Showing papers on "Leasehold estate published in 2016"

Reconsidering the links between poverty, international labour migration, and agrarian change: critical insights from Nepal

Abstract: The role of international labour migration in processes leading to the (re)production of rural poverty in the rural South continues to shape critical academic and policy debate. While many studies have established that migration provides an important pathway to rural prosperity, they insufficiently analyse the profound effects that migration and remittances have on agrarian and rural livelihoods. This article uses the case of rural Nepal, where over half of the households are involved in foreign labour migration, as a ‘window’ to understand the processes shaping how migration effects poverty. The paper analyses how migration generates outcomes across the domains of rural people's changing relationship to land and agriculture, their experience of migration, and rural labour markets to advance our arguments. First, it argues that migration leads to the commodification of land, generating changes in patterns of land uses and tenancy relations. With respect to rural people's engagement with agriculture, migra...

Off-farm work, land tenancy contracts and investment in soil conservation measures in rural Pakistan

Abstract: This study examines the impacts of participation in off-farm work and land tenancy contracts on the intensity of investment in soil-improving measures and farm productivity. A multivariate Tobit model that accounts for potential endogeneity between the intensity of investment and the off-farm work and tenancy contract variables is estimated for 341 rural households in Punjab province of Pakistan. An instrumental variable approach is also used to analyse the impact of tenancy contract and off-farm work on farm productivity. The empirical results show that participation in off-farm work and tenure security tends to increase the intensity of investment in long-term soil-improving measures. We also find that increases in off-farm work and tenure security exert significant and positive effects on farm productivity.

State-led gentrification in Hong Kong

Abstract: The specificity of Hong Kong’s gentrification trajectory reflects its urban morphology, political institutions, and social and economic structure. While continuously renewing itself economically, much of the city’s inner urban area building stock is old and functionally obsolete, whilst nevertheless providing affordable, well-located housing for lower-income and disadvantaged groups and small-scale commercial clusters. Constrained redevelopment is not the result of economic decline but rather of formidable frictions that make land assembly and vacant possession of buildings difficult. Hong Kong’s executive-led, quasi democratic government articulates with the public ownership of land and its management through the leasehold system, and leads inner-city redevelopment through the Urban Renewal Authority (URA) supported by various institutional and statutory arrangements. (Re)development is favoured because it generates significant state revenue from physical and economic intensification of sites. Although g...

The housing crisis and London

Abstract: City has, from its inception, paid close attention to London, to the ‘World City’ or ‘Global City’ ideologies underwriting its concentration of wealth and of poverty and to challenges from among its citizens to the prevailing orthodoxy. This paper focuses on London's extreme experience of the housing crisis gripping the UK—itself the European nation with the fastest long-term growth of average house prices and widest regional disparities, both driven by overblown financialisation and the privileging of rent as a means of wealth accumulation, often by dispossession. Londoners’ experiences stem partly from four decades of neo-liberal transformation and partly from accelerated financialisation in the last two decades and are now being accelerated by the imposition of ‘austerity’ on low- and middle-income people. The social relationships of tenancy in social housing, private tenancy and mortgage-financed owner-occupation are, however, divisive and the paper ends by identifying what may be the beginning of a u...

Housing in Chinese Urban Villages: The Dwellers, Conditions and Tenancy Informality

Abstract: While it is widely acknowledged that Chinese urban villages provide an important source of rental housing for low-income populations, the composition of their dwellers, housing conditions and rental contracts has not been adequately studied. Drawing from surveys of sixty urban villages in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, this study finds that housing in urban villages is more family oriented; that over half of dwellers work in the tertiary sector; and that although they have relatively stable jobs, few have job security with contracts. In predominantly rental housing, the housing unit is small. Tight control by the city government over housing development has led to quite expensive rentals measured by unit space as well as poorer housing conditions. Tenancy informality in terms of the absence of formal contracts is widespread and most severe in Shanghai. The lack of formal contracts is largely independent of the status of dwellers or their job status but is rather dependent upon the rent value.

An analysis of household farm investment decisions under varying land tenure arrangements in Ghana

Abstract: Land tenure insecurity is widely perceived as a disincentive for long-term land improvement investment hence the objective of this paper is to evaluate how tenure (in)security associated with different land use arrangements in Ghana influenced households’ plot level investment decisions and choices. The paper uses data from the Farmer-Based Organisations (FBO) survey. The FBO surveycollected informationfrom2,928householdsacross three ecologicalzones of Ghana usingmulti-stagedcluster sampling. Probit and Tobitmodels tested the effects of landtenancyandownership arrangements on households’ investment behaviour while controlling other factors. It was found that marginal farm size was inversely related to tenure insecurity while tenure insecurity correlate positively with value of farm land and not farm size. Individualownershipand documentationof land significantly reduced the probabilityof households losing uncultivated lands. Individual land ownership increased both the probability of investing and level of investments made in land improvement and irrigation probably due to increasing importance households place on land ownership. Two possible explanations for this finding are: First, that land markets and land relations have changed significantly over the last two decades with increasing money transaction and fixed agreements propelled by population growth and increasing value of land. Secondly, inclusion of irrigation investment as a long term investment in land raises the value of household investment and the time period required to reap the returns on the investments. Households take land ownership and duration of tenancy into consideration if the resource implications of land investments are relatively huge and the time dimension for harvesting returns to investments is relatively long.

Sanitation investments in Ghana: An ethnographic investigation of the role of tenure security, land ownership and livelihoods.

Abstract: Ghana’s low investment in household sanitation is evident from the low rates of improved sanitation. This study analysed how land ownership, tenancy security and livelihood patterns are related to sanitation investments in three adjacent rural and peri-urban communities in a district close to Accra, Ghana’s capital. Qualitative data was gathered for this comparative ethnographic study over seven months, (June, 2011-January, 2012) using an average of 43 (bi-weekly) participant observation per community and 56 in-depth interviews. Detailed observational data from study communities were triangulated with multiple interview material and contextual knowledge on social structures, history of settlement, land use, livelihoods, and access to and perceptions about sanitation. This study shows that the history of settlement and land ownership issues are highly correlated with people’s willingness and ability to invest in household sanitation across all communities. The status of being a stranger i.e. migrant in the area left some populations without rights over the land they occupied and with low incentives to invest in sanitation, while indigenous communities were challenged by the increasing appropriation of their land for commercial enterprises and for governmental development projects. Interview responses suggest that increasing migrant population and the high demand for housing in the face of limited available space has resulted in general unwillingness and inability to establish private sanitation facilities in the communities. The increasing population has also created high demand for cheap accommodation, pushing tenants to accept informal tenancy agreements that provided for poor sanitation facilities. In addition, poor knowledge of tenancy rights leaves tenants in no position to demand sanitation improvements and therefore landlords feel no obligation or motivation to provide and maintain domestic sanitation facilities. The study states that poor land rights, the history of settlements, in-migration and insecure tenancy are key components that are associated with local livelihoods and investments in private sanitation in rapidly changing rural and peri-urban communities of Ghana. Sanitation policy makers and programme managers must acknowledge that these profound local, ethnic and economic forces are shaping people’s abilities and motivations for sanitation investments.

Dividing Communities in South Sudan and Northern Uganda: Boundary disputes and land governance

Abstract: Many people in South Sudan and northern Uganda—like others around the world—see boundaries and borders as a potential source of clarity, security and conflict prevention. Political and economic ambitions, along with fears of discrimination or exclusion from land lead to the promotion of more rigid boundaries, both on the ground and between groups of people. The prevalence of such discourse reflects a picture first imagined by colonial officials, in which the peoples of this region live in discrete ethnic territories, organized into patrilineal descent groups and governed by their own decentralized administrations. In such a picture, it might indeed seem that demarcating clear boundaries and borders between various territories would resolve the tensions and conflicts that surround them. A different picture emerges, however, from a detailed exploration of the intricate histories and present realities of demography, ecology, liveli­hoods, social relations and land governance in South Sudan and northern Uganda. Historically, there is said to have been popular unease here with the moral and spiritual implications of trying to demarcate fixed boundaries in the soil. Moreover, transhumant pastoralism depends on negotiating access to land controlled by others, rendering the delimita­tion of clear and fixed borders impractical. Drawing boundaries between clans and tribal sections is also impossible because settlements are widely interspersed with other clans and sections. Although clans and sections are defined in a language of patrilineal kinship, they have always absorbed outsiders into their lineages and co-residential communities. Oral histories reveal the extent of migration and shifting identities. Practices of assimilation and intermarriage have worked to overcome boundaries rather than to create them. After all, being able to cross borders during recurrent wars and violent conflicts has been vital for survival. There is, however, a paradox. Greater peace in some parts of this region seems to have brought new conflict over land and boundariesThere is, however, a paradox. Greater peace in some parts of this region seems to have brought new conflict over land and boundaries in the past decade. Multiple factors are at work here, including urban­ization and uneven population densities driven by processes of return and patterns of service delivery and economic activity. Many people in South Sudan and northern Uganda are well aware of the wider context in Sudan and eastern Africa, where conflict over land and land grabbing are prevalent concerns. In their own countries, anticipated development and commercial exploitation drive perceptions of the changing value of land. The processes of government decentralization, begun in the 1990s, also play a key role in growing conflict over land. Local govern­ment officials and politicians may have an interest in promoting the idea of ethnic territorial units to garner popular support and increase their control of land and natural resources. Local land governance institu­tions—whether state-related, customary or the more common hybrid arrangements—derive revenue and power from both land transactions and disputes over land. It would be mistaken, however, to see increasing land disputes as simply the result of top-down control and manipulation. In an atmosphere of growing uncertainty and insecurity over land rights, there is also bottom-up demand for greater security and dispute resolution. Many people in South Sudan and northern Uganda are seeking to secure their own land rights through various mechanisms, whether through written documen­tation, the purchase of leasehold titles or by asserting customary rights to land through historical narratives and genealogical claims. Unsurpris­ingly, their efforts can easily become attempts at exclusion on the same basis, creating yet more disputes and conflicts over land and boundaries. Attempts to privatize land rights or assert more exclusionary defini­tions of customary land rights have been aided by national land reforms, which promote legal clarity and simultaneously impose simplified defini­tions of customary rights. External interventions in land governance have tended to support legal and policy processes, failing to adequately consider the implementation of statutory approaches on the ground. At the local level, it is evident that national laws and policies are being interpreted with varying degrees of accuracy, as well as being selectively adopted and adapted in combination with customary principles. These processes both rely on the cooperation of customary authorities and local governments and create competitions between them. This demonstrates a hybrid approach to land governance that is not amenable to being reduced to a legal or statutory form.

Recent housing transfer experience in Australia: implications for affordable housing industry development

Abstract: Key findings Public housing transfers and affordable housing industry development Since the mid-1990s, but especially since around 2007, property transfers by Australian state and territory housing authorities have added significantly to the housing stock and capacity of community housing providers (CHPs). Latterly, there has been increasing interest among housing policy-makers in the prospect of further transfers, at a larger scale, as reflected by the 2009 Housing Ministers Conference target of community housing achieving a 35 per cent share of the social housing sector. This interest has been particularly motivated by the increasingly financially stressed and physically run-down condition of public housing, and by the perceived benefits of 'contestability' arising from a multi-provider social housing system. Crucial here are the revenue advantages afforded CHPs under current subsidy settings-in particular, CHP tenant eligibility for Commonwealth Rent Assistance (CRA) paid through the social security system, thus enabling CHPs to charge higher rents without reducing tenant net incomes. Until recently, however, public housing transfer programs have been relatively small in scale and experimental in nature (Pawson, Milligan et al. 2013). Public housing transfers post-2012 Since 2012, three Australian states with little prior experience of transfers have commenced ground-breaking new transfer programs. Tasmania's Better Housing Futures (BHF), South Australia's Better Places, Stronger Communities (BPSC) and Queensland's Logan Renewal Initiative (LRI) are considered here as case studies on contemporary public housing transfer policy and practice. BHF involved four parcels of properties (about 500-1,100 dwellings each, with some vacant land for development), representing, in total, 35 per cent of Tasmania's public housing stock; these were transferred to four CHPs, three based interstate. BPSC involved transfer of two parcels (about 500-600 properties each) to two SA-based CHPs. These two programs proceeded through to management handovers in 2014 and 2015, and the respective state governments are, at this writing, progressing further transfer initiatives with more ambitious objectives. By contrast, LRI, which would have been the largest and most far-reaching transfer program yet undertaken in Australia (about 5,000 properties to a partnership of two interstate CHPs), has recently been terminated, along with other planned Queensland transfers, after protracted preparations, political controversy and a change of government. Transfer objectives and models Relative to the objectives and models of transfers identified in our 2013 research (Pawson, Milligan et al. 2013), the case study transfers examined here consolidated, extended and innovated in various ways. All three programs embodied the objective of capturing CRA as the most important motivating factor. In South Australia (SA) and Tasmania, this enhanced revenue was directed to increased spending to address maintenance backlogs. More ambitiously, the Queensland Government aspired to leverage funding for large scale estate renewal and housing construction, which would have involved investment reportedly totalling $800 million. Building the capacity of the not-for-profit housing industry was an important secondary objective of each of the programs. Recognition of local industry capacity limitations was reflected in the initially modest objectives for renewal and growth adopted by the SA and Tasmanian governments. The case study transfers also consolidated the model of transferring property management rights by lease or agency agreement, rather than freehold title. However, they also extended the model by transferring for longer periods (terms of 10 years for Tasmania, and 20 years for SA and Queensland (as planned)). Competitive selection processes, without a role for tenants, also consolidated previous practice-although the openness to interstate providers represented a new development. Transfer processes, terms and tenant implications In all the case study states, the transfer selection, contracting and transition processes built capacity in government and housing providers, but were costly-most of all, of course, in Queensland, where the Logan transfer was aborted despite an extensive tendering process and a subsequent lengthy period of preparation for handover. In the two states where transfers progressed to completion, significant process issues were encountered-particularly in connection with Centrelink payments and the transfer of tenant credits and liabilities. The transfer contracts contain notable provisions relating to: • Government termination of contracts-raising questions of security. • Backlog maintenance liabilities-subject to spending caps that mitigate risk for CHPs. • CHP organisational management and tenancy management in accordance with social housing policies-raising questions as to the proper place for this level of regulation. Large-scale transfers raise questions around the employment of public housing staff; however, BHF and BPSC largely avoided the issue through prior recruitment freezes and internal redeployments within the public service-approaches that could not be replicated in a larger- scale transaction or program. LRI would have required the successor CHP to employ ex-public housing staff-but with the project's cancellation, the associated organisational challenges and opportunities were not seen through to implementation. None of the case study transfers sought to build the capacity or agency of tenants in the transfer process, but CHPs' post-transfer engagement with tenants and service improvement initiatives appear to have been well received. Transfer finances, accounting and CHP asset bases Financial modelling indicates that, through CRA-enhanced rent revenues, transfers of public housing to CHPs may be a viable way of achieving maintenance backlog reduction and, at the same time generating a modest revenue surplus to underpin other designated CHP activities. Employing social landlord income and expenditure assumptions derived from transfer tendering practice, this modelling focused on a number of '30-year business plan' scenarios for a notional 1,000 dwelling public housing transfer. These scenarios were compared with a 'continuing public housing management' base case. Allowing for the elimination of a maintenance backlog averaging $15,000 per dwelling, our transfer 'base case' generated an operational surplus over the business plan period sufficient to leverage construction of 113 new homes. Of these, 13 would be for market sale, 29 to replace obsolete transferred public housing, and 71 as additional affordable housing units. Alternatively, in the most favourable scenario-where strong government action facilitates access to cost-effective private finance (through a financial intermediary) and free land (through planning interventions)-it was estimated that leveraging could yield as many as 557 new homes. Of these, 77 would be for market sale, as well as 143 units to replace worn out public housing and 337 additional affordable dwellings. However, any transfer contract commitment for a recipient CHP to carry out larger scale catch-up repairs and/or to undertake non-landlord activities (e.g. place making, housing advice and support) would quickly erode and eliminate this development capacity. And, even in the most favourable circumstances imaginable, the social housing financial regime would (over 30 years) enable the successor landlord to replace only a very small proportion of the ageing transferred portfolio. The above objectives may be achieved where CHPs are granted a mere leasehold, as opposed to freehold, interest in transferred properties. This is because lenders consider 'long-lease' acquisitions of former public housing as potentially sufficient to underpin cash flow-based lending to reputable providers. For accounting purposes, 'long lease' is now being interpreted as including contracts of as little as 10-year duration. As confirmed through recent practice, proper accounting treatment of such transactions involves the asset concerned being recorded as a 'disposal' on the public accounts. It must be emphasized that significant questions linger as to what, under current policy settings, transfers may be reasonably expected to deliver. In particular, there is no validated information about the true scale of dwelling condition impairment in transferred property portfolios, nor on the time needed for 'catch-up repair' programs to eliminate such problems.

Economic Explanation: From Sharecropping to the Sharing Economy

Abstract: I examine the sharing economy using a contractual approach pioneered by Cheung (1969, The Theory of Share Tenancy: With Special Application to Asian Agriculture and the First Phase of Taiwan Land Reform. Chicago: Chicago University Press). Progress in information technology that reduces transactions costs leads to the emergence of rental contract to supersede outright ownership, especially among goods and services in which search and monitoring costs had been major trade barriers. I present evidence that ridesharing indeed significantly lowers wait times. Trust cannot explain the economic success of some sharing economy companies (e. g., Airbnb, Uber) but not others (e. g., SnapGoods). Sharing power drill, the poster child of the sharing economy, is an economic failure because the major trade barrier is transportation rather than transaction costs. Changes in transaction costs lead to changes in contractual arrangements. In the case of contractual choice between ridesharing platform and drivers, findings about drivers’ characteristics and contract details are consistent with the theory of share tenancy. My analysis also sheds light on the current debate on the employment status of driver-partners.

Reviewing changes to housing management on remote Indigenous communities

Abstract: The shortage of housing in remote communities, and their deteriorated condition, has long been associated with high levels of crowding, homelessness and serious health and social problems affecting the wellbeing of Indigenous Australians. A contributing factor to poor housing standards was the diversity of housing providers and grants as well as complex and confusing land tenure arrangements. To address these problems, the Commonwealth, states and the Northern Territory established the National Partnership Agreement on Remote Indigenous Housing, (NPARIH) in 2008. NPARIH was a 10-year, $5.5b Commonwealthfunded tenancy management and capital works program of new housing and refurbishment of existing housing (DSS 2013a). Under NPARIH, remote Indigenous housing came under a single regime managed by the state and territory governments, through their public housing agencies, The aim was to introduce robust and standardised tenancy management consistent with public housing standards and a repairs and maintenance program that increased the life cycle of housing, improved housing conditions and expanded housing options in remote Indigenous communities (COAG 2008a: 5). This divestment of historical Commonwealth responsibility to the states and territories was an audacious policy change, involving an attempt to mainstream remote Indigenous housing that was formerly mostly managed by the Indigenous community housing sector. With NPARIH now ending, it is timely to review how tenancy management arrangements are working given the substantial investment and the need to ensure arrangements are sustainable over the long term. This project builds on research undertaken in 2013 that investigated the tenancy management arrangements that followed the introduction of NPARIH in the Northern Territory, Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia (Habibis, Phillips et al. 2014). It is not a review of NPARIH itself, and includes some consideration of non-NPARIH communities. This second phase of the study commenced in mid-2014 and investigates how well tenancy management arrangements are working under NPARIH, the appropriateness and effectiveness of the tenancy management policy and service delivery approaches, and the efficiency and value for money of the service delivery models. It aims to identify and share across jurisdictions, and nationally, the policy and practice lessons gained from the NPARIH experience.

Tenancy and Agricultural Productivity in Southern India: Nature, Extent, Trends and Determinants

Abstract: The study reconfirmed prevalence of reverse tenancy in dryland agriculture in Southern India in recent years (2009-10 and 2011-12) as was in the mid-seventies. Household level panel data collected from six villages by ICRISAT under its Village Level Studies (VLS) and Village Dynamics Studies (VDS) programme were analysed. Area under tenancy has increased in recent years, mostly in the form of sharecropping. Panel Data Probit analysis revealed that likelihood of a household to be a tenant is positively linked with bullock ownership and large farm size while age and education of the household head, and dependence on non-farm income had a negative association. Determinants of extent of tenancy (rented in area) were measured through Panel Data Feasible Generalised Least Square (FGLS) regression analysis. Results indicated that an additional bullock increased rented-in area by 0.22 ha. On the other hand, large farmers had 0.47 ha more area under rented-in compared to other tenants. There was negative relationship between rented-in area and age and education of the household head indicating that educated and elderly people participated less in the tenancy market. Input use level, crop yield and profitability were generally higher in own land than that of rented-in land in the mid-seventies. In recent years, we observed mixed (inconclusive) outcome for input use, crop yield and profitability. Reduction of production risks in one of the study villages has not only reduced tenancy but also abolished reverse tenancy.

Property Rights and Gender Bias: Evidence from Land Reform in West Bengal

Abstract: While land reforms are typically pursued in order to raise productivity and reduce inequality across households, an unintended consequence may be increased within-household gender inequality. We analyse a tenancy registration programme in West Bengal, and find that it increased child survival and reduced fertility. However, we also find that it intensified son preference in families without a first-born son to inherit the land title. These families exhibit no reduction in fertility, an increase in the probability that a subsequent birth is male, and a substantial increase in the survival advantage of subsequent sons over daughters.

The Development of Settler Agriculture in British Africa Revisited: Estimating the Role of Tenant Labour in Southern Rhodesia, c. 1920-1960

Abstract: In this paper I use primary and secondary sources to quantify the role of tenant labour on settler farms in colonial Africa, using Southern Rhodesia as a case in point. My findings show that the rise of wage labour did not mark the end of labour tenancy, as has been assumed in previous literature. On the contrary, the two forms of labour co-existed. The results find support in the theoretical literature on agrarian labour contracts as well as from studies on farm labour on large farms in pre-industrial Europe and America. This literature has been surprisingly neglected in studies of rural labour relations in colonial Africa. Based on my estimates I revise the fundamental question of the role of access to and control of indigenous labour in the growth of European settler agriculture in Africa. In contrast to previous research, I argue that the rise of wage labour was a response to settler farmers’ limited capacity to control tenant labour rather than a sign of the superiority of agrarian capitalist relations of production.

11. Agrarian transformations and land reform in Indonesia

Abstract: The total number of Indonesian households involved in farming to support at least part of their livelihoods is substantial, and poverty rates have persistently been higher in rural than in urban areas. As a result, improved access to agricultural land is widely held to be essential to achieve poverty alleviation. Farm fragmentation is also believed to be widespread, contributing to ever-decreasing farm sizes that lock near-landless, marginal farm households ( petani gurem ) into a vicious poverty trap. This is the standard narrative supporting the necessity for a broad-ranging land reform program to ensure improved access to agricultural land for petani gurem and landless farmers. This chapter assesses the relationship between the land reform movement and contemporary agrarian transformations in Indonesia—that is, the changing role of agriculture and land in livelihood strategies. In light of these transformations, I examine the discursive, political and structural challenges affecting the capacity of President Joko Widodo's land reform program to support rural poverty alleviation in Indonesia. The terms ‘land reform’ and ‘agrarian reform’ are sometimes used interchangeably, but there are differences between them. Land reform refers specifically to a change in the social institutions surrounding land ownership or access. Lipton (2009: 1) presents land reform as ‘laws with the main goal of reducing poverty by substantially increasing the proportion of farmland controlled by the poor, and thereby their income, power or status’. Agrarian reform refers to a much broader ‘multi-disciplined set of interrelated aims and means capable of combating the ills of the [unequal] agrarian structure’ (Cohen 1978: 1). The means of achieving agrarian reform usually encompass some kind of redistributive land reform in addition to interventions such as improved agricultural extension, credit availability, trade policies, pricing, and tenancy and wage regulations. In Indonesia (somewhat confusingly), the terms ‘agrarian renewal’ ( pembaruan agraria ) and ‘agrarian reform’ ( reforma agraria ) are in fact closely associated with land reform, and are widely used to suggest a progressive land agenda. Pembaruan agraria is legally defined (in MPR Decree IX/MPR/2001) as ‘a sustained process of restructuring the control, ownership and exploitation of agrarian resources, undertaken to attain justice, prosperity, legal protection and certainty for all Indonesian people’. Opportunities for the active participation of a resurgent peasant-based agrarian movement have emerged in post-authoritarian Indonesia.

The urban transformation of Beirut: an investigation into the movement of capital

Abstract: In this dissertation, I set out to answer two main questions: why does circulating capital become fixed in Beirut’s built environment, and how does this happen? Through conducting interviews with real estate developers, residents, architects, public officials, bankers and other relevant agents, through site surveys, the consultation of land and commercial registry records, real estate brochures and other primary material, I reconstruct the material and institutional components that explain the urban transformation of Beirut. I argue that this transformation constituted a “spatial fix”, where surplus capital was switched into the built environment to temporarily stave off a crisis of overaccumulation, in this case upper middle-class to high-end real estate, following a significant increase in capital flows to the country in 2008. The first part of the dissertation looks at the reasons for this spatial fix. I argue that the influx of excess liquidity can be explained by the Lebanese banking system escaping the financial crisis, consequently being able to offer higher interest rates than banks in countries that were affected by the crisis. Besides being constrained by conservative lending regulations, the banks had not engaged in risky financial products because they found a profitable outlet in lending to the government, who paid high interest rates, crowding out loans to the private sector. The banks were able to lend such large sums because of remittances and transfers from Lebanon’s large expatriate population, as well as funds from the Gulf following the steady rise in oil prices. As public debt increasingly had to be rolled over, however, interest rates declined. When after the crisis a large amount of liquidity found its way to Lebanon’s banks, they found an outlet for their capital when the Central Bank provided incentives that encouraged mortgage lending, leading to a major boom in loans to the housing and construction sectors and massive profits for the banks. I argue that these profits should be situated within “networks of accumulation”, consisting of persons with overlapping interests in banking, real estate and politics, who direct these capital flows and influence the legal framework that decides the ways in which these can be used to exploit the built environment. These networks are not so much a result of corruption, but of the social relations of capitalism, where the constraints of the laws of competition incentivize agents to concentrate and centralize capital, resulting in a tendency to monopolize. Capitalism in Lebanon was made through alliances and networks such as these, preventing the rise of a welfare or developmentalist state to temper these tendencies. In the second part of the dissertation, I set out to explore the materialization of the spatial fix in Beirut’s built environment, more specifically in the neighborhoods of Mar Mikhael, Zokak el-Blat and Corniche en-Nahr. I show how the legal framework in place created conditions for a large “rent gap” to occur, i.e. the difference between actual ground rent and potential ground rent under a plot’s “highest and best use.” The existence of rent controls ensured a low actual return from buildings where this was the main form of tenancy. The legal framework related to construction allowed for a much higher exploitation of a plot of land, especially after changes to the Building Law in 2004. This, coupled with the absence of any heritage protection framework, provided a significant incentive for property owners to sell their buildings to developers, who would demolish them, usually merge the plot with some neighboring plots, and construct a high rise to fully profit from the exploitation of the plot as allowed in the Building Law. The ways in which the rent gap was closed, however, varied greatly and were influenced by many factors, some of which have received little attention in the literature on gentrification (i.e. on the process whereby higher-income dwellers and uses displace lower-income ones). These include the presence of art-related activities and creative industries, the legacies of (sectarian) conflict and displacement, the related territorial stigma of an area, and an area’s location in terms of accessibility by car or proximity to upmarket shopping and entertainment districts. In Corniche en-Nahr, I show how the area’s industrial character was used to connect its redevelopment to the redevelopment of brownfields in the United States and Western Europe and became part of an imagined urban world of loft living, shared by investors who referred to their experiences as Lebanese traveling and living abroad, pointing to the ways in which space is always constituted by multiple translocal relations. My findings contribute to theories on the rent gap, gentrification, urban political economy, the production of networks of accumulation, the structure, function and influence of diasporas, the historical development of secondary circuits of accumulation and neoliberalism, postcolonial/Marxist debates, the geographies of the financial crisis and the financialization of housing and land. As a case from the “South”, they bring dimensions in that might open up relevant questions on the transformation of cities everywhere and the spatial fix underlying these transformations.

Payment for environmental services, rural poverty reduction and agricultural land conservation in Oyo state farm settlements, Nigeria

Abstract: Despite successive anti-poverty and environmental resources conservation programs by the Nigerian government, the problems of poverty and environmental resources degradation still persist. This study argues that since the two problems are interrelated, the solutions to them must be undertaken simultaneously and in an integrated manner rather than independently of each other. However, one major obstacle to the solution is property rights (i.e. Secured land ownership rights). Past studies argued that without property rights the poor would not be willing to participate in the environmental resources conservation. Besides, studies have indicated that most of the anti-poverty benefits do not reach the target group. Hence, it is inevitably necessary for this study to first of all identify the ‘real poor’ and the categories of the poor multidimensionally. This was achieved with the aid of Alkire and Foster (2010) and Alkire and Santos (2011) multidimensional poverty assessment methods. The study argues that a credit-based Payment for Environmental Services (PES) has the potential to tackle rural poverty and agricultural land degradation simultaneously, without the poor having absolute ownership rights of the agricultural land. To this end a choice experiment approach was employed to design the multi-attributes of PES. Thus, the perspectives of the poor and their preferences for the options of the PES attributes on rural poverty reduction and agricultural land conservation were identified. Multistage sampling technique was used to choose 317 respondents in Akufo, Ijaye and Ilora farm settlements. The main findings of this study revealed that tenancy security of the land is sufficient to attract the poor to participate in land conservation programs. The study also discovered that PES is a viable mechanism for rural poverty reduction and agricultural land conservation. Thus, there is a need for an institutional arrangement for adequate tenancy security provision as this arrangement will enhance the potentials of PES to mitigate both land degradation and rural poverty concomitantly.

Tenancy vs. Ownership Rights. Housing Rent Control in Southeast and East-Central Europe, 1918 – 1928

Abstract: 51 This paper deals with a particular aspect of the huge structural economic and social changes caused by the first global war. Based on relevant primary and secondary sources, it focuses on the comparison of the specific social and legal implications of the stateinterventionist practices in the housing sector in the countries considered as European economic periphery. The system was founded under the war circumstances when securing the welfare of conscripts’ families against excessive demands of landlords became a priority of the belligerents’ domestic policies. Gradually, these measures were evolving towards ever more elaborated protection of almost all tenant groups during and after the war. It is important to stress that such a large-scale state intervention in the domain of housing tenancy was introduced for the first time in modern history. Interwar Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia and Poland have been chosen to represent respective Southeastand East-Central European regions for some specific features of the housing policies conducted by their authorities. In the first place, these fragile states, accounting for lack of institutional capacities and weak governance, turned out to be the most interventionist and to carry out the most intensive schemes of state intervention in housing rental market in Europe (Russia excluded). In addition, these countries displayed a rather distinctive dynamics of implementation and abandonment of housing rent controls when compared with other European countries and regions. In addition to the elaboration of the main features of the housing Rent Control System (RCS), this paper also deals with unwanted consequences of its long-term application in the four countries under review. It investigates effects and outcomes of the state involvement with housing tenancy by taking into account concrete evidence from the everyday practice of the implementation of housing legislation. The concentration is focused on obvious abuses, anomalies, and deficiencies in the system, which compromised its very foundations. Particularly, the paper will shed light on development of conception of tenancy right as confronted with previous sacrosanct concept of property ownership. The study will reconsider the general notion of a tenant-protection program being justified as a protection of those who were “economically weak” against exploitation of the “economically strong”. It will provide facts and analyses on how the system evolved and how its most important features were altered by the daily routines of life. The study is almost completely written on previously unexplored primary sources. Taking into account a somewhat disappointing experience with the findings of research in the national Tenancy vs. Ownership Rights. Housing Rent Control in Southeast and East-Central Europe, 1918 – 1928

Land Reforms, Land Markets and Urban Transformation: Identifying Some Long Run Impacts of Land Reforms from Kerala, India

Abstract: Land that has legacies of tenure reforms offers scope for studying its relationship with contemporary dynamic land markets and increasing urban influence. This article seeks to locate the association of interventions in land tenure with the increasing urban influence and spurt in land markets of Kerala, an India state renowned for land reforms. Based on review, analysis of interventions initiated in Kerala is attempted to understand the changes in tenure and its impact on land markets and urban form. The role of the land reforms in distributing scores of title deeds by way of abolishing tenancy as well as hutment land were seminal in increasing the land ownership, but also contributed to activating land markets and rural–urban transformation. Results also indicate that in the absence of periodic introduction of proper land governance structures, land markets can also lead to imperfections and distortions.

Growth of Cash Rent Tenancy and Modernisation of Land Lease Market in Punjab

Abstract: The nature of farm tenancy in Punjab has completely changed due to the technological revolution and commercialisation of agriculture; traditional share tenancy has been replaced by modern cash rent tenancy. The tenancy laws of the state, however, have not changed to keep in tune with the emergence of modern tenancy. This chapter argues that the existing tenancy laws need to be replaced by a new set of modern tenancy laws to facilitate the smooth, costless and hassle-free transfer of land for cultivation from less efficient to more efficient farmers. The focus of the new tenancy laws should be on creating zero risk of land loss through renting out, easy and costless registration and enforcement of lease contracts, promotion of long lease contracts and enabling the tenants to get institutional credit on the basis of rented in land.

Liberalizing Lease Market The Andhra Pradesh Land Licensed Cultivators Act

Abstract: Tenancy has been on the rise in the post economic liberalization period from the decades of 1990s. It was also viewed that freeing the lease market for land may contribute to equity as well as efficiency by bringing into open the lease transactions. A strong case or legalization of land leasing has been made in order to improve the rural poor's access to land through leasing and also for their upward occupational mobility. It is argued that removal of restrictions on land leasing will result in better utilization of land and labour as fears of losing land by leasing out stand to be addressed. If land security for the owner and tenurial security for the tenant is provided for there would be enhanced interest in cultivation. Accompanied with a ceiling on operational holding size legalization of land lease would result in better utilization of land by reducing fallow land and also check concentration of land.

Agricultural Tenancy in Some Irrigation Command Areas of North Gujarat

Abstract: In the pre-independence period, Gujarat the Rayatwari system was predominant in the presidencies where land rights were with the tillers, who were subjected to regular payment of revenue. Tenants in Gujarat and Saurashtra were mostly Patidars by caste. They had become politically powerful by the time of Independence due to participation in the Indian freedom movement under Gandhi. Since they were the beneficiaries of reforms, they had enacted progressive laws., land reforms have met with mixed success in achieving equitable distribution of land. The intermediaries between the state and the actual tillers have been removed, but efforts to provide land to the tiller have not been successful even though the distribution of land has become a little less unequal. Although the number of tenants has come down, unwritten contractual arrangements have increased. Thus, large-scale concealed tenancy still exists. So is the case with reverse tenancy-leasing-out land by marginal and small farmers to medium and large ...

Land Ownership Inequality and Rural Factor Markets in Turkey: A Study for Critically Evaluating Market Friendly Reforms

Abstract: Introduction: Why Agriculture? A Portrait of Turkish Agriculture: Inequality and its Discontents Sharecropping or Fixed Rent Tenancy? Testing For Inverse Size-Yield Relationship in Turkish Agriculture Conclusions

Security of Tenure for Generation Rent: Irish and Scottish Approaches

Abstract: As fewer people are able to make the transition into home ownership, more New Zealand households do not have adequate security of tenure due to the lack of durational protections in the Residential Tenancies Act 1986. This article shows that Ireland and Scotland are comparable jurisdictions that have moved to regimes providing durational protections to residential tenants, allowing them to choose to remain in their home for a specified number of years or indefinitely, subject to a limited set of grounds for which the landlord may terminate the tenancy. We should consider these examples and take steps to provide greater durational protections, so that more New Zealanders may have homes that provide them with stable foundations on which they may build their lives.