This workshop facilitates inquiry of the global forces influencing changes in property rights related to land today and over the past two centuries. One of the workshop's key issues is: have there been converging trends in land rights during recent world history? Another is: do certain property regimes invariably lead to land degradation and other, negative environmental outcomes related to the land? A dozen scholars from several different disciplines whose expertise reaches across a number of world regions are participating in the workshop. Specifically, they meet for four sequential sessions over a span of two years, each presenting, critiquing and refining an analysis of these issues for a given world region. A second stage of the workshop focuses on the development of a synthesizing essay that looks at trends in property regimes and their influence on environmental issues from a global perspective. The project is significant in advancing basic understanding of the evolution of property rights due to its transnational focus and contributing to global policy debates about how to govern human use of land in the contemporary world.
