Beyond Property: Law and Land in the Iberian World (1510-1850)

A Research Agenda

verfasst von: Manuel Bastias Saavedra, Camilla de Freitas Macêdo
Abstract: The article introduces the IberLAND project, which seeks to provide a new, non-Eurocentric history of the development of land tenure from a global perspective. The idea that property was invented in Europe and transferred to the non-European world through colonialism, more than reflecting a historical process, is the product of a colonial image of the world based on the assumption that the European experience was inherently more advanced than those of other world regions. Recent research, however, has shown that this assumption needs to be revised. Until the late eighteenth century, land tenure in Europe was not characterized by private property. Instead, land was organized through different forms of reciprocal obligations between kings and subjects and lords and tenants, but also tied to cities and towns, kinship and marriage, as well as various forms of communal usage or ownership. If the traditional narrative of property does not provide an accurate account of land tenure arrangements across the early modern Iberian world, then we must look back and ask certain basic questions: How did people live on the land? How did they distribute it? How did they organize the relations to the land both inside and outside the group? How did contemporaries describe their relationship to the land? Which norms governed these relationships? How were these norms affected by the imperial experience? How did these relations change over time? IberLAND aims to provide a shared analytical framework that allows scholars from all territories influenced by the Iberian crowns to explore the experiences that shaped land relations in each of them. This framework takes into account both the local nuances of these relations and the broader dimensions of colonization. We believe it has the potential to avoid binary comparisons with other colonial experiences and to understand its parallels more accurately.
Organisationseinheit(en): Historisches Seminar
Typ: Artikel
Journal: Globalgeschichte/Global History
Band: 2,2
Seiten: 23-54
Anzahl der Seiten: 31
ISSN: 2941-7562
Publikationsdatum: 2024
Publikationsstatus: Veröffentlicht
Peer-reviewed: Ja
Elektronische Version(en): https://doi.org/10.13173/GG.2.2.023 (Zugang: Offen)

BibTeX

@article{fa44be4bceb845179f79115048c03e8b,
title = "Beyond Property: Law and Land in the Iberian World (1510-1850): A Research Agenda",
abstract = "The article introduces the IberLAND project, which seeks to provide a new, non-Eurocentric history of the development of land tenure from a global perspective. The idea that property was invented in Europe and transferred to the non-European world through colonialism, more than reflecting a historical process, is the product of a colonial image of the world based on the assumption that the European experience was inherently more advanced than those of other world regions. Recent research, however, has shown that this assumption needs to be revised. Until the late eighteenth century, land tenure in Europe was not characterized by private property. Instead, land was organized through different forms of reciprocal obligations between kings and subjects and lords and tenants, but also tied to cities and towns, kinship and marriage, as well as various forms of communal usage or ownership. If the traditional narrative of property does not provide an accurate account of land tenure arrangements across the early modern Iberian world, then we must look back and ask certain basic questions: How did people live on the land? How did they distribute it? How did they organize the relations to the land both inside and outside the group? How did contemporaries describe their relationship to the land? Which norms governed these relationships? How were these norms affected by the imperial experience? How did these relations change over time? IberLAND aims to provide a shared analytical framework that allows scholars from all territories influenced by the Iberian crowns to explore the experiences that shaped land relations in each of them. This framework takes into account both the local nuances of these relations and the broader dimensions of colonization. We believe it has the potential to avoid binary comparisons with other colonial experiences and to understand its parallels more accurately.",
author = "{Bastias Saavedra}, Manuel and {de Freitas Mac{\^e}do}, Camilla",
year = "2024",
doi = "10.13173/GG.2.2.023",
language = "English",
volume = "2,2",
pages = "23--54",
journal = "Globalgeschichte/Global History",
issn = "2941-7562",
}