Major land reform programs have reallocated property in more than one-third of the world's countries in the last century and impacted over one billion people. But only rarely have these programs granted beneficiaries complete property rights. Why is this the case, and what are the consequences? This book draws on wide-ranging original data and charts new conceptual terrain to reveal the political origins of the property rights gap. It shows that land reform programs are most often implemented by authoritarian governments who deliberately withhold property rights from beneficiaries. In so doing, governments generate coercive leverage over rural populations and exert social control. This is politically advantageous to ruling governments but it has negative development consequences: it slows economic growth, productivity, and urbanization and it exacerbates inequality. The book also examines the conditions under which subsequent governments close property rights gaps, usually as a result of democratization or foreign pressure.
Author(s): Michael Albertus
Series: Cambridge Studies in Comparative Politics
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Year: 2021
Cover
Half-title page
Series page
Title page
Copyright page
Contents
List
of Figures
List of
Tables
Acknowledgments
1 Introduction
1.1 Conceptualizing the Property Rights Gap
1.2 The Radical Shift in Property Rights in Latin America over the Last Century
1.3 Three Canonical Paths of Property Rights Gaps
1.4 Measuring the Property Rights Gap
1.5 Framing the Puzzle: Property Rights, Development, and Land Reform
1.6 Existing Explanations for the Underprovision of Property Rights
1.7 Reexamining the Political Origins of the Property Rights Gap
1.8 Consequences of Property Rights Gaps
1.9 Roadmap of the Book
2 Conceptualizing and Measuring the Property Rights Gap
2.1 The Dramatic Evolution of Property Rights in Latin America
2.2 Identifying and Defining Relevant Dimensions of Property Rights
2.3 Data Sources for Land Reform and Property Rights
2.4 Constructing the Property Rights Gap
2.5 Conclusion
3 The Political Origins of the Property Rights Gap
3.1 Prevailing Explanations for the Underprovision of Property Rights
3.2 Political Determinants of Redistributive Land Reform
3.3 Generating a Property Rights Gap: Granting Property without Rights
3.4 Closing the Property Rights Gap: Granting Property Rights without Property
3.5 Connecting the Theory to the Three Canonical Paths of Property Rights Gaps
3.6 Conclusion
4 Evidence on the Rise and Fall of Property Rights Gaps in Latin America
4.1 Research Design and Measurement Strategy
4.2 Political and Economic Patterns Tied to the Property Rights Gap
4.3 Statistical Analyses of the Property Rights Gap
4.4 Observable Implications: Cognate Policies of Rural Control and Strategic Rural Targeting
4.5 Conclusion
5 Consequences of the Property Rights Gap
5.1 Social and Economic Consequences of the Property Rights Gap
5.2 Political Consequences of the Property Rights Gap
5.3 Illustrative Consequences of the Property Rights Gap in Path A, Path B, and Path C Cases
5.4 Conclusion
6 Opening and Closing a Property Rights Gap in Peru
6.1 Case Selection for Subnational Analysis
6.2 The Generation of a Property Rights Gap in Peru
6.3 Closing the Property Rights Gap after the End of Land Reform
6.4 Conclusion
7 The Long-Term Consequences of Peru’s Property Rights Gap
7.1 Making Use of Peru’s Agrarian Reform Zones for Causal Identification
7.2 Data
7.3 Research Design
7.4 Investigating Estimation and Identification Assumptions
7.5 The Property Rights Gap and Development Outcomes
7.6 Alternative Explanations
7.7 Conclusion
8 Property Rights Gaps around the World
8.1 The Nature of Property Rights Gaps around the World since 1900
8.2 Conditions Linked to Opening and Closing Property Rights Gaps around the World since 1900
8.3 Case Studies
8.4 Conclusion
9 Conclusion
9.1 Reinterpreting Long-Term Political and Economic Development in Latin America
9.2 Limitations to the Property Rights Paradigm and a New Rights Agenda in Land
9.3 Property Rights and the Rise of Markets
Appendix A:
Regression Tables for Chapter 4
Appendix B:
Regression Tables for Chapter 5
Appendix C:
Regression Tables for Chapter 7
References
Index
