Thesis (master's)--Kaiserliche Universität Dorpat. / Errata at end of text. Reproduction of original from Kress Library of Business and Economics, Harvard University. Goldsmiths'-Kress no. 33662.14. Includes bibliographical references.

Privately-owned estates dominate Scotland's uplands, and their owners' decisions greatly influence rural communities. While the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003 has altered power relations in rural areas, its impact on landowner-community dynamics has received little attention. Discourse on the contemporary ‘estate community' and factors determining its ‘sustainability' has also been minimal. The research reported here, involving in-depth case studies on six, upland, private estates, aims to address these knowledge gaps and contribute to Scottish policy on sustainable land use and community development. Scoping interviews with a group of expert commentators informed the design of a national survey of private landowners, and this, in turn, facilitated case study selection. The research questions were explored through a triangulated method of household questionnaires, interviews with key actors (in the local community and in estate management), and participant observation. This grounded, ethnographic approach generated an in-depth understanding of the threats and opportunities facing rural communities and private landowners in upland Scotland, in addition to the key factors required to promote their sustainability, and the constraints to achieving this goal. The results showed (i) that many key factors and constraints are shared by the estate and the community; (ii) that their sustainability is interlinked; and therefore (iii) that estate-community interaction and positive engagement is crucial. Evaluation of estate-community interaction and engagement processes reveals opportunities and challenges for effective approaches. Evaluation of the prospects for landowner/estate-community partnership working illustrates the opportunities for mutual benefits, and the need for greater community empowerment to ensure partnership success. These findings are reinforced from a Habermasian perspective. Private landowners are recommended to adopt three key roles - as contributor, enabler and partner - in order to contribute positively to estate community sustainability, and, in turn, to private estate sustainability and public legitimacy. The research informs a concluding set of best practice recommendations.

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Includes bibliographic references. / This research develops a pro-poor prenuptial agreement as an innovative land tenure tool to secure rights in urban subsidized housing. The model tested is confined to prenuptial agreements under the Marriage Act, but is relevant to other cohabitation or marital agreements that could be used to secure social tenure arising from intimate relationships. The model aims at securing the tenure of the entire household, in particular the more vulnerable members of the household. The research focuses on urban State -subsidized housing, with an emphasis on the Western Cape, South Africa. This housing is transferred to beneficiaries by registration of individual or co-ownership at the Deeds Registry, with the title deeds public documents. While prenuptial agreements are not usually regarded as a land tenure tool, the fact that they are also public documents registered at the Deeds Office makes them pertinent. A limited dataset of recent academic writing is analysed to identify the social context of household conflict and tenure insecurity, and existing legal template clauses assessed. The prenuptial template design is predicated on current tenure approaches that regard informal practices as equally relevant for the poor's tenure security as the formal law. The template uses various strategies to manage tenure insecurity arising from the death of an owner, disputes, or threatened eviction of dependents. It also aims to ensure that diverse normative beliefs are respected, particularly African normative systems. A personal servitude is used to secure housing tenure as a real right burdening the land, making this a very secure right. In addition the template includes a succession agreement and dispute resolution mechanisms. The template model is tested on clients simulated by re-storying the facts of two seminal Constitutional Court cases and a recent case study of another researcher. Focus groups are held with housing beneficiaries and interviews with housing officials, as a preliminary test of the private and public reception of such agreements. The need for legal aid is discussed. The research makes clear that cohabitation and marital agreements can be used to secure overlapping land rights that the ownership paradigm does not currently protect.

The first object of this essay is to trace any tendency of the Natives in the Cape Colony to modify their own communal system of land occupation in favour of any system more approximating to the Western ideal of individual tenure or ownership. The significance of any such tendency need not be emphasised. The communal occupation of land is one of the most essential bases of tribal organisation. It is closely linked up with the organisation of the family as an economic unit, as well as with the tribe in that aspect. It is, indeed, at the very roots of the Native family and tribal system. To trace any changes from communal to individual occupation mu.st be a part, therefore, of a larger study, viz., of the development of tribal life so as to admit of free economic action by individuals untrammelled by the bonds of tribal custom.

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The development of and changes in human social organization have been a concern of anthropological research since the inception of the discipline. A perspective that focuses on the interaction between exogenous (ecological and historical) variables and social organization is argued for herein. This study tests the idea that inheritance patterns reflect both land use and sociohistorical factors. Further, it is suggested that after their move into the American Southwest, the inheritance of agricultural land was influential in the development, although not necessarily the origins, of matrilineality among the Navajo. Data were obtained on land tenure practices in Canyon de Chelly and its major tributary, Canyon del Muerto, historically important centers of Navajo agriculture. Detailed interviews with 93% of the Navajo families owning land in the canyons provided information on land use and inheritance patterns since the 1880s. Data from over 400 cases of land transfers were analyzed. Historical documents and archaeological studies also provided information on Navajo settlement patterns, changes in farming practices and environmental fluctuations since the mid-1700s. Within the past fifty years, and probably longer, topographic and physiographic differences between Canyon de Chelly and Canyon del Muerto have contributed to variations in land use within the canyon system. Ditch irrigated feed crops are now only grown in Canyon del Muerto, and they are commonly used by families involved in market oriented cattle ranching. Further, as a result of erosion problems, the production potential of some canyon areas, as well as the quantity of arable land, is declining. Not all families are able to meet the increasing need for labor and capital intensive practices that could maximize agricultural production on their canyon land, but it remains a highly valued resource. This research indicates that since the 1880s agricultural land in Canyon de Chelly has been transferred more frequently along matrilineal lines, and the explanations for the differences in land tenure patterns between the canyons over time relate both to ecological and socio-historical variables. In conclusion, it is argued that the complexity found within this canyon system reflects a heterogeneity common to any culture, but which anthropologists tend to overlook.