Land Reform Policies, the Sources of Violent Conflict, and Implications for Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon

Abstract

In this paper we examine land reform policies and their implications for violent conflict over land and resource use in the Brazilian Amazon. We identify the protagonists (land owners and squatters), derive their incentives to use violence, and show the role of legal inconsistencies as a basis for conflict. Although civil law guarantees title for land owners, the Brazilian Constitution adds a beneficial use criterion as a condition for title enforcement. This provision is part of a land reform or redistribution effort and it provides authorization for transfers to squatters. We describe the government agency involved in land reform, INCRA, and show that its intervention critically affects the actions of both squatters and land owners. Further, we point out the resource use effects of land reform policies and associated insecure property rights to land. Forested lands on large farms do not meet the constitutional beneficial use criterion and hence, are vulnerable to invasion by squatters and redistribution by INCRA. In the contest for control, land owners and squatters have incentives to deforest more rapidly and extensively prior to a conflict than agricultural production alone would warrant in order to demonstrate their respective land use. In analyzing the determinants of violent conflict, an analytical framework is provided to generate hypotheses for testing. Using data from the Brazilian census and the Pastoral Land Commission for the state of Para we examine the characteristics of regions where violent conflict predominates. Our empirical results indicate that a greater policy emphasis on land reform in Brazil through expropriation to reduce violent conflict, may have the unanticipated effect of increasing violent competition and wasteful resource use. The results of the paper are suggestive not only for Brazil, but for elsewhere in Latin America where there is tension between the goals of secure property rights and wealth redistribution.

Land occupations and deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon

“…Numerous scholars have identified specific mechanisms by which contentious social relations are linked to deforestation (Fearnside 2001;Alston, Libecap and Mueller 2000;Aldrich et al 2012). From these studies, mechanisms include the following: 1) Brazilian law itself has long provided an incentive to deforest land in order to show that it is productive, and both landholders and squatters have an interest in demonstrating productive use to attain or maintain ownership as they compete for control over land; 2) under the threat of occupation, landholders may preemptively deforest land, discouraging occupation and raising the value of the land if it is expropriated, lowering a landholder's overall exposure to risk; 3) landholders may collude with squatters and banks to encourage an occupation; 4) squatters may sell land gained by expropriation and move on to occupy land again on the frontier.…”

Environmental and Community Stability of a Mountain Destination: An Analysis of Residents’ Perception

“…Natural resources are often used by societies for livelihood, cultural expression and food but for those societies that depend upon natural resources some conflicts may arise, since it is necessary to determine who have access and who can use those resources [1]. Relationship between societies and natural resources can shape day-to-day activities and long-term wellbeing [2].…”

The Political Economy of Land Conflict in the Eastern Brazilian Amazon

“…Numerous accounts of early peasant resistance (e.g., the War of Cunudos in 1821, the Ronco de Abelha rebellion in 1851, the Quebra-Quilos rebellion in 1874, the Contestado rebellion in 1912, and others) have pointed to the maldistribution of land. 1 Other land-related conflicts occurred during frontier expansion into São Paulo State beginning in the 19th century (Welch 1999;Brannstrom 2001), western Paraná in the 1940s, Matto Grosso in the 1950s (see Velho 1972;Katzman 1977;Foweraker 1981;Schmink and Wood 1992;Mueller, Alston, and Libecap 1994;Alston, Libecap, and Mueller 2000), and Southern Pará at the turn of the 20th century as entrepreneurs started claiming large tracks of Brazil nut forest. A very recent account of land conflict garnering much international attention was the clash between the military police and landless farmers in Eldorado do Carajás, Pará, which led to 19 fatalities (New York Times, April 21, 1996).…”