Topic
Sharecropping
About: Sharecropping is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 580 publications have been published within this topic receiving 12485 citations.
Papers published on a yearly basis
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Papers
TL;DR: In this article, the authors formulate a simple general equilibrium model of a competitive agricultural economy, based on the risk sharing and incentive properties of alternative distribution systems, which is of interest not only for extending our understanding of these simple economies but also in gaining some insight into the far more complex phenomena of shareholding in modern corporations.
Abstract: At least from the time of Ricardo, economists have begun their investigations of how competitive markets work, how wages, rents and prices are determined, by a detailed examination of agriculture. Even today, agriculture is taken as the paradigm-and perhaps almost the only important example-of a truly competitive market (or at least this was the case until the widespread government intervention in this market). For a number of years I have been concerned with how competitive markets handle risk taking, and how risk affects real resource allocation. Risks in agriculture are clearly tremendously important, yet remarkably the traditional theoretical literature has avoided explicit treatment 3 of risk sharing in agricultural environments. The consequences of this are important. First, it makes suspect the traditional conclusions regarding sharecropping. Is it really true that sharecropping results in too low a supply of labour, because workers equate their share of output times the (value of the) marginal productivity of labour to the marginal disutility of work, whereas Pareto optimality requires the (value of the) marginal productivity of labour be equal to the marginal disutility of work? Or is it true, as Wicksell asserted, that there is no distincion between landlords hiring labour or labour renting land? Second, it leaves unanswered many of the important economic questions. How is the equilibrium share determined? Why have some economies (in the past or at present) used one distribution system, other economies used others? Our object is to formulate a simple general equilibrium model of a competitive agricultural economy. (Other general equilibrium models of competitive economies with uncertainty have been formulated by Arrow [2] and Debreu [9], Diamond [10], and Stiglitz [14]. Each of these has its serious limitations in describing the workings of the modern capitalist economy. (See Stiglitz [15]).) The model is of interest not only for extending our understanding of these simple economies but also in gaining some insight into the far more complex phenomena of shareholding in modern corporations. Our focus is on the risk sharing and incentive properties of alternative distribution systems. The analysis is divided into two parts. In the first, the amount of labour (effort) supplied by an individual is given, and the analysis focuses on the risk sharing aspects of
1,504 citations
TL;DR: This article conducted a large-scale survey of agriculturalists in 11 African countries to determine the ability of farmers in Africa to detect climate change, and to ascertain how they have adapted to whatever climate change they believe has occurred.
Abstract: The objective of this paper is to determine the ability of farmers in Africa to detect climate change, and to ascertain how they have adapted to whatever climate change they believe has occurred. The paper also asks farmers whether they perceive any barriers to adaptation and attempts to determine the characteristics of those farmers who, despite claiming to have witnessed climate change, have not yet responded to it. The study is based on a large-scale survey of agriculturalists in 11 African countries. The survey reveals that significant numbers of farmers believe that temperatures have already increased and that precipitation has declined. Those with the greatest experience of farming are more likely to notice climate change. Further, neighboring farmers tell a consistent story. There are important differences in the propensity of farmers living in different locations to adapt and there may be institutional impediments to adaptation in some countries. Although large numbers of farmers perceive no barriers to adaptation, those that do perceive them tend to cite their poverty and inability to borrow. Few if any farmers mentioned lack of appropriate seed, security of tenure, or market accessibility as problems. Those farmers who perceive climate change but fail to respond may require particular incentives or assistance to do what is ultimately in their own best interests. Although experienced farmers are more likely to perceive climate change, it is educated farmers who are more likely to respond by making at least one adaptation.
1,269 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors present new evidence using detailed data collected from eight Indian villages, showing that most tenants own some land of their own; this provides a controlled environment in studying the impact of contractual arrangements.
Abstract: The "Marshallian" approach assumes a prohibitively high cost of monitoring the sharecropper's activities while the "monitoring" approach argues that landlords stipulate and effectively monitor sharecroppers' activities. I present new evidence using detailed data collected from eight Indian villages. Most tenants own some land of their own; this provides a controlled environment in studying the impact of contractual arrangements. The differences in input and output intensities on owned minus sharecropped land of the same household are found to be sizable and significant, suggesting a rejection of the monitoring approach and supporting the notion of the "Marshallian productive inefficiency" of sharecropping.
451 citations
TL;DR: For example, the authors pointed out that the existing empirical work tends to focus on the question of efficiency, and that the theoretical models tend to examine contracts that bear little resemblance to those found in the United States today.
Abstract: E CONOMISTS have expended enormous effort examining the rationale for various contractual arrangements in agriculture, particularly sharecropping. While economists have made considerable theoretical efforts to understand agricultural contracts, few empirical studies have been undertaken. The dearth of empirical analyses of agricultural contracts is particularly striking for modern Western agriculture.' This is an important omission, not only because the existing empirical work tends to focus on the question of efficiency, but also because the theoretical models tend to examine contracts that bear little resemblance to those found in the United States today.
333 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors compare inheritance versus equal division of land ownership in Europe and Sub-Saharan Africa, focusing on the transition from collective farms to individual farms in Central and Eastern Europe.
Abstract: 1. Access to land and Land Policy Reforms 2. Impartible Inheritance Versus Equal Division: A Comparative Perspective Centered on Europe and Sub-Saharan Africa 3. Intrahousehold Access to Land and Source of Inefficiency: Theory and Concepts 4. Land Rights and Natural Resource Management in the Transition to Individual Ownership: case Studies from Ghana and Indonesia 5. The Puzzle of Counterproductive Property Rights Reform: A Conceptual Analysis 6. Case Study. Property Rights: Access to Land and Forest Resources in Uganda 7. Devolution of Control of Common-Pool Resources to Local Communities: Experiences in Forestry 8. Access to Land via Land Rental Markets 9. Case Study. Regulating the Sharecropping System: Operation Barga 10. Land market Liberalization and the Agrarian Question in Latin America 11. The Changing Role of the State in Latin American Land Reforms 12. Case Study. Grassroots-Initiated Land reform in Brazil: The Rural Landless Workers' Movement 13. Negotiated Land Reform as One Way of Land Access: Experiences from Colombia, Brazil, and South Africa 14. Transition form Collective Farms to Individual Tenures in Central and Eastern Europe 15. Case Study. The Dramatic Rise of Individual Farming in Albania: Causes and Effects 16. Case Study. Post-Communist Land Reform and Changes in Tenure in the Czech Republic 17. The Evolution of the World Ban's Land Policy
328 citations
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Performance Metrics
| Year | Papers |
|---|---|
| 2025 | 10 |
| 2024 | 13 |
| 2023 | 21 |
| 2022 | 18 |
| 2021 | 10 |
| 2020 | 14 |