| This dissertation investigates new patterns of property rights to collective forest land in order to analyze rural China's contemporary political and ecological transformation. The study reveals the new patterns by first tracing historical changes in forest property rights during the initial quarter-century of Communist rule and then by systematically examining how these rights have been redefined, negotiated, and contested in Sichuan Province as China has gradually dismantled its planned economy over the past quarter-century.; The particular focus of the research is a policy promulgated in 1992 and hailed by Chinese officials as a breakthrough in forest land management called the “Four Wastelands Auction Policy.” The policy's reliance on market-based incentives to promote reforestation of barren lands distinguishes it from previous soil conservation policies. While policymakers insist that the Wasteland Auction Policy diversifies property rights without altering state and collective land ownership, which are fundamental principles of China's “socialist market economy,” my research demonstrates that local officials have introduced innovations to the policy and made it a mechanism for privatizing valuable forest land.; Systematic inquiry into the wasteland auction process provides evidence of the previously undocumented privatization of property rights to land in China. Specifically, the field data demonstrate that the Wasteland Auction Policy has provided networks of local political and economic elites with opportunities to both privatize and appropriate collective land. This transformation of property-rights patterns has consequently altered mountain landscapes, widened the gap between rich and poor households, and increased the frequency of land disputes.; Unlike other studies of property rights in China, my dissertation hinges on ethnographic inquiry conducted over eight, month-long fieldtrips to the Yangtze River Valley. Extended village stays with one family enabled me to undertake comparative and historical case studies of wasteland auctions in four collectives belonging to two neighboring villages. I complemented my fieldwork with interviews at the provincial, county, and township seats with forestry officials responsible for implementing the Wasteland Auction Policy. Some of these officials gave me the opportunity to examine relevant documents usually restricted for internal use. Additionally, my research drew on Chinese-language publications including press reports, periodicals, and local gazetteers. |
