This presentation was given by Ruth Meinzen-Dick (International Food Policy Research Institute), as part of the Annual Scientific Conference hosted by the University of Canberra and co-sponsored by the University of Canberra, the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR) and CGIAR Collaborative Platform for Gender Research. The event took place on April 2-4, 2019 in Canberra, Australia.
Read more: https://www.canberra.edu.au/research/faculty-research-centres/aisc/seeds-of-change and https://gender.cgiar.org/annual-conference-2019/
2. • Low excludability, high subtractability
• Heterogeneous resources over space and time
• Multiple, overlapping uses
• Gender differences in resource uses, dependence, priorities
Key features of common pool resources
(e.g. forests, pastures, fisheries)
4. Key features of collective tenure
• Mosaics of tenure types
• Communal tenure (land held
collectively, e.g. by lineage, but
allocated for individual use and
management)
• Common property (collectively
used and managed; may be
“owned” by the state)
• Multiple, overlapping users,
claims
• “Secondary”
rights are important
• Need for collective
• To manage resources
• Mutual assistance
• Collective identity
• Land rights socially embedded
• Territorial approach:
• Land rights and Governance
5. Tenure security
• Tenure security:
• Completeness of the bundles of rights
• Access, withdrawal, management, exclusion, alienation
• Focus on “ownership”
• Robustness/resilience (can withstand challenges, e.g. land grabs)
• Duration (long horizon)
• Institutional focus: state
6. Women’s Tenure Security
• Individual level—not just FHH
• Tenure security:
• Completeness of the bundle of rights (but often only women’s “access”, not
“rights”)
• Robustness/resilience
• Duration (long horizon, not changed by change in marital status)
• Bundles of rights (use, fructus, control, inheritance)
• Institutional focus: state and (extended) family, clan
• Degree of individual vs joint rights
7. Women’s Tenure Security in Collective Tenure
• Group and Individual level
• Tenure security:
• Importance of individual “sticks in the bundle” of rights, not completeness
of the bundle of rights (but often group “rights” not recognized)
• Robustness/resilience (can withstand challenges, e.g. land grabs affecting
whole community)
• Duration (long horizon, not changed by change in marital status, may vary
over seasons or years; locally considered in generations)
• Institutional focus: state agencies (e.g. forest agency) and (extended)
family, clan and community
• Nested security/insecurity:
• Strength of collective’s rights
• Strength of individual’s rights and voice in the collective
10. Land rights embedded in social relations
• Applies to all land rights, but
especially apparent for collective
tenure
• Who “holds” the land rights?
• Where are women in those social
relations over land?
• Importance of governance
arrangements
Photo credit: Fiona Flintan
12. Securing women’s
collective tenure
• Securing rights of the collective to the
resource
• Ensuring effective governance of the
collective resource
• Redressing discriminatory ‘custom’
• Ensuring women’s voice in collective
governance
• Ensuring complementary resources to
use collective rights effectively
• Opportunities for women to help
secure collective rights, thereby also
raising their status in the community
Photo credit: Rachael Knight
13. Women’s land rights Collective tenure
Photo credit: Landesa Photo credit: CIFOR
14. Ruth Meinzen-Dick, IFPRI
Cheryl Doss, University of Oxford
Fiona Flintan, ILRI
Anne Larson, CIFOR
Iliana Monteroso, CIFOR
Rachael Knight, Rachael Knight Consulting
15. gender.cgiar.org
We would like to acknowledge all CGIAR Research Programs
and Centers for supporting the participation of their gender
scientists to the Seeds of Change conference.
Photo: Neil Palmer/IWMI
Editor's Notes
This draws on Land Tenure Center’s generic work on tenure security and Resource Equity’s work on women’s land rights
Individual level—not just comparing MHH vs FHH
Tenure security:
Robustness/resilience (can withstand challenges, e.g. land grabs)
Duration (long horizon, not changed by change in marital status)
Assurance/enforceability (can present claim, be heard)
Cultural and legal legitimacy (recognized by law, custom, community, family)
Exercisability (informed of rights, understand meaning and how to document)
Beyond “ownership”—actual bundles of rights (use, fructus, control)
But not just “access”
Often depends on how acquired, social categories of land
Ancestral vs Purchased, Dowry
Degree of individual vs joint rights
However, this data is rarely available in the literature
This draws on Land Tenure Center’s generic work on tenure security and Resource Equity’s work on women’s land rights
Individual level—not just comparing MHH vs FHH
Tenure security:
Robustness/resilience (can withstand challenges, e.g. land grabs)
Duration (long horizon, not changed by change in marital status)
Assurance/enforceability (can present claim, be heard)
Cultural and legal legitimacy (recognized by law, custom, community, family)
Exercisability (informed of rights, understand meaning and how to document)
Beyond “ownership”—actual bundles of rights (use, fructus, control)
But not just “access”
Often depends on how acquired, social categories of land
Ancestral vs Purchased, Dowry
Degree of individual vs joint rights
However, this data is rarely available in the literature
This draws on Land Tenure Center’s generic work on tenure security and Resource Equity’s work on women’s land rights
Individual level—not just comparing MHH vs FHH
Tenure security:
Robustness/resilience (can withstand challenges, e.g. land grabs)
Duration (long horizon, not changed by change in marital status)
Assurance/enforceability (can present claim, be heard)
Cultural and legal legitimacy (recognized by law, custom, community, family)
Exercisability (informed of rights, understand meaning and how to document)
Beyond “ownership”—actual bundles of rights (use, fructus, control)
But not just “access”
Often depends on how acquired, social categories of land
Ancestral vs Purchased, Dowry
Degree of individual vs joint rights
However, this data is rarely available in the literature
Community land protection efforts that do not include mechanisms to improve local governance:
May at best be described as a lost opportunity to effect positive community change.
May at worst make land dealings more unjust!
Dangerous to give communities documentation of their land without creating accountability for leaders and strengthening governance.
Positively, process can lead to:
Protections for women and minority groups’ rights
Increased downward accountability of leaders
Greater democratic participation by community members in land and natural resources management decisions
Increased conservation and sustainable natural resources management
Strong foundations that support future community prosperity
Don’t get me wrong: I am a big advocate for women having land rights, and certificates in their names in contexts where individual or household land rights are appropriate, e.g. for housing, some agriculture.
But not at the expense of taking them out of families or communities that provide so much other security, resources, tangible and intangible. It generally doesn’t ensure their security, especially where the state is a remote presence, and any edicts have to be enacted within the social field of the family and community.
Rather, look for ways to reinforce these in a positive way