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Periodical article Periodical article Leiden University catalogue Leiden University catalogue WorldCat catalogue WorldCat
Title:Whose Security? Deepening Social Conflict over 'Customary' Land in the Shadow of Land Tenure Reform in Malawi
Authors:Peters, Pauline E.ISNI
Kambewa, DaimonISNI
Year:2007
Periodical:Journal of Modern African Studies
Volume:45
Issue:3
Period:September
Pages:447-472
Language:English
Geographic term:Malawi
Subjects:land tenure
land reform
land conflicts
land use
customary law
Agriculture, Natural Resources and the Environment
Law, Human Rights and Violence
Politics and Government
Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups)
External link:https://www.jstor.org/stable/4501299
Abstract:Malawi, like other countries in Africa, has a new land policy designed to clarify and formalize customary tenure. The country is poor with a high population density, highly dependent on agriculture, and the sites researched - in Zomba district - in this article are matrilineal-matrilocal, and near urban centres. But the Zomba case raises issues relevant to land tenure reform elsewhere: the role of 'traditional authorities' or chiefs vis-à-vis the State and 'community'; variability in types of 'customary' tenure; and deepening inequality within rural populations. Even before it is implemented, the pending land policy in Malawi is intensifying competition over land. The authors discuss this and the increase in rentals and sales; the effects of public debates about the new land policy; a new discourse about 'original settlers' and 'strangers'; and political manoeuvring by chiefs. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum. [Journal abstract]
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