Musing on HLP Rights

I've returned from Thailand, where I was attending a workshop to discuss housing, land and property (or HLP) rights.

HLP issues aren't just a result of conflict, they're often also an underlying cause. In earlier posts I've said that land was a key cause of the conflict in the Solomons Islands. Migration between the islands was pretty minor until the introduction of the cash economy. During WWII, the American forces brought people from Malaita - the most populous island in the Solomons - to Guadacanal as labourers. After that, development continued to be focused in Honiara, on Guadacanal, and there were actually development policies that deliberately discouraged development on Malaita so as to use it as a source of indentured labour.

This obviously led to increased transactions in land. Land in the Solomons is governed by custom (only about 4% is outside the customary system). Attempts to register land have been made, but have been largely unsuccessful. Some land was legitimately leased and there were written leases, some land was legitimately transferred according to custom (non-Guadacanalese can't 'own' it, but they can have certain rights to occupy etc), other transactions were entirely illegitimate according to custom because they occurred with a male individual (land on Guadacanal is transferred matrilineally and is communally held). There was also squatting on top of this.

Malaitans came to hold dominant positions in the economy (accounting for 75% of the police force!), and this, together with increased competition for land and employment, was resented by Guadacanalese. It was particularly resented by Guadacanalese youth, who had no land, no work, no education...you get the picture. They began stockpiling weapons in 1997/98, and the Premier of Guadacanal gave a highly divisive speech demanding the return of "stolen land" and compensation for the use of land for development, and compensation for alleged murders. As is the case in many so-called "traditional" societies, land in the Solomons has not just economic, but social and spiritual importance. Compensation also plays an important role in Melanesian culture. So, the Premier's speech was powerful indeed.

These patterns exist throughout the developing world. The constitutions and legislation of many countries recognise customary tenure - and this is a good thing, since a failure to do so creates a wealth of problems, not least of which is legal pluralism - however customary systems didn't evolve in a cash economy, and there's a desperate need to think about how the two can interact in a manner that facilitates tenure security rather than disputation.

Lots more to say, but for now, I thought I'd stick a few resources here:

Do people who flee their homes to escape war or natural disaster have a right to return to them?

A lack of international expertise in humanitarian relief makes the tasks involved in aid operations even more complicated.

Land Policy in Post-Conflict Circumstances: Some Lessons from East Timor