Hostname: page-component-7f64f4797f-l842n Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-11-04T07:46:53.665Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

LAND REFORMS AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 April 2010

Hans Gersbach  and
Lars-H. R. Siemers
Hans Gersbach*
Affiliation:
Center of Economic Research and CEPR, ETH Zurich
Lars-H. R. Siemers*
Affiliation:
RWI Essen
*
Address correspondence to: Hans Gersbach, Center of Economic Research, ETH Zurich, ZUE D7, 8092 Zurich, Switzerland; e-mail: hgersbach@ethz.ch.
Address correspondence to: Lars Siemers. Department of Public Finance, RWI Essen, Hohenzollernstrasse 1-3, 45128 Essen, Germany; e-mail: siemers@rwi-essen.de
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

We examine the nexus between land transfers and human capital formation. A sequence of land redistributions enables the beneficiaries to educate their children and thus to escape from poverty. A successful land reform allows the transition of a society from an agriculture-based state of poverty to a human capital–based developed economy. We find that a temporary state of inequality among the poor is unavoidable. Finally, we discuss the political economy of land reform, whether access to land markets should be allowed for beneficiaries of land reforms, and property rights issues.

Keywords

PovertyLand ReformsLand Market AccessTransition

Information

Type
Articles
Information
Macroeconomic Dynamics , Volume 14 , Issue 4 , September 2010 , pp. 527 - 547
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2010

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

REFERENCES

Aghion, Philippe, Caroli, Eve, and García-Peñalosa, Cecilia (1999) Inequality and economic growth: The perspective of the new growth theories. Journal of Economic Literature 37 (4), 1615–1660.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Alston, Lee J., Libecap, Gary D., and Mueller, Bernardo (1999) A model of rural conflict: Violence and land reform policy in Brazil. Environment and Development Economics 4 (2), 135–160.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Alston, Lee J., Libecap, Gary D., and Mueller, Bernardo (2000) Land reform policies, the sources of violent conflict, and implications for deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon. Journal of Environmental Economics and Management 39 (2), 162–188.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Attwater, Roger (1997) Property Entitlements and Land Reform in Upland Thai Catchments. Working Papers in Ecological Economics 9704, Australian National University, Canberra.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baland, Jean-Marie and Robinson, James A. (2000) Is child labor inefficient? Journal of Political Economy 108 (4), 663–679.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Banerjee, Abhijit (1999) Land Reforms: Prospects and Strategies. Working Paper 99–24, Department of Economics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Basu, Kaushik (1999) Child labor: Cause, consequence, and cure, with remarks on international labor standards. Journal of Economic Literature 37 (3), 1083–1119.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Basu, Kaushik (2003) Analytical Development Economics—The Less Developed Economy Revisited. Cambridge, MA/London: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Basu, Kaushik and Hoang Van, Pham (1998) The economics of child labor. American Economic Review 88, 412–427.Google Scholar
Bell, Clive (2003) Development Policy as Public Finance. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bell, Clive and Gersbach, Hans (2009) Child labor and the education of a society. Macroeconomic Dynamics 13 (2), 220–249.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Benjamin, Dwayne and Brandt, Loren (2002) Property rights, labor markets, and efficiency in a transition economy: the case of rural China. Canadian Journal of Economics 35 (4), 689–716.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Besley, Timothy and Burgess, Robin (2000) Land reform, poverty reduction, and growth: Evidence from India. Quarterly Journal of Economics 115 (2), 389–430.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bigsten, Arne and Levin, Jörgen (2005) Growth, income distribution, and poverty: A review. In Shorrocks, Anthony F. and van der Hoeven, Rolph (eds.), Growth, Inequality, and Poverty—Prospects for Pro-poor Economic Development, pp. 251–268. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Birchenall, Javier A. (2001) Income distribution, human capital and economic growth in Colombia. Journal of Development Economics 66 (1), 271–287.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Burgess, Robin and Stern, Nicholas (1993) Taxation and development. Journal of Economic Literature 31 (2), 762–830.Google Scholar
Conning, Jonathan H. and Robinson, James A. (2001) Land Reform and the Political Organization of Agriculture. Working Paper 160, Center for Development Economics, Williams College, Williamstown.Google Scholar
Dasgupta, Partha and Ray, Debraj (1986) Inequality as a determinant of malnutrition and unemployment: Theory. Economic Journal 96 (384), 1011–1034.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dasgupta, Partha and Ray, Debraj (1987) Inequality as a determinant of malnutrition and unemployment: Policy. Economic Journal 97 (385), 177–188.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Deaton, Angus and Laroque, Guy (2001) Housing, land prices, and growth. Journal of Economic Growth 6 (2), 87–105.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Deininger, Klaus (1999) Making negotiated land reform work: Initial experience from Colombia, Brazil, and South Africa. World Development 27 (4), 651–672.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Deininger, Klaus and Feder, Gershon (1998) Land institutions and land markets. In Gardner, B.L. and Rausser, G.C. (eds.), Handbook of Agricultural Economics 1, 1st ed., chap. 6, pp. 288–331. Amsterdam: Elsevier.Google Scholar
Deininger, Klaus, Jin, Songqing, and Nagarajan, Hari K. (2007) Land Reforms, Poverty Reduction, and Economic Growth: Evidence from India. Policy Research Working Paper 4448, The World Bank, Washington, DC.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Deininger, Klaus and May, Julian (2000) Can There Be Growth with Equity? An Initial Assessment of Land Reform in South Africa. Policy Research Working Paper 2451, The World Bank, Washington, DC.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Deininger, Klaus and Olinto, Pedro (2000) Asset Distribution, Inequality, and Growth. Policy Research Working Paper 2375, The World Bank, Washington, DC.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Deininger, Klaus, Olinto, Pedro, and Maertens, Miet (2000) Redistribution, Investment, and Human Capital Accumulation: The Case of Agrarian Reform in the Philippines. Prepared for the Annual Bank Conference on Development Economics, The World Bank, Washington, DC.Google Scholar
De Janvry, Alain and Sadoulet, Elisabeth (1996) Household Modeling for the Design of Poverty Alleviation Strategies. Working Paper 787, Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics, University of California at Berkeley. [Published in French in Revue d'Economie du Developpement 3(1995): 3–23.]Google Scholar
Díaz, Antonia (2000) On the political economy of Latin American land reforms. Review of Economic Dynamics 3, 551–571.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Drazen, Allan and Eckstein, Zvi (1988) On the organization of rural markets and the process of economic development. American Economic Review 78 (3), 431–443.Google Scholar
Eicher, Theo S. and García-Peñalosa, Cecilia (2001) Inequality and growth: The dual role of human capital in development. Journal of Development Economics 66, 173–197.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fearnside, Philip M. (2001) Land-tenure issues as factors in environmental destruction in Brazilian Amazonia: The case of southern Para. World Development 29 (8), 1361–1372.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Finan, Frederico, Sadoulet, Elisabeth, and de Janvry, Alain (2005) Measuring the poverty reduction potential of land in rural Mexico. Journal of Development Economics 77, 27–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Galor, Oded (2005) From stagnation to growth: Unified growth theory. In Aghion, Philippe and Durlauf, Steven N. (eds.), Handbook of Economic Growth 1A, chap. 4, pp. 171–293. Amsterdam: Elsevier.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Galor, Oded and Moav, Omer (2006) Das Human-Kapital: A theory of the demise of the class structure. Review of Economic Studies 73 (1), 85–117.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Galor, Oded, Moav, Omer, and Vollrath, Dietrich (2009) Inequality in land ownership, the emergence of human capital promoting institutions, and the Great Divergence. Review of Economic Studies 76 (1), 143–179.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Galor, Oded and Weil, David N. (2000) Population, technology and growth: From Malthusian stagnation to the demographic transition and beyond. American Economic Review 90 (4), 806–828.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Galor, Oded and Zeira, J. (1993) Income distribution and macroeconomics. Review of Economic Studies 60, 35–52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gersbach, Hans and Siemers, Lars-H. (2005a) Can Democracy Educate a Society? IZA Discussion Paper 1693, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA), Bonn.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gersbach, Hans and Siemers, Lars-H. (2005b) Land Reforms and Economic Development. CEPR Discussion Paper 5184, Center for Economic Policy Research (CEPR), London.Google Scholar
Gersovitz, M. (1976) Land reform: Some theoretical considerations. Journal of Development Studies 13 (October), 79–91.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Horowitz, Andrew W. (1993) Time paths of land reform: A theoretical model of reform dynamics. American Economic Review 83 (4), 1003–1010.Google Scholar
Johnson, D. Gale (1997) Agriculture and the wealth of nations. American Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 87 (2), 1–12.Google Scholar
Lundberg, Mattias and Squire, Lyn (2003) The simultaneous evolution of growth and inequality. Economic Journal 113 (487), 326–344.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moene, Karl Ove (1992) Poverty and landownership. American Economic Review 82 (1), 52–64.Google Scholar
Platteau, Jean-Philippe (1992) Formalization and Privatization of Land Rights in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Critique of Current Orthodoxies and Structural Adjustment Programmes. DEP 34, London School of Economics.Google Scholar
Poutvaara, Panu (2003) Gerontocracy revisited: Unilateral transfer to the young may benefit the middle-aged. Journal of Public Economics 88 (1–2), 161–174.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Proto, Eugenio (2007) Land and the transition from a dual to a modern economy. Journal of Development Economics 83 (1), 88–108.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ranjan, Priya (2001) Credit constraints and the phenomenon of child labor. Journal of Development Economics 64, 81–102.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ravallion, Martin and Sen, Binayak (1994) Impacts on rural poverty of land-based targeting: Further results of Bangladesh. World Development 22 (6), 823–838.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ray, Debraj (1998) Development Economics. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Ray, Debraj and Streufert, Peter A. (1993) Dynamic equilibria with unemployment due to undernourishment. Economic Theory 3 (1), 61–85.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Siemers, Lars-Hinrich R. (2005) How to Overcome Poverty Traps by Education. Doctoral thesis, Ruprecht-Karls-University at Heidelberg, Available at http://www.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/archiv/5363. Accessed September 1, 2009.Google Scholar
Swinnerton, Kenneth A. and Rogers, Carol Ann (1999) The economics of child labor: A comment. The American Economic Review 89 (5), 1382–1385.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sylwester, Kevin (2000) Income inequality, education expenditures, and growth. Journal of Development Economics 63, 379–398.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tomich, Thomas, Kilby, Peter, and Johnston, Bruce F. (1995) Transforming Agrarian Economies. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
UN (2007) The Millennium Development Goals Report 2007. New York, NY: United Nations.Google Scholar
UNESCO (2007) EFA global monitoring report. UNESCO Institute for Statistics, database at http://gmr.uis.unesco.org. Accessed February 18, 2008.Google Scholar
Viaene, Jean-Marie and Zilcha, Itzhak (2003) Human capital formation, income inequality and growth. In Eicher, Theo S. and Turnovsky, Stephen J. (eds.), Inequality and Growth: Theory and Policy Implications, chap. 4, pp. 89–117. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
WDI (2004) World Development Indicators 2004. Washington, DC: The World Bank.Google Scholar