Gender and Land Dispossession: A Comparative Analysis

This paper was published by UN Women in July 2017. It was written by Michael Levien (assistant professor at John Hopkins University, USA) and studies the gendered impacts of rural land dispossession.The paper discusses five case studies – from England, Gambia, India and Indonesia – where rural women were deprived of independent land rights. Such dispossession occurred without much consultation with the women and intensified their role in household ‘reproductive work’. The paper concludes that “…land dispossession consistently contributes to gender inequality.”The 34-page publication contains six chapters: Introduction (chapter 1); Case 1: The English enclosures (chapter 2); Case 2: Wetland rice projects in Gambia (chapter 3); Case 3: Large dams in India (chapter 4); Case 4: Oil palm plantations in West Kalimantan (chapter 5); Case 5: Special economic zones in India (chapter 6).