Policy Submissions

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Browsing by Author "Cousins, Ben"

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    Reforming communal land tenure in South Africa – why land titling is not the answer: Critical comments on the communal land rights bill, 2002
    (Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2002) Cousins, Ben
    The long-awaited draft Communal Land Rights Bill sets out government’s proposals to resolve urgent land tenure problems in the former ‘homeland’ areas, where most rural South Africans still live, and where land is registered in the name of the state. These problems derive from lack of adequate legal recognition of communal tenure systems, abuse by powerful elites, breakdown of the old permit-based system, and gender inequalities. They result in conflicting claims to land and bitter disputes over authority. Development efforts are severely constrained by lack of clarity on land rights, and the tensions that result. Tenure insecurity also results from the forced overcrowding of these areas under apartheid. This means that de facto rights often overlap and are in conflict.
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    Restitution of land rights amendment bill 2013
    (Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2013) Cousins, Ben; Hall, Ruth; Isaacs, Moenieba; Paradza, Gaynor
    1.1. This document represents a response from researchers at the Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies to the Restitution of Land Rights Amendment Bill as published on 19 October 2013. It is a statement by the signatories below and does not purport to represent the views of the University or the Institute as a whole. All those signing have been supporters of the Restitution programme since its inception in 1994, and several have been intimately involved in its development over the years. 1.2. Our comments are made in the spirit of the original aims of the Restitution of Land Rights Act 22 of 1994: that a just resolution should be found for the situation those dispossessed of land rights through racist and apartheid legislation, and that this should be done in a way that supports the broader national aims of reconciliation and the social and economic development of our people. PLAAS’s experience and role in supporting and monitoring the restitution programme are set out in the later section 10 of this submission.
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    Submission to the Constitutional Review Committee
    (Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2018) Hall, Ruth; Cousins, Ben