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Land Policy: A Framework for Analysis and Action

I chose the topic of land and land policy as my contribution to this collection of essays in honour of Tony Allott because it seemed to me that there are certain parallels between the role of land in society and the role of Tony Allott in the development of the study of African Law and indeed of the study of the law of pre-literate societies by lawyers in the United Kingdom. Land is central to the workings of any society, but especially is this so in respect of pre-literate societies and societies subjected to the impact of colonialism. So too has Tony's work been central to the growth of our understanding of the workings of customary law in African society and the manifold problems created by the impact of received law i.e. for the most part Western Europe law brought by the colonial powers, on customary law and society. Those of us who began our careers of law teaching and legal scholarship in Africa owe a great debt to Tony for his pioneering work in the field and for his tireless efforts to promote African legal scholarship. In going beyond Africa as I do in this essay, I am once again following in Tony's path for he long ago realised that law in Africa is a part only of the great family of law in the developing world and one can no more isolate African legal scholarship from that world than one can isolate land from the society of which it is a part. It is to this that I now turn.