil palm cultivation in Indonesia; and special economic zones in India. The paper first identifies some of the very common gendered effects of dispossession. In each case, it shows that land dispossession reproduced women’s lack of independent land rights or reversed them where they existed, intensified household reproductive work and occurred without meaningful consultation with – much less decision-making by – rural women. The paper secondly demonstrates ways in which the gendered consequences of land dispossession vary across forms of dispossession and agrarian milieux. The most important dimension of this variation is the effect of land loss on the gender division of labour, which is often deleterious but varies qualitatively across the cases examined. The paper also illustrates important variation within dispossessed populations as gender intersects with class, caste and other inequalities. The paper concludes that land dispossession consistently contributes to gender inequality, albeit in socially and historically specific ways. So while defensive struggles against land dispossession will not in themselves transform patriarchal social relations, they may be a pre-condition for more offensive struggles for gender equality.