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Agricultural Land, Gender and Kinship in Rural China and Vietnam: A Comparison of Two Villages
Author(s) -
BÉLANGER DANIÈLE,
LI XU
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
journal of agrarian change
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.63
H-Index - 56
eISSN - 1471-0366
pISSN - 1471-0358
DOI - 10.1111/j.1471-0366.2009.00201.x
Subject(s) - kinship , entitlement (fair division) , china , dominance (genetics) , geography , vietnamese , land tenure , position (finance) , socioeconomics , economic growth , livelihood , development economics , agriculture , political science , sociology , economics , biochemistry , chemistry , linguistics , philosophy , mathematical economics , archaeology , finance , law , gene
This study examines the impact of current land policies in China and Vietnam on women's entitlement to land, women's wellbeing and gender power relations. The ethnographic study of one village in each of the two countries contextualizes women's lives in the kinship and marriage system in which power and gender relations are embedded. Current land policies, when implemented in the existing kinship and marriage system, make women's entitlement to land more vulnerable than men's, limit women's choices and weaken their power position. Variations in kinship rules in the two countries lead to different outcomes. In the Chinese village the dominance of patrilocal marriage and exogamous marriages limits women's access to land, whereas in the Vietnamese village the rigid concentration of inheritance to males puts women in a difficult position. The comparison between communities of rural China and Vietnam reveals the importance of considering gender and kinship when studying the implementation and impact of land policies.