# 2 ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK

The principal concern in this paper is with the ability of the rural poor and other socially excluded groups<sup>2</sup> to gain access to and effective control over cultivable land. This calls for an analytical framework that allows for subtle nuances in the definition of property rights.

The analytical framework adopted here distinguishes individuals' rights, claims or interests in land according to three parameters: (i) whether or not they may legally be upheld, under prevailing legislation _(strict legality);_ (ii) whether or not they are socially perceived to be legitimate, irrespective of their strict legality _(social legitimacy);_ and (iii) whether or not they are actually exercised in practice, and therefore translate into effective control over land _(effective control)._ The last of these parameters refers to the degree of tenure security that is enjoyed in practice, regardless of the type of rights. For example, an individual with limited usufruct rights may enjoy security of tenure, if s/he is confident that s/he will actually be able to exercise those rights when necessary. Conversely, an individual with ownership rights to a parcel of land may find his or her claim to be vulnerable to land-grabbing by another individual with greater bargaining power, voice, and leverage over government officials, particularly if the original landholder's rights are not recorded in the official land records. The relative bargaining power of diverse agents strongly influences the extent to which individuals are able to enjoy effective command over land and other resources. The rural poor and other socially excluded groups, by definition, have less bargaining power vis A vis other agents (Leach, Mearns and Scoones 1998).

Generally speaking, ownership rights (which may be acquired through inheritance or the sale/purchase market) are the most secure. They are also the least likely to be enjoyed by the rural poor and other socially excluded groups. Individuals not owning land but still relying on land for at least part of their livelihood may also gain access to land through: (i) the land-lease (rental) market; (ii) customary use rights in commons; and/or (iii) encroachment on public land<sup>3</sup> . These forms of property rights may be more or less secure, depending on prevailing legislation (e.g. are tenancies legally recognized and protected?); their perceived social legitimacy (e.g. are women able in practice to exercise their legal rights to land under prevailing social norms and customs?);

- **2** Patterns of social exclusion tend to be closely correlated though not synonymous with the incidence of poverty. It is well recognized that people of scheduled tribes and scheduled castes in India are much more likely than other groups to live below the poverty line. Throughout this paper, 'socially excluded groups' refer to people of scheduled tribes and castes, women, and the rural poor. All of these groups are more likely than better-off or more powerful and influential groups to suffer from forms of discrimination atthe hands of those government officials with whom they come into contact, and to be more or less excluded from receiving entitlemen **t** s hrough administrative procedures.

- **3** Owing to non-compatible definitions and mis-classification, it is difficult to obtain reliable estimates of the relative shares of the total land area in India under different uses and tenure regimes. The broad picture is as follows: private, cultivable land amounts to around 58 percent of the total land area for which records are available (of which around 9 percent is fallow and 2 percent under tree crops); forest land amounts to 22 percent of the total area (half of which has a forest cover of less than 40 percent); uncultivated (revenue) 'wastelands' 7percent; rocky, barren land 7 percent; and urban/nonagricultural land 7 percent. 'Commons' include both cultivable and uncultivable wastelands, and some forest land, amounting to roughly 20 per cent of the total land area (World Bank 1993: 5).

4