Legacy Land: Disaster Capitalism and Land Grabs

The process of dispossession and formalization work in similar ways to draw land and people into a market economy governed by rules of private property rights (Goffe, 2023). After emancipation from slavery, the tiny British outpost of Barbuda was left in common ownership of the descendants of the slaves. The concept of private property and the sale of land was impossible for almost 200 hundred years. In 2017 Barbuda was devastated by Hurricane Irma and their communal land tenure was overturned by the government in Antigua. Since then, foreign developers have taken advantage of their forced displacement to clear acres of forest to build a playground for the ultra-wealthy.

In this webinar, we talk with members of Barbuda Land Actors, a group working to protect the communal land tenure of the island for environmental social and economic self-sufficiency.

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