[Diggers350] Book recommendation on Land Reform
Ram Selva
seeds at snail.org.uk
Wed Jun 19 12:45:51 BST 2013
The thuggery that created global poverty by grabbing land continues
thanks to malignant individuals such as the author of this book:
Make Poverty Business
The strapline of the book is 'Increase profits and reduce risks by
engaging with the poor'
http://makepovertybusiness.squarespace.com/peter-wilson/
(full text pasted below in case this info too vanishes just as Libra
Advisory Group featured in the above link has been vanished!)
The worrying bit is this is by a key UK government agent at top of a
pyramid that engineers and overseas situations as created by Shell (and
others such as Exxon-Mobil) in the Niger Delta or ongoing genocide of an
entire nation as in Sri Lanka.
The co-author's description is also noteworthy:
http://makepovertybusiness.squarespace.com/craig-wilson/
---
Make Poverty Business
"Packed With Insight" John Elkington, Founder, Sustainability
Peter Wilson is a Director of Omnia Strategy LLP, which advises
developing country Governments and companies on law, reputation and
strategy. Peter is former COO of Coffey International Development in
Europe, managing DFID and EU-funded economic and governance development
programmes in developing and post-conflict countries. He is a former
director of Libra Advisory Group, which advises donors, Governments and
businesses on strategy, development and reform, and was acquired by
Coffey in 2010. He has lived or worked in a variety of developing and
post-conflict countries including East Timor, Ethiopia, Indonesia,
Kosovo and Sierra Leone. He is a former strategy consultant with
Strategos and McKinsey and has worked with a wide range of multinational
clients including Danone, Masterfoods, Shell and two international
banks. His early career was in the British Diplomatic Service. He has an
MBA with Distinction from INSEAD in France and an MPhil in Economics
from the University of Oxford, where his research focused on the role of
foreign direct investment in economic development.
On 2013-06-16 23:16, Simon Fairlie wrote:
> 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"
>>
>>
>> ------------------------------------
>>
>> Diggers350 - an e-mail discussion/information-share list for
>> campaigners and members of THE LAND IS OURS landrights network based
>> in the UK
>> http://www.tlio.org.uk
>> http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Land-Is-Ours-a-landrights-
>> campaign-for-Britain/125281497524632
>>
>> The list was originally concerned with the 350th anniversary of The
>> Diggers (& still is concerned with their history). The Diggers
>> appeared at the end of the English Civil war with a noble mission to
>> make the earth 'a common treasury for all'. In the spring of 1999
>> there were celebrations to remember the Diggers vision and their
>> contribution.
>>
>> TASH FROM THE HILL
>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FWk9rRJsk5I
>>
>> THE LAND MAGAZINE
>> Simon Fairlie still produces The Land magazine every 6 months or so.
>> Subsription is £18 (£15 unwaged) or £4 for a single edition
>> http://www.thelandmagazine.org.uk/
>>
>> THE SCYTHE SHOP (advertisement)
>> There is a revival of scything in the UK. Scything summer growth by
>> hand is usually quicker than using a strimmer, and there is no noise,
>> vibration or pollution. http://www.thescytheshop.co.uk/
>>
>> 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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