Land Socio-Economic and Political Issues

There has been a growing interest in studying land as a coupled human–environment system in research and policy making at local, regional, national, and international scales. Investigating contemporary and historical land issues contributes to broader land management plans by linking land systems to the social, economic, and environmental dimensions of sustainability. This Section of the Land journal will focus on studies exploring different land policies and the nexus of human–land–environment tied with contemporary and historical land issues. Understanding the drivers, trends, and impacts of different contemporary and historical land issues on social and natural processes helps to reveal how changes in the land system impact the functioning of socio-economic systems as a whole as well as the tradeoff between these changes. By studying the interplay between social and economic systems that shape land use policies, land issues operate at the interface of the social and economic sciences and require a high level of interdisciplinary collaboration across academic disciplines, which is reflected in this Section of the Land journal. Hence, in this Section, we are seeking to publish articles that examine the comprehensive scope of contemporary and historical land issues, notably socio-economic relations, politics and dynamics of power, land governance, land tenure, access to land, land market, land rights, and other relevant topics at micro (local), meso (national), and macro (global) levels. All manuscripts should be written clearly so that they can be understood by a broad group of scholars and policy makers. Contributions from economists, political economists, socio-economists, development economists, as well as sociologists and political scientists committed to the rigorous study and analysis of land issues are welcome.