Making Land Markets Work for All 1

SUMMARY The design of land administration systems needed to support land markets now benefits from the broader theoretical framework of the discipline. The arrival of new “tool box” approaches has also enriched our capacity to design systems that work despite the diversity of national approaches and experiences. The central feature of land markets is the concept of property. The concept is cerebral, conceptual and divorced from physical reality: this is both its challenge and its weakness. The property concept appears at an early stage in development of land markets but is not well understood. Despite popular thinking, design of land administration systems for land market operations does not revolve around managing land. Rather the design revolves around management of this abstract and cerebral concept, with management of land itself as an essential but secondary function. An analysis of the stages of development of systems of market administration can help explain how markets develop abstract concepts into commodities. The stages can help national implementation of pro-market systems without sacrificing pro-poor initiatives.