Land Occupations Research Papers - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

This open forum argues that the language and discourse of xenophobia is a shared experience among people who are seen and constructed as being from ‘elsewhere’ in four different provinces in South Africa. It suggests that use of... more

This open forum argues that the language and discourse of xenophobia is a shared experience among people who
are seen and constructed as being from ‘elsewhere’ in four different provinces in South Africa. It suggests that use
of xenophobic discourse and language, the precarious nature of living conditions, labour conditions and restricted
access to citizenship rights from the State, are experienced by all people who are categorised as ‘migrants’
internally, and those described as ‘foreigners’ or ‘refugees’ by Government officials.
What this open forum will also show is that the Pan-Africanism and collective ideas of freedom, struggle and
resistance or ‘bonds of solidarity’ among migrant labourers, both from other countries as well as the former
Bantustans during the struggles against apartheid, should not be confined to a nostalgic past, but seen as very
much present in South Africa today. This solidarity is perhaps not so much about a shared history of struggle
against colonialism and apartheid, although this too may be extant, but is rather informed by a shared present
where some are seen as citizens with freedom of movement and access to services from the State, while
others are excluded. The notion of citizenship, then, becomes refracted, not merely through the making of the
new categories of ‘foreigners’ through labour migration, but also through deeply raced and classed discourses
which inform who is viewed as a migrant and who is not.

Archaeological research in the département des Landes has been gaining new momentum since the beginning of the years 2000 (CRAL and CRESS works; PCR; academic works). The paradigm of the “desert” is now widely questioned. However sparse... more

Archaeological research in the département des Landes has been gaining new momentum since the beginning of the years 2000 (CRAL and CRESS works; PCR; academic works). The paradigm of the “desert” is now widely questioned. However sparse land occupation in Roman Times, an original organisation, has gradually emerged even though it is still too early to sketch an accurate typology of the sites. A quite marked contrast appears between the south of the Adour River — loosely bounded by towns (Aquae, Atura) and villae — and the north of the département including some seaside settlements where more precarious establishments (modest housing; workshops producing tar or iron goods...) are predominantly to be found.

Bu yazı, Türkiye 68 yazınında üzerinde neredeyse hiç durulmamış yoksul ve topraksız köylülerin toprak işgallerine odaklanıyor. İcra edilen eylem –işgal— üzerinden köylülerin diğer politik aktörlerle karşılaşmalarını ve kendi toplumsal... more

Bu yazı, Türkiye 68 yazınında üzerinde neredeyse hiç durulmamış yoksul ve topraksız köylülerin toprak işgallerine odaklanıyor. İcra edilen eylem –işgal— üzerinden köylülerin diğer politik aktörlerle karşılaşmalarını ve kendi toplumsal konumlarını yeniden tanımlama mücadelelerini merkeze alıyor. Ross’un ifadesiyle, siyasal öznellik ve toplumsal grup arasında ortaya çıkan ayrımı, yani, “siyaseti mümkün kılan toplumsal kimliğin parçalanma” süreçlerini anlamaya gayret ediyor. Bu şekilde, yazıyla, Türkiye 68 tarih yazımında ihmal edilmiş topraksız köylü mücadelesini bu anlatı içerisine yerleştirmek kadar, 68’e dair kurulan “sol doxa”nın kendisini dönüştürmeyi arzulayan yazına da katkıda bulunmayı umuyorum.

This article contributes to the literature on rural politics in Turkey by investigating peasants' land occupations between 1965 and 1980. We show that agricultural modernization after 1945 created the structural conditions for land... more

This article contributes to the literature on rural politics in Turkey by investigating peasants' land occupations between 1965 and 1980. We show that agricultural modernization after 1945 created the structural conditions for land conflicts by enabling the reaching of the frontier of cultivable land and facilitating landlords' displacement of tenants. The 1961 Constitution's promise of land reform and the rise of the center-left and socialist politics helped peasants press for land reform by combining direct action and legalistic discourse. Moreover, the vastness of state-owned land and the incompleteness of cadastral records allowed peasants to challenge landlords' ownership claims. During land occupations, villagers often claimed that contested areas were public property illegally encroached upon by landlords, and that the state was constitutionally obliged to distribute it to peasants. Although successive right-wing governments decreed these actions to be intolerable violations of property rights, their practical approach was more flexible and conciliatory. Although nationwide land reform was never realized, land occupations extracted considerable concessions via the distribution of public land and inexpensive land sold by landlords.

While existing literature has amply demonstrated how states may "see" their populations, we know less about which residents are legible to the state as populations. Drawing on extended ethnographic fieldwork and interviews conducted... more

While existing literature has amply demonstrated how states may "see" their populations, we know less about which residents are legible to the state as populations. Drawing on extended ethnographic fieldwork and interviews conducted between 2011 and 2019 in Cape Town, South Africa, this paper compares the fate of two large land occupations, one of which was evicted, one of which was not. In doing so, this paper demonstrates how rather than taking "populations" as a given, this status should be understood as an outcome. It suggests that participants in each respective occupation began with different views of the state. In other words, the way residents saw the state impacted each respective organizational outcome, which in turn affected how they were seen by the state. In one occupation, participants saw the state as a partner in obtaining housing, and so they organized themselves as atomized recipients. In the other, they viewed the state as an obstacle, and so they organized themselves collectively. Only in the latter case were residents viewed as a population; in the former, they were all evicted. Ultimately, this paper argues that, by bringing tools from political sociology to bear upon urban ethnography, we can gain insight into a process otherwise overlooked in the literature, allowing us to make sense of a question that is central to understanding urban politics in the global South: how do municipal governments decide which occupations to evict and which to tolerate?

This policy brief on urban land rights was developed as part of a series of policy briefs commissions by the Mandela Initiative, to feed into a synthesis report on a variety of cross-cutting themes on addressing poverty and inequality in... more

This policy brief on urban land rights was developed as part of a series of policy briefs commissions by the Mandela Initiative, to feed into a synthesis report on a variety of cross-cutting themes on addressing poverty and inequality in South Africa. It looks at the informalisation of land rights, urban poverty and spatial inequality, and proposes various policy and implementation interventions that could improve access to well-located urban land. The brief was written by Michael Clark of the Socio-Economic Rights Institute of South Africa (SERI) and Liza Rose Cirolia of the University of Cape Town's African Centre for Cities (ACC).

This paper analyses the attempt to create an ‘imagined community’ among members of the MST (Movimento Dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra, Movement of Rural Landless Workers) as a way of maintaining high levels of participation. As one of... more

This paper analyses the attempt to create an ‘imagined community’ among members of the MST (Movimento Dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra, Movement of Rural Landless Workers) as a way of maintaining high levels of participation. As one of the most active rural movements in Brazilian history, MST owes much of its success to high levels of involvement among members who have already achieved their initial goal of access to land. Movement leaders and activists encourage participation by creating a community through ideas and practices and distilled into symbols, slogans and ritual. The lived experiences of community differ from the imaginings, however, and in this paper I show how MST members negotiate the movement's expression of community in ways that reflect historical experiences of economy and society. Ultimately, MST's imagined community is effective because the movement has established itself as a successful mediator between the settlers and the Brazilian State.

In Cape Town, South Africa, some residents risk eviction and even arrest by participating in land occupations. But where else are they to go as they wait decades for state-provisioned housing? This article explores the tensions between... more

In Cape Town, South Africa, some residents risk eviction and even arrest by participating in land occupations. But where else are they to go as they wait decades for state-provisioned housing? This article explores the tensions between South Africa's technocratic model of housing delivery and residents' own demands for inclusion, proposing a synthetic approach that urges municipalities to stop criminalizing squatters.

Atop Mount Gerizim (Mountain of Mercy) on the outskirts of the dusty, chaotic Palestinian town of Nablus, sits a reconstruction of a villa designed and built four centuries ago by Andrea Palladio for a Vicentine aristocrat. The copy of... more

Atop Mount Gerizim (Mountain of Mercy) on the outskirts of the dusty,
chaotic Palestinian town of Nablus, sits a reconstruction of a villa designed and built four centuries ago by Andrea Palladio for a Vicentine aristocrat.
The copy of the Palladian villa, called Beit Falasteen, overlooks most of Nablus's sprawling neighborhoods.
Nobody walking in the busy souk of Nablus could avoid the view of this
humongous Palladian building perched above the city – the dream of
a billionaire come true: to create a new symbol of Palestinian culture.

This book chapter looks at the case of a group of land occupiers in Limpopo Province, South Africa, who have illegally occupied and use land and do so believing it is rightfully theirs. Outside the constraints of the government processes,... more

This book chapter looks at the case of a group of land occupiers in Limpopo Province, South Africa, who have illegally occupied and use land and do so believing it is rightfully theirs. Outside the constraints of the government processes, and the 'political' leaders in the community who work closely with the government, community members have got on with practical land and agrarian reform. Importantly they are producing on the land. Perhaps we should spend more time encouraging people to act on their rights to land instead of channeling them into bureaucratic processes that are controlled by particular elites and are generally not leading to land rights or effective land use by those who need these the most.