The people’s choice: options for land ownership in South Africa’s land reform

Abstract

This paper analyses land tenure reform in South Africa from the perspective of land redistribution and restitution projects. It takes the absence of a clearly defined tenure reform in the country as its point of departure to argue that land redistribution and restitution projects serve as a vehicle through which forms of land tenure in post-apartheid South Africa are expressed. There is dissonance between the official position on giving land to large groups under the legal entity of the CPA and the practice and preferences at project sites. The paper suggests that a progressive land tenure reform policy requires a bottom-up approach that takes into consideration various ways in which beneficiaries of land reform could own and use land.

Succession Planning and the Sustainability of the Land Reform Programme in Zimbabwe

“…Although land reform in South Africa generally sought to reverse the apartheid-induced land ownership disparities, it also sought to prevent any possible post-settlement failure (De Villiers, 2003: 42). Another challenge was its poor implementation and lack of protection of farm workers’ and dwellers’ rights (Binswanger-Mkhize, 2014: 262) and that of the victims of land dispossessions during the apartheid era (Ramutsindela and Mogashoa, 2013: 314). The South African land reform programme was on-going and highly contentious with issues of succession and sustainability likely to be of concern for some time.…”

Non‐income effect of land ownership and tenure on subjective wellbeing in South Africa

“…Wealth inequality in South Africa remains a persistent socioeconomic difficulty that is most evident in the land ownership patterns of the historically disadvantaged (Statistics South Africa, 2019a). The legal framework of the colonial and apartheid governments that systematically excluded black Africans from legally owning land, has had far‐reaching impacts on the ownership and tenure security of approximately 30 million people in South Africa (Rugege, 2004; Treiman, 2005; Ramutsindela and Mogashoa, 2013). Two decades after the advent of democracy in South Africa, the legacy of this spatial separation continues to determine the current socioeconomic landscape as land ownership remains heavily skewed towards a minority (Nobel and Wright, 2013).…”

“…This debate, also presumed within the laws of the current governing institutions, enforces a divisive understanding of historical land ownership patterns in South Africa. Ramutsindela and Mogashoa (2013:309) submit that the dual tenure system, endorsed by the colonial government to advance its imperial interests, obscures the fact that Africans “purchased and owned land as individuals, syndicates and as tribes.”…”