Common lands between two forces

Ways of privatisation and preservation of assets and uses in Spain during the long nineteenth century

Abstract

This text reviews the transformations experienced by commons lands in Spain between the eighteenth and twentieth centuries based on the notion of "bundles of rights". It is suggested that the process of change was the result of the confrontation of different alternative models, starting with privatization or conservation. As for privatization as such, several alternatives were advocated and eventually implemented, depending on the social groups that promoted them and their balance of power. In stylized form, two alternatives, not necessarily incompatible, are contrasted: on the one hand, privatization in the form of large property units with concentration of land in the hands of an elite of creditors and investors, and on the other hand, privatization in small lots with broader social participation and greater access to land. For its part, the conservation of communal lands did not prevent the privatization of their use, in some cases in favor of large industrial companies in the timber, resin and cork sectors, and on other occasions in the service of social inclusion policies through the distribution of plots of land for cultivation to the rural proletariat.