Dispossession by neglect: Agricultural land sales in Southern India

Active land markets in the periphery of Chennai have resulted in large tracts of agricultural land being bought by non‐agricultural actors seeking returns primarily from speculation. We argue in this paper that the financialization of land and consequent spurt of agricultural land sales are central to what scholars have termed land grab. Recent literature on land grabs has focused primarily on processes of accumulation by dispossession and the coercive role of the state. Our contention is that land grabs more commonly occur due to the state underinvesting in agriculture, resulting in “dispossession by neglect” of especially marginal and small farmers. Dispossession by neglect better captures the fluid boundary between the coercive and voluntary in contemporary land grabs.     

Review Essay: Land,Labour and Agrarian Transition in Vietnam

Martin Ravallion and Dominique van de Walle argue that growing landlessness in Vietnam is a function of people capitalizing on the higher returns to education witnessed in wage labour when compared with farming. So, growing landlessness is a sign of economic success. This review argues that Ravallion and van de Walle misconstrue landlessness, misinterpret the associated data and downplay the constraints facing rural Vietnamese. In so doing, they fail to capture the complex realities of Vietnam's agrarian transition.     

From Covert to Overt: Everyday Peasant Politics in China and the Implications for Transnational Agrarian Movements

This contribution spotlights overt collective action as the form of everyday peasant politics in post-socialist China. It first considers the interlinking in the post-socialist period of global neoliberal capitalism and internal (so-called) primitive accumulation by corrupt officials and eager entrepreneurs. Against this background it examines the collective protests of the last 20 years, focusing first on the issue of corrupt local power and then on land seizures. It argues that the emergence of sustained rural contention has been informed by China's socialist legacy as well as older peasant ideologies, and it has involved the coalescence of a shared class perspective among the poor and dispossessed. The final portion of the article considers the implications of these everyday peasant politics, especially land struggles, for transnational agrarian movements.     

Agrarian change through speculation: Rural elites as land brokers for mining in Colombia

This paper studies the connections between the expansion of mining capital, speculative forms of land grabbing and agrarian transformation. It is argued that in periods of commodity boom, the landowning rural elite benefits from mining through speculative land deals with mining companies. They act as ‘land brokers’ for the mining firms, helping them to overcome a significant barrier to land accumulation through the de facto abolition of landed property. The analysis is based on a qualitative case study on the expansion of coal mining in central Cesar in northern Colombia. To develop my arguments, I refer to the concept of accumulation by dispossession as defined by Michael Levien, and historical materialist approaches on rent, and speculative land dispossession. In addition, I use concepts developed for studying coercive land grabbing and agrarian elite participation in armed conflicts to analyse the mechanisms applied to (coercively) acquire rights to land. It is concluded that with high global prices for minerals, metals and fossil fuels, the expansion of mining in the countryside fosters a process of agrarian change through land speculation that is articulated in a reconcentration of landed property, a re-strengthening of the rural landowning elite and the dissolution of peasant agriculture.     

论土地利用/土地覆盖变化驱动力研究

驱动力研究是土地利用/土地覆盖变化(LUCC)研究的重要组成部分,意义重大。在论述土地利用/土地覆盖变化驱动力研究内容的基础上,对国内外的驱动力研究现状及研究方法进行了初步总结,并提出了目前土地利用/土地覆盖变化驱动力研究中应该注意的几个关键问题。     

西方农地法的特点及启示

西方农地管理有着丰富的经验和有力的法律基础.本文立足于我国实行最严格的土地管理制度,在系统总结西方,尤其是欧洲农地法特点的基础上,采用比较分析的方法,对我国土地资源管理法律建设的重点问题进行了探索.研究表明,政府对农地最终处置权的享有、区域规划的突出地位、农地转让及农场规模的控制以及可持续发展思想的充分体现是西方农地法的主要特点.这些特点给了我们以下一些启示:①应加强区域规划和土地利用规划相互关系的研究;②积极探索农地管理的市场机制及其实现形式;③重视我国农地取得方式问题和农地细碎化现象;④及时将农地保护以数量保护为主转变为农地的数量、质量和生态环境保护并重的三维保护体系.     

Agrarian Change and Privatization of Ejido Land in Northern Mexico

This paper uses the findings of a 1999 case study of ejidos (collective landholdings) in the Yaqui Valley, Sonora, a prominent agricultural region of northwest Mexico, to examine responses to a series of economic and legal reforms enacted as part of Mexico's 'Reform of the Countryside', which began in the late 1980s. In particular, it analyses reactions to the 1992 amendment to Article 27 of Mexico's Constitution, which legalized the rental and sale of previously inalienable ejido land and created programmes and institutions to officially certify ejido members' land rights. The paper concludes that the complex of economic and legal reforms – combined with the specificities of Sonoran agriculture – has generated a visible change in ejidos with respect to land operation, setting the stage for an accelerated shift towards the privatization of agricultural land in northern Mexico.     

Knowledge and Control in the Contemporary Land Rush: Making Local Land Legible and Corporate Power Applicable in Rural Sierra Leone

Substantial media and academic attention has recently focused on changing patterns of land control in the ‘Global South’, wherein foreign governments and corporations seek to control land for food, fuel and feed production. Recent scholarship describes such projects as symptomatic of a broader liberalization of global governance. However, few studies investigate how such liberal governance is applied on the ground in host countries. This paper fills this need by examining one such case in Sierra Leone, and describing the various technologies of control deployed to make local land legible to the corporate eye and therefore manageable within the liberal model. As I show, such imported technologies are disrupting and displacing traditional modes of authority and allowing the company concerned to apply power and manage both the land and the local people. At the same time, however, these technologies generate frictions on the ground, creating dangerous tensions between the various actors in the local setting.     

Repossession,Re‐informalization and Dispossession: The ‘Muddy Terrain’ of Land Commodification in Turkey

This paper examines the process of land commodification in the commercialization of agriculture and housing in Turkey. Specific mechanisms involved include cadastre modernization, land titling, land registration and land‐consolidation schemes. Through these techniques, the state increases its control over common‐public lands, reconfigures land‐use and access patterns, and deepens commodification. The paper traces historical variation in land use from the national developmentalist to the neoliberal phases of capital accumulation in Turkey, with comparative, contextual examples drawn from the Ottoman Empire. It highlights the combined and socio‐spatially differentiated processes of commodification across sectors that engender a multiplicity of outcomes in simultaneously framing commercialization of agriculture and housing. Contextual analysis of official documents and histories is complemented by information gathered from fieldwork and in‐depth interviews in several former wheat‐cultivating villages, a former gecekondu neighbourhood, and a small agricultural town in the province of Ankara.     

Agrarian Change under Globalization: Markets and Insecurity in Turkish Agriculture

This paper argues that deepening commodification in Turkish agriculture has changed the lives of farmers in significant ways. Global circuits have swept away the accustomed networks of information, production and marketing which had been largely established and maintained by comprehensive governmental support policies. New institutions have come into the picture establishing the links between small producers and larger markets. With state policy strengthening the domination of the market, prices and demand patterns fluctuate widely leaving small producers vulnerable to market forces and raising the level of risk and insecurity. This situation brings about a rapid de‐ruralization of the population in most regions of the country. In the fertile coastal strip of the southern and western provinces, however, commercial opportunities introduced by global circuits have led to a thriving market in products, land, and labour. Farming of vegetables and fruits for domestic and European markets dominate agricultural production. Seasonal employment, in tourism and in labour‐intensive crops, supplement household incomes, permitting the rural population to remain in the countryside.     

Foreignization,Financialization and Land Grab Regulation

The global rush for land has provoked diverse policy responses from host countries. While some governments are facilitating ‘land grabs’ within their borders, others have restricted land acquisitions by foreigners. Drawing from the Brazilian case, I argue that such restrictive regulations may be limited in their effectiveness because they apply a state‐centric geopolitical logic to a threat that is largely de‐territorialized and financialized. The Brazilian government reacted to fears about land grabbing by reinstating a legal framework from the 1970s that focuses on the threat that foreigners pose to national sovereignty. This measure dampened international enthusiasm for Brazilian land, but it also triggered companies to begin searching for legal ways to get around the restrictions, often by exploiting the mismatch between the fungibility of global capital and the rigidity of the foreign/domestic dichotomy. I suggest that the semi‐permeability of the new restrictions may present an opportunity for the Brazilian government to balance its conflicting commitments to smallholder farmers and export‐oriented agribusiness. Regulations focused on foreign threats may be politically effective even as they impose an outdated conceptual framework on a far more complex reality.     

土地利用变化与低碳经济实现:一个分析框架

通过文献回顾和理论分析方法,建立实现低碳经济发展的土地利用变化分析框架。土地利用变化可从两条路径、三个方面实现低碳经济发展的要求,前者分别为增加碳汇用地和减少碳源用地,后者分别为农用地内部结构调整、控制农用地转为建设用地规模和建设用地布局优化。低碳经济的实现需要多学科、多方面的结合,需要自然科学和社会科学研究的综合,需要城市建设和农村发展的结合,需要技术和管理的融合。     

中国耕地动态变化与占补平衡分析

测算耕地动态转换造成的耕地质量等级变化,评估耕地动态变化对数量与质量平衡的影响。采用综合分析法、模型侧算法、实证分析法,评估耕地生产能力变化与占补平衡实施成效。研究结果表明:耕地的占补平衡仅实现了数量平衡,但因城镇建设扩张占用了优质高等耕地而新增耕地质量等级较低,因此未达到质量平衡。特别是中国依靠开发后备资源来补充耕地而不是通过土地整理来增加质量等级较高的耕地,因此新增耕地的平均自然质量等级较低。研究结论:应加大土地整理补充耕地比例,从而提高耕地平均自然质量等级,达到耕地数量与质量占补平衡。     

土地利用/覆被变化与土地利用优化调控

了解土地利用优化调控的内涵及基本模式，国内外土地利用和土地覆被变化的研究进展格趋势，对研究LUCC与我国土地利用调控的结合方式和途径具有重原意义。对此，本文作了系统的阐述并进行探讨。     

开展新一轮国土规划若干问题的探讨

建立于部门和专项规划之上的国土规划对于国家资源、经济与环境的统一管理和协调发展具有战略性的宏观指导意义。本文在分析影响国土规划内容和作用要素的基础上，从我国现阶段面临的形势出发，探讨了新一轮国土规划的地位、内容以及编制方法。最后，提出了开展新一轮国土规划的六点建议。     

平昌县土地利用动态变化分析

土地利用变化研究是生态环境变化研究的重要基础,也是规范人类行为的科学决策依据。随着人口的持续增长和社会经济的快速发展,平昌县土地利用发生了较大的变化。本文以平昌县2006~2010年土地利用统计资料为依据,利用土地利用动态度模型、土地利用程度模型、区域差异模型,对该县2006~2010年的土地利用动态变化状况进行了分析。分析结果表明：平昌县耕地、园地、林地、城乡建设用地、交通水利用地面积在增加,其他农用地、水域、自然保留地在减少;自然保留地和林地面积变化幅度相当大,变化面积分别为-2005.92hm2、937.96hm2;土地利用变化速度较快,年变化率达0.53%;土地利用程度较高,土地利用综合指数达245.18,土地利用处于发展时期;各乡镇土地利用变化区域差异显著。     

'Changing Before Our Very Eyes': Agrarian Questions and the Politics of Land in Capitalism Today

This paper endorses the criticisms of neo-classical populism and its advocacy of redistributive land reform provided by other contributions to this special issue of the Journal, to which it adds several further points. If GKI propose a version of an agrarian question of 'small' or 'family' farming, and its resolution through a familiar (Chayanovian) path of development, much of the critique rests, in one way or another, on the 'classic' agrarian question in capitalist transition, in effect the agrarian question of capital in which the agrarian question of labour was once subsumed. Here the question is posed whether, in the conditions of contemporary 'globalization' and its tendency to the 'fragmentation' of labour, there might be a new agrarian question of labour, now detached from that of capital, and which generates a new politics of struggles over land (and its distribution). Even to conceive of this question is beyond the analytical and political field of vision of neo-classical populism. Some of the dimensions of an agrarian question of labour are illustrated in a brief consideration of recent, and highly contradictory, events in Zimbabwe: a unique case of comprehensive, regime-sanctioned, confiscatory land redistribution in the world today.     

土地文化与文化土地内涵分析

土地文化与文化土地内涵丰富。土地文化类型多样,具多元性、技术性、实用性、美学性等特征。文化土地建设迫在眉睫,其建设遵循的是自组织系统观、多元价值观和高品位审美观,目的是体现土地的真实价值与美学价值。