Land Governance Re-Arrangements: The One-Country One-System (OCOS) Versus One-Country Two-System (OCTS) Approach

Abstract

This paper evaluates how land governance is re-arranged in a state re-structuring process. We compare the cases of the (re-)unification of China with Hong Kong with that of West and East Germany. The division and (re-)unification of these states mark different land governance re-arrangements. The China-Hong Kong (re-)unification relied on a one-country two-system (OCTS) approach, while in West and East Germany, (re-)unification resulted in the creation of a one-country one-system (OCOS). Our key interest is to identify similarities and differences in both cases and the implications of the differences. To support the analysis, we view land governance and (re-)unification from theoretical to practical lenses-structuration theory and the government tools-based approach. This supports the construction of a conceptual and analytical framework, with which we conduct an in-depth exploration to evaluate land governance re-arrangements. We find that the conceptual and analytical framework proves effective for countries, with entirely different land governance regimes, to decide whether to merge or adapt. We do not conclude which approaches for (re-)unification are appropriate to land governance re-arrangements since all countries have different historical contexts and institutional arrangements. Instead, we recommend that governments consider adaptive land governance in signification structures and focus on hierarchical enforcement in legitimation structures. While multi-level land governance in the domination structure phase is strongly required, issue-and-project-based land governance has a pivotal role in providing cross-boundary infrastructures. Nevertheless, further empirical analysis is recommended to verify how and where the re-arrangement processes are initiated and structured.The North and South Korean (re-)unification quagmire is not new in the world. There are many divided countries in need of reunification and there are others that were once divided but finally became reunified. Countries like Cyprus (Turkish and Greek Cypriots), Sudan (Sudan and South Sudan), and Yemen (South and North Yemen) are some countries in need of reunification. China, Vietnam and Germany are examples of countries that were once divided and then became reunified.Adm. Sci. 2019, 9, 21 2 of 26 systems differed vis-à-vis the ideological role of the state, this raised challenges during and after the (re-)unification process.Land governance has been critical to this transforming institutional form and function (Augustinus 2009;Borras and Franco 2010;Deininger and Feder 2009;Enemark 2012). According to Palmer et al. (2009), land governance ruminates more intensely on the matter of the rules, processes and structures about land and its use and concern about who made decisions and how implemented and enforced. As the product of open-ended interactions within structures and agency, land governance can differ significantly depending on the state structures (e.g., unitary state; federal state) and the (re-)unification mechanisms (e.g., civilizat...

Bridging the Semantic Gap between Land Tenure and EO Data: Conceptual and Methodological Underpinnings for a Geospatially Informed Analysis

“…Many studies using EO data for North Korea have been proposed for monitoring land use and land cover Gathering and establishing reliable information for policy-making in pursuing Korean (re-)unification is more significant than ever during a peace-building process. In this process, re-shaping land governance are a fundamental question focusing on land tenure security, transferability, legitimacy and identity in (re-)unification setting [43,44]. Despite the passive attitude of the North Korean government to disclose information, it is possible to obtain data in a direct or indirect manner, such as [45]: official government reports (e.g., Korean Central News Agency: KCNA and Rodong Sinmun); materials from international organizations dealing with humanitarian aid (e.g., FAO, UNDP, UNFPA, WFP, WHO, UNICEF (For the resources, [46] etc.…”

The Politics of Decentralization: Competition in Land Administration and Management in Ghana

“…We used the purposive sampling technique to choose our respondents (small-scale farmers, customary authorities, registered surveying firms and local government authorities) based on their respective activities, experiences, knowledge and obligation in land administration and management. We applied the snowball sampling technique to make sure that the right small-scale farmers who were involved in land-use planning, regularization and formalization, and the government authorities who facilitated the approval of local plan at the local level were chosen [7,57].…”

“…This resulted in some families losing their land to the chiefs [26,34,56]. The chiefs were granted supervisory, jurisdictional, and territorial control of the people, land, and related natural resources in Talenteng on behalf of the colonial government [27,35,57]. The commissioner made the chiefs more business-orientated to increase their efficiency and effectiveness [26,56].…”

Testing and Validating the Suitability of Geospatially Informed Proxies on Land Tenure in North Korea for Korean (Re-)Unification

“…We also view land management as a combination of interventions in governance, based on questions of how and under what conditions such land interventions are responsible and how these can be supported by technologies. It is possible, therefore, that GIA supports both smart and responsible land management [70,71], especially of difficult-to-access regions where unknown or unsupported land governance exists [21,39,40].…”

“…To date, however, there is a notable paucity of evidence-based literature describing and investigating how to identify unknown land tenure relations in North Korea due to the obvious difficulties in obtaining and analyzing empirical data. Several ways of overcoming these barriers to capturing the relationship between land tenure and governance and Korean (re-)unification process have recently been suggested that involve understanding and suggesting methods and solutions to problems [21,39,40]. Drawing upon both land administrative and geospatial engineering approaches, these enabled to provide reasonably consistent evidence and knowledge-base of an association between land tenure/land governance and (re-)unification of which relatively little is known.…”