[Diggers350] Book recommendation on Land Reform
Simon Fairlie
chapter7 at tlio.org.uk
Mon Jun 17 00:16:23 BST 2013
Thanks. Back in 1977 Lipton wrote"Why poor people stay poor" a
classic study on how most investment in poor countries goes into
urban projects rather than rural projects.
http://books.google.co.uk/books/about/Why_poor_people_stay_poor.html?
id=kgNHAAAAMAAJ&redir_esc=y
Simon Fairlie
Monkton Wyld Court
Charmouth
Bridport
Dorset
DT6 6DQ
01297 561359
chapter7 at tlio.org.uk
http://www.thelandmagazine.org.uk/
http://www.thescytheshop.co.uk/
On 13 Jun 2013, at 00:52, Ed Jones wrote:
> You wont agree with all of it, but it will definitely make you
> think. It
> attempts to look at all the academic evidence of which land reforms
> have
> worked, and which have failed, in "developing countries":
>
> *Land Reform in Developing Countries: Property rights and property
> wrongs*
> by Michael Lipton
>
> More info on the book here:
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
> Land_Reform_in_Developing_Countries:_Property_rights_and_property_wron
> gs
>
> .As it points out on the wikipedia page:
>
> 'It then expands on what is meant by poverty and how land reform still
> "matters", especially as according to Lipton "land is poor people's
> main
> productive asset"<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
> Land_Reform_in_Developing_Countries:_Property_rights_and_property_wron
> gs#cite_note-2>and
> "at least 1.5 billion people today have some farmland as a result of
> land reform, and are less poor, or not poor, as a
> result<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
> Land_Reform_in_Developing_Countries:_Property_rights_and_property_wron
> gs#cite_note-page8-3>.
> However, for Lipton, "huge, inefficient land inequalities remain,
> or have
> re-emerged, in many low-income countries. Land reform remains both
> 'unfinished business' (...) and alive and
> well."<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
> Land_Reform_in_Developing_Countries:_Property_rights_and_property_wron
> gs#cite_note-page8-3>'
>
> Best,
>
> Ed
>
>
> http://www.amazon.co.uk/Land-Reform-Developing-Countries-
> Development/dp/0415615569/
>
> Review
>
> 'Michael Lipton has produced a unique work drawing upon the
> author’s extraordinary expertise in rural development. Lipton
> takes on a great, complex, and contentious topic, land reform, and
> does justice to this huge topic. He delves deeply and widely,
> producing a text that is remarkable in its scope, insights, and
> historical knowledge. He never fears to point out the true
> complexities of topics that are all too often over-simplified.
> Lipton’s work is also extremely timely, as the world turns its
> attention once again to smallholder agriculture after decades or
> relative neglect. Scholars, students, and policy makers in all
> parts of the world will turn to this new study with enormous
> benefit and with gratitude to Lipton for his remarkable efforts'.
>
>
> - Jeffrey D. Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute at Columbia
> University; Special Advisor to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon on
> the Millennium Development Goals.
>
> 'Land reform can make a huge contribution in removing poverty, but
> it has not been effectively tried in many areas of the world. The
> story has to be finished, and in this important book one of the
> foremost development economists tells us why and how'.
>
>
> - Amartya Sen, Lamont Professor of Economics and Philosophy,
> Harvard University; Nobel prizewinner in economics
>
> 'A compelling case is made about the need to refocus on
> agricultural growth as the engine to reduce rural poverty.
> Improving access to land will ensure that the benefits of
> agricultural technical change reach many millions of rural poor.
> Professor Michael Lipton is a world renowned authority on these
> issues. His decades of research experience, distilled in the book,
> offer compelling, insightful and timely solutions which are
> critical in addressing the global food crisis'.
>
> - Akin Adesina, Vice President, Alliance for a Green Revolution in
> Africa
>
> 'Michael Lipton (pinching from Mark Twain) convincingly states that
> 'Reports of land reform's death are greatly exaggerated'. He takes
> the reader on a developing-world tour and shows tremendous dynamics
> in land reforms. Land reform is neither dead nor dying. As land
> (with access to water) becomes more scarce, land values increase as
> a consequence. Farms in many regions of the developing world
> actually become smaller -mostly for good economic reasons- and the
> need for efficient institutional change related to land remains
> strong. This book gives guidance for sound policy and offers unique
> opportunities for learning about land reform across time and
> locations. It is a must for development scholars!'
>
> - Joachim von Braun, Director, International Food Policy Research
> Institute
>
> 'Land reform has had a rollercoaster ride in the toolbox of
> development strategies: from a panacea that would cure all ills and
> help replicate the successes of Japan and Korea, to venom that
> destroys property rights and creates unviable production units that
> lead to agricultural decline and urban migration as it has
> purportedly done in Latin America. The story is really much more
> complex and nuanced. Michael Lipton - the doyen of the field - uses
> his half-century of thinking and experience as a development
> economist to set the record straight and to clarify the conditions
> under which land reform does and does not deliver the goods. It is
> a must read for those who are committed to finding the road to
> shared prosperity in the developing world'.
>
> - Ricardo Hausmann, Director, Center for International Development
> at Harvard University; Professor of the Practice of Economic
> Development, Harvard Kennedy School
>
> 'This is a passionate book – it is also brilliantly argued. Michael
> Lipton accepts that the poor of South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa
> need appropriate and often advanced scientific technologies – many
> new green revolutions – but they also need land reform. Without
> both of these there is little hope of the rural poor lifting
> themselves out of chronic poverty'.
>
> - Sir Gordon Conway, Chief Scientific Adviser, Department for
> International Development, UK; Professor of International
> Development, Imperial College, London
>
> 'Comprehensive, careful, thoughtful and surprising: Land reform is
> alive and well and delivering development around the world.
> Serious students of development, poverty and inequality will find
> here the micro theory and the macro picture – for years to come'.
>
> - Nancy Birdsall, President, Center for Global Development
>
> 'In the context of poverty, land is the major asset. The rights
> over land are social constructs and so are an emotive political
> battleground. But rights affect incentives: land reform needs
> economic analysis. Michael Lipton provides an accessible and
> comprehensive guide without which no reformer should go into battle'.
>
> Paul Collier, Professor of Economics and Director, Centre for the
> Study of African Economies, Oxford University
>
> 'Land and Land Reform are, in several developing countries
> including India, live issues - perhaps more critical today than
> they were decades ago. The unique analytical framework, remarkable
> empirical evidence and insight, and a modern perspective in this
> path-breaking new book of Prof. Lipton are invaluable to
> researchers and policymakers in their endeavour to address problems
> of poverty, inequality and sustainability'.
>
> - Pramod K Mishra, Chairman, Gujarat Electricity Regulatory
> Commission (India), and former Secretary to Government of India,
> Ministry of Agriculture, Department of Agriculture and Cooperation
>
> 'Michael Lipton has, for the last few decades, been the world's
> authority on land reform and economic development. In a world of
> continuing poverty and inequality, slow agricultural growth,
> changing economic structures, rapid urbanisation, and facing
> profound challenges of climate change and deforestation, the
> institutions, policies and pressures concerning access to and use
> of land are as important as ever. Michael Lipton's book is a
> crucial contribution and an analytical landmark'.
>
> - Lord Nicholas Stern, I.G. Patel Professor of Economics and
> Government and Director of Asia Research Centre, London School of
> Economics; Chief Economist and Senior President of the World Bank
> 2000-2003; leader of the Africa Commission and the Stern Review on
> climate change.
>
> 'Land reform as a topic in development studies might seem to many
> to have a distinctly dated air, redolent of the 1960s. Michael
> Lipton, in this broad, solid, and impressive treatise on the
> subject, strongly demurs'.
>
> - John Bongaarst, Susan Greenhalgh and Geoffrey McNicoll, the
> Journal of Population and Development
>
> 'It is a book of importance not only for those interested in
> development issues from any perspective, but should be required
> reading for anyone who works for the World Bank, Food and
> Agricultural Organisation or any of the regional development
> banks... The debate about land reform remains alive and well and
> should you wish to know anything at all about it you need to read
> this book.'
>
> - Herb Thompson, Journal of Contemporary Asia, Vol. 41 No. 1 (2011)
> --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
> About the Author
>
> Michael Lipton has worked since 1960 as a development economist. He
> was based for 25 years at the Institute of Development Studies, for
> three years directed the Sussex University Poverty Research Unit,
> and remains research professor at Sussex.
> --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
>
>
>
> You wont agree with all of it, but it will definitely make you
> think. It attempts to look at all the academic evidence of which
> land reforms have worked, and which have failed, in "developing
> countries"
>
>
> ------------------------------------
>
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> campaigners and members of THE LAND IS OURS landrights network
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>
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>
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>
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> Subsription is £18 (£15 unwaged) or £4 for a single edition
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>
> THE SCYTHE SHOP (advertisement)
> There is a revival of scything in the UK. Scything summer growth by
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>
> Die Pride and Envie; Flesh, take the poor's advice.
> Covetousnesse be gon: Come, Truth and Love arise.
> Patience take the Crown; throw Anger out of dores:
> Cast out Hypocrisie and Lust, which follows whores:
> Then England sit in rest; Thy sorrows will have end;
> Thy Sons will live in peace, and each will be a friend.
> http://www.bilderberg.org/land/gift.htm
>
> Woe to those who join house to house and field to field, until
> there is no more room, and you are made to dwell alone in the midst
> of the land. Yahweh of heaven's armies has sworn in my hearing:
> "Surely many houses shall be desolate, large and beautiful houses,
> without inhabitant." Isaiah 5:8-9
>
> http://www.downingstreetmemo.comYahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
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