Post-conflict land governance reform in the African Great Lakes region. Part I - The challenges of post-conflict land reform (original) (raw)
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2016
After conflict, governments and donors often feel a need for up-scaling and modernizing land use. Through stimulating large-scale investment in land, the ambition is to realize economic recovery and contribute to food-security. Our research in Uganda, Burundi and South Sudan suggests that policy makers should be extremely careful to promote large-scale land acquisitions, both foreign and national ones. Especially in the difficult transition from war to peace, large-scale appropriation of land risks turning into a threat to tenure security and the recovery of rural livelihoods. The second part of this info-sheet analyses ongoing transformations in and policies on pastoralism in the Great Lakes Region, which also has a significant effect on rural livelihoods and land use patterns. Pastoralism is widespread in the region, and plays an important role in contestation over land. Issues at stake are the increasing enclosure of former communal lands, competition with other land users, and l...
Shades of grey: Post-conflict land policy reform in the Great Lakes Region
The Struggle over Land in Africa. HSRC Press, Cape …, 2010
Access to land lies at the heart of social, economic and political life in most of Africa, and thus is part of the dynamics of conflict, peace-building processes and post-conflict reconstruction, particularly for conflicts involving lengthy population displacement.
2016
In post-conflict settings, securing tenure of local small-holders is considered of major importance to reduce and prevent local land disputes, to contribute to the recovery of rural livelihoods, and to improve agricultural production. Registration and other ways of formalizing land ownership are generally considered to significantly enhance local tenure security and rural development. Our research in Uganda, Burundi and South Sudan suggests, however, that post-conflict settings pose particular challenges to formalization of land ownership, which may for instance ignite conflict and competition, or add to confusion about local ownership and tenure security. A particular challenge is how to improve land tenure security of women, who experience specific vulnerabilities in accessing land, notably in post-conflict settings. Both customary and statutory tenure arrangements pose opportunities as well as threats to secure women’s access to land.
The Journal of Legal Pluralism and Unofficial Law, 2016
In Sub-Saharan Africa, Uganda has been hailed for embarking on an intensive decentralization programme. Whereas a lot of literature assumes that decentralization leads to improved service delivery, it is unclear to what extent this is the case in practice, especially when it comes down to decentralized land governance. This paper, which is based on ethnographic research carried out between 2011 and 2013, argues that decentralization of land governance in postconflict Northern Uganda fails to realize the expected benefits and instead has increased tenure insecurity. Decentralization of land governance gave rise to institutional multiplicity by creating new institutions that add on to the already existing authorities and regulations. Institutional proliferation in land governance that is fuelled by legal pluralism and decentralization results into confusion in land dispute resolution and the failure of institutions to effectively resolve land disputes in post-conflict settings. This exacerbates the dilemma of people who do not know where to go to seek redress to land disputes. While this multiplicity of both statutory and customary institutions creates choices and opportunities for both people and institutions in relation to land governance and in particular land conflict resolution, they are also used by power holders and authorities in political competition at local level, complicating the process of land dispute resolution. The struggle for authority between representatives of the state and of customary land institutions becomes especially problematic because it merges with local and national politics.
Peacekeeping and Housing Land and Property (HLP) Rights in the Great Lakes Region of Africa
A variety of recent studies have revealed complex relationships between control over land (and land-based resources) and conflict. Combatants involved in conflict within states – by far the most significant kind of conflict today – often claim that unequal access to land is one of the causes of violence. During conflict, land access is affected not just for belligerents, but for entire communities, who become targets of violence due to the ‘ethnicization’ of conflict. And in post-conflict situations, the land and shelter needs of returning internally displaced populations (IDPs) and refugees must be carefully managed in order to avoid dangerous disputes and further violence. The types of interventions in the housing, land and property rights (HLP) sector which are necessary and feasible change as the country emerges from conflict towards a more stable period of reconstruction. This chapter will look specifically at Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo (former ‘Zaire’) and Rwanda. The three case-study countries are at different stages of post-conflict recovery, and a brief overview of recent events in the region follows.
Reviewing the Role of Selected Land Governance Institutions in Land Conflict Management in Uganda
International Journal of Conflict Management
Purpose: This study aimed to assess the role of selected land governance institutions in managing land conflicts in Uganda. Methodology: A desk research was adopted given that it was purely based on secondary data. Findings: The outcomes suggest that although a variety of mechanisms are available, ad-hoc mediation is key is resolving land conflicts in Uganda. Conclusion: The study concludes that government strengthen ad-hoc mediation as well as making them more formal in land conflict management. Recommendations: From the study, it is encouraged that local council court members be periodically trained in conflict management; that government advocates, trains, and considers better facilitation for ad-hoc mediators to make them more effective.