The Politics of Property Rights Institutions in Africa

Half title......Page 3
Title......Page 5
Copyright......Page 6
Dedication......Page 7
Contents......Page 9
Tables......Page 11
Acknowledgments......Page 13
Abbreviations......Page 17
1 Divergent Attitudes Toward Property Rights Institutions......Page 21
Case selection and study design......Page 26
Disorder and politics in africa......Page 31
Institutions that govern property rights in land......Page 34
Field research......Page 37
Part I: institutional choice and stability......Page 39
Efficiency Theory and Its Revisionists......Page 40
Modes of Extracting Gains from Land......Page 43
Capacity: Translating Preferences into Institutions......Page 55
Divergent Institutional Choices......Page 58
Explaining Institutional Choice in Botswana, Ghana, and Kenya......Page 59
The Relationship between Preferences and Capacity......Page 64
Part II: why institutions evolve: endogenous contributions to change......Page 67
Punctuated Equilibrium and Exogenous Shocks......Page 69
The Contradictory Potential of Institutions......Page 71
Some Scope Conditions......Page 77
Conclusion: Grounding the Rethinking of Preferences......Page 79
3 Varying Responses by Ghanaian and Batswana State Leaders......Page 81
Background......Page 84
Rules Governing Transactions......Page 86
Land Information Systems......Page 88
Adjudication......Page 89
Enforcement......Page 90
Cattle barons and real estate magnates in botswana......Page 92
The orientation against indigenous private capital in ghana......Page 100
Power and the delivery of institutional forms......Page 112
The Effects of Growing Capacity in Botswana......Page 113
The Effects of Declining Capacity in Ghana's Enclaves......Page 117
Conclusion......Page 123
4 Traditional Leaders Take Charge in Akyem Abuakwa and Ga......Page 125
Traditional leaders respond to rising land values......Page 127
Land Information Systems......Page 129
Adjudication Mechanisms......Page 130
Enforcement......Page 131
The era of land sales in ga and akyem abuakwa......Page 132
Creating an Enabling Institutional Environment......Page 139
The Birth and Effects of an Agricultural Chieftaincy in Akyem Abuakwa......Page 140
The institutional consequences of continuing land sales in ga......Page 145
Evidence from the 1930s......Page 152
A Question of Distributive Conflicts?......Page 154
A Rural–Urban Divide?......Page 158
Varying Capabilities?......Page 160
Conclusion......Page 162
Introduction......Page 164
Background and changing responses......Page 166
Land Information Systems......Page 168
Enforcement......Page 170
Inheriting productive interests......Page 171
The Reinforcement of Facilitating Institutions......Page 176
The move towards unmediated gains......Page 179
Fashioning a facilitating institutional environment......Page 184
Strong Elites in Early Kenya......Page 186
Moderate Decline in Late Kenya......Page 189
The red herring of capacity......Page 192
Conclusion......Page 194
6 Endogenous Contributions to Institutional Change......Page 196
The rise and positive feedback effects of land documentation......Page 198
The subversion of land documentation in kenya......Page 200
The small-time originators......Page 201
“Vanity shares”: the refinement and exportation of techniques......Page 203
Arriving at the heart of the mainstream......Page 210
Conclusion......Page 211
Institutional choice in zimbabwe: taking the argument further afield......Page 214
Upholding and then undercutting institutions in zimbabwe......Page 215
Accounting for the switch......Page 217
Decentering zimbabwe: south africa and namibia......Page 220
Wider theoretical pay-offs......Page 223
A correction to the transaction costs literature......Page 224
The discourse on institutional reform......Page 226
Distributive Conflicts......Page 229
New directions for research......Page 231
The Enigma of Access......Page 233
The Handsome Fruits of Archival Research......Page 236
The Invaluable Contribution of Field Research: Identifying Assets in Kenya......Page 237
Index......Page 241