What will we do without our land? Land Grabs and Resistance in Rural Cambodia by Alison Elizabeth Schneider A Thesis Submitted to Saint Mary's University, Halifax, Nova Scotia in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts in International Development Studies. December 2010, Halifax, Nova Scotia © Alison Elizabeth Schneider December 2010 Approved: Dr. Saturnino M. Borras Jr. Supervisor Approved: Dr. Henry Veltmeyer Reader Approved: Dr. Walden Bello External Date: December 10, 2010 Library and Archives Biblioth6que et 1*1 Canada Archives Canada Published Heritage Direction du Branch Patrimoine de l'6dition 395 Wellington Street 395, rue Wellington Ottawa ON K1A 0N4 Ottawa ON K1A 0N4 Canada Canada Your file Votre reference ISBN: 978-0-494-72012-7 Our file Notre reference ISBN: 978-0-494-72012-7 NOTICE: AVIS: The author has granted a non- L'auteur a accorde une licence non exclusive exclusive license allowing Library and permettant a la Bibliotheque et Archives Archives Canada to reproduce, Canada de reproduire, publier, archiver, publish, archive, preserve, conserve, sauvegarder, conserver, transmettre au public communicate to the public by par telecommunication ou par I'lnternet, preter, telecommunication or on the Internet, distribuer et vendre des theses partout dans le loan, distribute and sell theses monde, a des fins commerciales ou autres, sur worldwide, for commercial or non- support microforme, papier, electronique et/ou commercial purposes, in microform, autres formats. paper, electronic and/or any other formats. The author retains copyright L'auteur conserve la propriete du droit d'auteur ownership and moral rights in this et des droits moraux qui protege cette these. Ni thesis. Neither the thesis nor la these ni des extraits substantiels de celle-ci substantial extracts from it may be ne doivent etre imprimes ou autrement printed or otherwise reproduced reproduits sans son autorisation. without the author's permission. In compliance with the Canadian Conformement a la lot canadienne sur la Privacy Act some supporting forms protection de la vie privee, quelques may have been removed from this formulaires secondaires ont ete enleves de thesis. cette these. While these forms may be included Bien que ces formulaires aient inclus dans in the document page count, their la pagination, il n'y aura aucun contenu removal does not represent any loss manquant. of content from the thesis. I+I Canada Abstract What will we do without our land? Land Grabs and Resistance in Rural Cambodia by Alison Elizabeth Schneider Dynamics of the global land grab are exemplified in Cambodia, where at least 27 forced evictions took place in 2009, affecting 23,000 people. Estimates suggest that 15 to 20 percent of the population is landless or 'near landless'. Evictions of the rural poor are legitimized by the assumption that non-private land is idle, marginal, or degraded and available for capitalist exploitation. This paper: (1) views accumulation by dispossession as a defining characteristic of land grabs; (2) questions the assumption that land is idle; (3) explores whether land grabs can be regulated through a 'code of conduct'; (4) considers peasant resistance to land grabs. Overall, the Cambodian case studies confirm that land grabs are not benefiting the rural poor. Peasants challenge the existing distribution of power. Although 'everyday forms of peasant politics' are prevalent, 'advocacy politics' is slowly emerging as peasants activate their agency in an effort to prevent the loss of their land and livelihoods. December 10, 2010 Table of Contents Chapter 1: Introduction 1 1.1 Methodology and data gathering 4 1.2 Cambodian context 8 1.3 Overall argument 12 1.4 Thesis outline 13 Chapter 2: Theoretical Explorations on Land Grabs 15 2.1 Land grabs as accumulation by dispossession 16 2.2 The state, private property and development 22 2.3 A code of conduct for Responsible Agricultural Investment 25 2.4 Resistance to dispossession 31 2.5 Conclusion 39 Chapter 3: National Perspective on Lands Grabs in Rural Cambodia 41 3.1 Capitalist accumulation and rural dispossession 42 3.2 Origins of non-private land: forests and state land management 49 3.3 Land governance for land grabs: 2001 Land Law 55 3.4 Resistance 67 3.5 Conclusion 70 i Chapter 4: Land Grabs in Actual Practice: Three Case Studies 71 4.1 Introduction to case studies 71 4.2 Accumulation by dispossession 74 4.3 Land titling and state land 84 4.4 Land governance in actual practice 90 4.5 Resistance at the village level 95 4.6 Conclusion 104 Chapter 5: Summary, Conclusions and Implications 105 Bibliography 112 Abbreviations and Acronyms 143 ii Chapter 1: Introduction The current discourse on the global land grab, mainly coming from civil society (in this case, NGOs, environmental and agrarian social movements, human rights groups) and independent media, has been monitoring the incidence, activities and extent of such land deals. They have brought forward the urgency of looking into the question of the global land grab and its implications for food security and the reported displacement and dispossession of the rural poor in places where such land deals were carried out. However, the dominant radical discourse tends to be weak in terms of explaining how exactly the rural poor1 can benefit - or not ~ from large-scale land investments. The power dynamics that influence how and why dislocation and dispossession actually occur are under-explored in the largely activist literature. Therefore, there is an imperative to for a more rigorous theoretical and empirical study to clarify the mechanisms of dispossession, the possible in/effectiveness of mainstream land policies, and the nature and extent of peasant resistance to land grabs. This will be the main area of inquiry of the current study. At the heart of this research is the question of distribution of power within and between capital, state, and the rural poor which is in turn a key to understanding the character and dynamics of current land grab. The central research question that this study attempts to answer is: can the rural poor in Cambodia benefit from the current large-scale land deals? If so, how; if not, why? 1 Peasants, rural poor, and villagers are used interchangeably to denote subsistence-based agriculturalists living in rural regions of Cambodia. I use the term 'villager' most often when discussing local authorities and national views on large-scale land investments or land grabs because this is the language that they used during our discussions. The term 'peasant' is used to indicate class, which is a critical component to understand the social hierarchies in Cambodia. To most Cambodians, this hierarchy is assumed and immoveable, as it constitutes the basis of societal interactions. 1 Preliminary field reports show that the displacement and dispossession of the rural poor in many countries have been one of the immediate outcomes of the global land grabs. This is exemplified in Cambodia, with 70 percent of the population involved in the agricultural workforce and practicing subsistence consumption (Engvall and Kokko 2007: 7). In 2008, approximately 150,000 people were living under the threat of eviction (Amnesty International 2008: 2). The following year, Cambodia experienced at least 27 forced evictions, affecting 23,000 people (Amnesty International 2009: n.p.). Estimates suggest that 15 to 20 percent of the population is landless or 'near landless' and the percentage is rising (Guttal 2007; 10-11; 9; Ullenberg 2009: 6).2 The gap in the literature discussing rural land grabs in Cambodia and the major impacts that land deals are having on peasants throughout the countryside encourages an examination of empirical evidence in this study. It is assumed in the mainstream policy discourse that 'land governance' - which is understood as the efficient technical and administrative management of policy questions linked to land - encourage financial transactions and greater investment in land, especially agricultural; support the flow of credit to the rural economy; bring economic efficiency through land markets; facilitate effective land administration; and reduce land disputes. So-called 'idle' and 'marginal' lands, especially those that are non- private (i.e. state, public and community lands) have been the main object and target of land titling programs and large-scale land investments. For (trans)national corporations and the governments that collaborate with them, purchasing or contracting non-private lands in the Global South, titled or not, is the perfect opportunity to make their 2 "Near landless" is defined as a household that possesses 0.5 hectares of land or less. In some Cambodian provinces, landlessness is a reality for more than a quarter of the population (for examples, see Sophal & Acharya, 2002). 2 investment. The assumption that these lands are marginal and available for the extraction of capital is questioned in this thesis. Mainstream institutions are also aware of the negative processes and adverse consequences of commercial and state land deals. In response, the notion of 'land governance' measures, first promoted by the World Bank and International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), offers regulations to make such commercial land deals work simultaneously for investors and the poor in target countries. It focuses on land titling and effective Principles for Responsible Agricultural Investment (RAI) to ensure that land exchanges between countries or private interests benefit all parties. Increasing landlessness and the explosion of large-scale land investments in rural Cambodia present an opportunity for a case study that will analyze field data on the impacts of land grabs on rural communities. Adopting a political economy framework, this thesis: (1) views 'accumulation by dispossession' as a defining characteristic of land grabs; (2) questions the assumption that land is idle, marginal, or degraded and available for capitalist exploitation; (3) investigates whether land grabs can be regulated under a code of conduct and; (4) considers the nature and extent of peasant resistance.