Redistributive Land Reform Research Articles

Revisiting Enduring Labour Questions and Social Reproduction Dynamics in Rural Zimbabwe’s Post Land Reform Context: Implications on Citizen Welfare and Wellbeing

Enduring agrarian labour questions and social reproduction dynamics in former settler colonies like Zimbabwe have always been a subject of much scholarly interest. Two decades after Zimbabwe’s controversial fast track land reform programme (FTLRP), the agrarian labour questions and social reproduction dynamics are receiving renewed attention. This is partly attributable to an uneasy political transition, neo-liberal economic trajectories, and the perceived reversals of the policies of the Robert Mugabe administration. With these changes occurring, questions are arising on how this is implicating on agrarian labour and social reproduction in the resettlement areas created by the FTLRP. In a context of trying to understand the outcomes of land and agrarian reform framed within the transformative social policy conceptual framework, this article explores emergent agrarian labour and social reproduction dynamics in the two rural districts of Goromonzi and Zvimba in rural Zimbabwe. Using an interpretive research paradigm and a mixed methods research approach, the study elicited responses from 200 small to medium scale farmers who are beneficiaries of the FTLRP. Arguing from the position that land and agrarian reforms are an overlooked vector of social policy, the article investigated the extent to which the FTLRP has facilitated the creation of employment opportunities, enhanced the productive and reproductive capacities of land reform beneficiaries, enabled wealth distribution and improved rural livelihoods. The article shows that despite the emergent capitalist trajectories and the continued super exploitation of labour reminiscent of the settler colonial era, empirical field-based evidence suggests that redistributive land reform has contributed to socio-economic transformation and enhanced citizens welfare and wellbeing. This is shown as having been evident in the realm of agrarian labour and social reproduction.

Chromite Mining Cooperatives, Tribute Mining Contracts, and Rural Livelihoods in Zimbabwe, 1985–2021

Transnational corporations dominated chromite mining in Zimbabwe for the entire colonial period. However, the postcolonial period witnessed a gradual but significant shift toward small-scale and artisanal mining as liberalisation led to the informalisation of the mining sector. This chapter examines the impulses in the transformation of the chromite mining sector in the postcolonial period and the rise and development of chromite mining cooperatives since the 1980s. In particular, it analyses the impact of tribute mining arrangements on the emergence and growth of chromite mining cooperatives in Zimbabwe. The chapter argues that while tribute mining arrangements engendered the development and growth of mining cooperatives, the contracts also created an asymmetrical and exploitative relationship between cooperatives and large-scale mining companies that owned mining claims that they sublet to cooperatives. The chapter also considers the effects of Zimbabwe’s redistributive land reform programme and Chinese participation in artisanal and small-scale mining on mining cooperatives. Overall, the chapter analyses the effects of the liberalisation of the mining sector in Zimbabwe and the centrality of mining cooperatives in the interface between large- and small-scale chromite mining.

A politicized ecology of resilience

Abstract Brazil has endured multiple political, economic, and environmental crises—and now the COVID-19 pandemic—which have drawn social inequalities into razor sharp relief. This contribution analyzes the resilience of rural families facing these crises in southern Bahia. These families have benefited from various redistributive policies over the years, including redistributive land reforms (RLRs), conditional cash transfers (CCTs), and recent emergency aid (EA) payments related to the pandemic. Each (re)distributive approach involves different notions of distributive justice informed by competing background theories of “the good,” which hold implications for concepts of resilience. Drawing on long-term research with RLR communities in Bahia, this article considers the gains achieved by different redistributive programs. Families who acquired land through RLR projects appear more resilient, especially in the face of crisis.

Redistributive land reform policy and women nutritional status in Zimbabwe

Based on a nationally representative sample of 12,119 households surveyed in 2018, the study sought to analyse the impact of Zimbabwe's redistributive land reform policy on women's nutritional status. It focused on the minimum dietary diversity for women (MDD-W) in rural smallholder farming households and tested the hypothesis that improving access to adequate and better-quality agricultural land enhances the diversity and increases the availability of food, which in turn ensures better nutritional outcomes for the household. Using Endogenous Switching Regression (ESR) modelling, the study found that diets consumed by women in rural smallholder farming households in Zimbabwe lack adequate diversity (MDD-W = 0.35); with MDD-W being marginally higher for land reform beneficiaries (MDD-W = 0.38) compared to non-beneficiaries (MDD-W = 0.35). However, average treatment estimation suggested that the implementation of the FTLRP has not positively impacted MDD-W as anticipated. This implies that land reform beneficiaries did not exhibit any superior nutritional outcomes compared to non-beneficiaries. Female members of the household need to be empowered with relevant nutritional education on the importance of consuming nutrient-rich foods and diversified diets. It is not enough for public policy to just emphasise on poverty reduction and attainment of food security; it is imperative that appropriate agrarian reform policy strategies are put in place to enhance the delivery of critical support services such as agricultural extension, credit and social protection, which have proven to have significant impact on the nutritional status of women of reproductive age in land reform areas. The land reform beneficiaries should be encouraged to build strong social capital through engaging in social networking activities, which enhance sharing of nutrition-sensitive information.

Important Policy Parameters for the Development of Inclusive Digital Agriculture: Implications for the Redistributive Land Reform Program in South Africa

The creation and deployment of digital technologies throughout the agro-food system contribute to achieving Sustainable Development Goal nine. However, various digitalization studies offer limited insight into the policy issues and solutions around emerging technologies and big data systems in agriculture. There is a need for an additional understanding of how agricultural policymaking should respond to the usage of digital technologies in the agri-food sector. Furthermore, evidence is limited on how existing agricultural government programs such as land reform can be linked with digitalization policy. This systematic review of literature sought to determine the transformation that is needed in the political and economic environment for the digital revolution to take place within South African land reform agriculture. A thematic analysis of data sampled from ProQuest Central, Scopus, Dimensions, and Google Scholar reveals five areas of intervention from agricultural policymaking. The digital revolution in agriculture can be brought about by transforming digital infrastructure, data interoperability and governance, digital markets, the compatibility of government incentives with the private sector, and the digital cultural landscape. This essay contributes to agricultural policy and decision-making dialogues that pay attention to digital technologies and land reform programs in South Africa.

Land, caste and tenancy: understanding the origins and effects of absentee landlordism in the changing context

ABSTRACT India is witnessing a transition in policy perspective from the creation of peasant proprietorship to tenancy liberalisation as a part of market friendly land reforms in contrast with state-led redistributive land reforms. The proposed market friendly reforms are more oriented towards landlord interests compared with landless tenants and agricultural labourers. This justifies the historical unjust and unfair forms of the process of accumulation. The present article, by explicitly considering the case of tenancy liberalisation, argues that the policy absolves the problem of widening socio-economic inequalities and abstains from addressing the issues of absentee landlordism. The research maps evidence of the concentration of land with the feature of absenteeism amongst dominant castes and fallowisation. Hence, a case is made for enabling land ownership by the cultivator in order to achieve equity, efficiency and sustainability in agriculture.

Do partial land rights increase productivity and investment? evidence from the redistributive land reform in post–world war II Japan

There are inconclusive findings on the causal effect of land reform and its crucial channels in the development economics literature. One challenge is to separate the channels, through which land rights operate. This study examines the impact of redistributive land reform in post–World War II Japan on agricultural productivity and investments. This reform imposed a ceiling on landholdings, redistributed above‐ceiling farmland from landlords to tenants, and severely restricted the transferability of redistributed farmland. Thus, we can focus on the tenure security effect (not the tradability and pledgeability effects) as one probable channel. Using rice‐farm panel data before and after the reform (i.e., 1947 and 1948), we exploit the variation in the reform implementation across tenants. The land reform had little effect on total factor productivity and investment in the subsequent season. Our results suggest that the security dimension of land rights alone does not increase short‐run agricultural productivity.

One Land Reform, Two Groups of Farmers in One Sugar Estate: A Case of Mkwasine

This study highlights how redistributive land reform in Mkwasine Sugar Estate created two groups of farmers in the same estate. The first group-the Chipiwa Settlement Scheme (CSS) was introduced in 1982 and the second groupthe ‘A2 sugarcane farmers’ scheme, in the year 2005 and beyond. This creation has culminated into tensions and conflict between the two groups to this day. Using both primary and secondary data the study explores how the two groups of farmers were established in the estate. Study findings indicate that the CSS was more ordered than the A2 scheme which was introduced in response to the restlessness of war veterans and landless peasants over the slow pace of land reform in the first decade of independence. Findings furher indicate that the CSS farmers had sugarcane farming skills as well as experience as compared to some of the beneficiaries of the A2 scheme. The study recommends fair treatment by the government of both groups of farmers and that the former be allocated the same sizes of land or more than was given to the latter.

Structural transformation and inequality: The case of South Korea

This paper examines the relationship between structural transformation and inequality in South Korea from 1963 to 1990. We quantify the impact of structural change, age structure, employment and wage structure, and the distribution of farmland on income inequality. We find that the relatively equal initial distribution of farmland due to an extensive redistributive land reform undertaken in the 1950s significantly constrained subsequent income inequality. Structural change through the reallocation of labor out of agriculture contributed to rising income inequality. By contrast, a greater female labor force participation rate in non-agriculture, and a lower share of the working-age population reduced household income inequality.

The social and cultural dynamics of Zimbabwe’s land reform programme on the ‘new generation’ of farmers: a transformative social policy perspective

ABSTRACT This article examines the socio-cultural dynamics of redistributive land reform on the ‘new generation’ after Zimbabwe’s fast track land reform programme (FTLRP). Firstly, using the transformative social policy conceptual framework (TSP) as a heuristic and evaluative tool, it makes a conceptual contribution that land and agrarian reforms are a social policy instrument that can transform the welfare and wellbeing of citizens. This marks a departure from conservative ideologies and doctrines on welfare which have seen social policies having a neo-liberal orientation which wrongly assume that the welfare needs of citizens are met through the market. Secondly, it presents field-based evidence which shows that for the new generation, land reform has transformed socio-economic and cultural relations while enhancing their productive capacities. The article is informed by data which was gathered from Goromonzi District. It employed an interpretive research paradigm and a qualitative life history approach which entailed the use of several data-gathering instruments. Findings suggest that in addition to the generational transfer of land, there are some outcomes of the FTLRP which have not been subjected to rigorous empirical interrogation. Due to the FTLRP, it shows that in the resettlement areas; cultures, rituals and traditions are being undertaken by the new generation. These practices are of sentimental, symbolic and practical significance creating a bond and sense of identity between resettled households and the land. From a TSP perspective, it can be shown that access to land has had multiple-interrelated outcomes which include production, reproduction, protection, redistribution and social cohesion outcomes.

Rural Azerbaijan through Quantitative and Qualitative Research Lenses: Debating the Transition to Small Farm Capitalism

AbstractThis article examines agrarian relations in post‐Soviet Azerbaijan after redistributive land reforms. We argue that the reforms failed to establish small‐farm capitalism on former collective and state farm land. Commodity production in rural Azerbaijan is characterized by increasing concentration of land and capital, and the recipients of the privatized land shares procure livelihoods not through commercial farming, but through a combination of strategies—including wages, remittances from migrant relatives, and subsistence agriculture. This study is based on the combination of state statistics, government reports, and local ethnography—in‐depth interviews with land reform administrators and with rural residents in six diverse villages from two distinct regions of Azerbaijan. Previous studies of post‐Soviet transition in rural Azerbaijan reported different results of the land reforms. A quantitative account based on the state statistics reported a postreform countryside where small farmers, former collective and state laborers, live off their privatized land shares and increase agricultural productivity. A qualitative account based on local ethnography suggested that the privatized land shares play a marginal role in the livelihoods of local residents. We show how the discrepancy is illusory and stems from an erroneous, legal definition of “small farms” used in the state statistics, which conflates socially distinct categories of land use. When the statistical terms are put into their social context, the quantitative data confirm the qualitative findings.

Labour after Land Reform: The Precarious Livelihoods of Former Farmworkers in Zimbabwe

ABSTRACTWhat happens to labour when major redistributive land reform restructures a system of settler colonial agriculture? This article examines the livelihoods of former farmworkers on large‐scale commercial farms who still live in farm compounds after Zimbabwe's land reform. Through a mix of surveys and in‐depth biographical interviews, four different types of livelihood are identified, centred on differences in land access. These show how diverse, but often precarious, livelihoods are being carved out, representing the ‘fragmented classes of labour’ in a restructured agrarian economy. The analysis highlights the tensions between gaining new freedoms, notably through access to land, and being subject to new livelihood vulnerabilities. The findings are discussed in relation to wider questions about the informalization of the economy and the role of labour and employment in a post‐settler agrarian economy, where the old ‘farmworker’ label no longer applies.

Redistributive Land Reform and Structural Change in Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan

AbstractRedistributive land reforms implemented in post‐WWII Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan have often been considered a substantial stimulus for these countries’ subsequent economic growth. Before the reforms, there were a small number of large landlords and many small tenant cultivators, but after the reforms, tenancy effectively disappeared. This article assesses the impact of reforms on structural change and income per capita, and shows that reforms were responsible for at least half of the actual reallocation of labor out of agriculture in each of these countries in the aftermath of the reforms. By contrast, their impact on income per capita was small.

Beyond the market? New agrarianism and cooperative farmland access in North America

As land and wealth are increasingly concentrated in North America, grassroots organizations are calling into question longstanding norms about the relationships between private property, sustainable agriculture, land governance institutions, and ongoing processes of agrarian transformation. In response to challenges faced by new entrants to agriculture in accessing farmland oriented towards localized and alternative food systems, advocates for farmland protection and cooperative land access point to the potential for community-based land reform to support sustainable land use while promoting social and political equity – areas where they argue an economic system based on individual ownership of farmland has failed. Based on the principles of “new agrarianism,” community-based farmland access initiatives are experimenting with new forms and practices of cooperative and shared land tenure, as an alternative to a state-led model of redistributive land reform based on individual property rights. We analyze here the results of a participatory research project conducted with a cooperative and community-based land trust and land access program in British Columbia, Canada. We assess the efficacy of the community farms program as a potential mechanism to spark a new phase of agrarian transition that can reverse farmland consolidation and support socially and ecologically embedded land relations, as a structural context for food sovereignty in North America. Specifically, we argue that the community foodlands trust movement can be viewed an insurgent – but fundamentally constrained – “people's enclosure” within a corporate land regime.

Changing Forms of Wage Labour in Zimbabwe’s New Agrarian Structure

This essay examines the changing nature of farm wage labour in the context of the extensive redistributive land reform since 2000. Using field research from two districts in Zimbabwe with contrasting agro-ecology and socio-economic patterns, it shows that agrarian wage labour is not the preserve of large-scale capitalist farms (LSCFs), which it is usually associated with. The new agrarian structure dominated by the peasantry not only employs an expanded base of unpaid family labourers, but also employs ‘informal’ wage labour whose character and conditions of employment are qualitatively different from the full and part-time labour of the past. Yet, there is continuation of the super-exploitation of agrarian wage labourers that is reflected by the payment of poor wages and differing degrees of the institution of the residential labour tenancy in both the old and new farm compounds. Landlessness and/or land shortage continues to be a key characteristic of farm wage labourers as in the past suggesting the persistence of the labour reserve dynamic.

A coup foretold: Fernando Lugo and the lost promise of agrarian reform in Paraguay

AbstractThis paper offers a political economy interpretation of the “parliamentary coup” that took place in Paraguay in June 2012. It situates this analysis in the wider historical context of the protracted transition to democracy between 1989 and 2008, the rural class structure of the country, the changing character of contemporary agro‐extractive capitalism, and the long‐standing class struggle for redistributive land reform. By examining the Paraguayan agrarian reform impasse under the short‐lived government of Fernando Lugo (2008–2012) through an “interactive state/society” framework, this paper attempts to locate the sources of current social and political conflict in the country, and the demands of rival social groups. In doing so, the paper argues that the rise and fall of Lugo occurred in the context of structural legacies from the Stroessner era (1954–1989) that have remained largely unchanged and that coexist today with an expanding agro‐extractivist development model. They lead to the conceptualization of the continued “predatory” or “oligarchic” state in the country.

Gender discrimination in land ownership and the alleviation of women’s poverty in Nigeria

In Nigeria, gender roles are manifested in social rights and entitlements in a form which denies women equal economic and political empowerment and, in particular, women right to own land. The consequence of gender discrimination in land ownership is women’s lack of access to land which constitutes a major source and means of wealth creation and economic empowerment, hence women’s vulnerability to poverty. This article considers a land redistribution reform which can address the discrimination against women in land ownership and give women access to land for economic empowerment, thereby alleviating poverty among women in Nigeria. The article proposes that an ideal land reform in Nigeria has to fulfil three key objectives of equity, equality and productivity which the article refers to as ‘new equities’. It argues that only a redistributive land reform which integrates these ‘equities’ can adequately address gender discrimination in land ownership, ensure women’s access to land for economic empowerment and alleviate women’s poverty in Nigeria.

The profits of excludability and transferability in redistributive land reform in central Namibia

ABSTRACTPolicies which redistribute property rights to land can improve the well-being of rural households and can have overall growth effects. In many cases, however, land reforms are driven mainly by politically justified objectives. Under such circumstances, little emphasis is placed on whether and, if so, how property rights can increase productivity. Following 18 years of land reform implementation in Namibia, we evaluated 65 beneficiaries in Namibia. We assess to which degree land rights affects their farm income. The study focuses on Namibia’s two main commercial land reform instruments, namely the Farm Unit Resettlement Scheme and the Affirmative Action Loan Scheme. We find evidence that the majority of land reform projects are not profitable. Further, our study confirms the importance of the right to restrict land access compared with the right to transfer. The long-term leasehold contract seemingly provides sufficient incentives to make productive use of the land.

Bernstein's Puzzle: Peasants, Accumulation and Class Alliances in Africa

To establish the significance of Henry Bernstein's theoretical work on the dynamics of agrarian class struggles in Africa, this paper discusses two important political debates in which he has been both observer and participant, and that have oriented much of the subsequent Marxist work done in Africa on agrarian change. The first was the heated discussion begun over 40 years ago around Nyerere's ‘African socialism’ and the failures of the ujamaa policy of villagization. The second is the still unsettled debate around programmes of redistributive land reform in South Africa. Bernstein's distinction between the peasantry and petty commodity production allowed him to apply Lenin's theory of peasant differentiation to new contexts, and to locate African class struggles within the contradictions between capital and labour. He thus disposed of two competing visions: the harmonic peasant community and the maximizing entrepreneurial peasant hindered by the absence of markets. Yet, this paper argues, his focus on class formation within the peasantry can also limit our understanding of class alliances in the politics of anti‐capitalist struggles in Africa.

The environmental implications of redistributive land reform

Ownership of land is important for a number of reasons. One reason is the agenda-setting role the landowner has in terms of its use, which in turn has an impact on the environment. Environmental law plays a role in regulating the use of land, as do other devices such as planning law and private law controls including the law of nuisance. In the absence of such regulation the decisions of the owner are crucial. Land reform, by which it is meant the process that is geared towards the reallocation of property rights, either: changes who is invested with that crucial decision-making power; or influences the decision making of an existing owner, who might act in a way to negate any policy argument for reallocation of ownership. Both of these reactions can impact on the environment. How well are those impacts understood, and to what extent do they feature in the law-making process or the application of land reform measures? This article will use the contemporary Scottish scene, particularly its two land reform statutes of 2003 and 2016, to scrutinise where the environment sits in the land reform debate. This will provide an opportunity to assess the environmental implications of actual and forthcoming land reform measures where the environment has featured in a specific land reform process.