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The Relationship Between Legal Knowledge and Villagers’ Preferences for Customary Farmland Reallocation: A Case Study of Village X in the North China Plain

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 May 2025

Bin Jia Open the ORCID record for Bin Jia [Opens in a new window]  and
Gakuto Takamura Open the ORCID record for Gakuto Takamura [Opens in a new window]
Bin Jia*
Affiliation:
Graduate School of Policy Science, Ritsumeikan University, Osaka, Japan
Gakuto Takamura
Affiliation:
Graduate School of Policy Science, Ritsumeikan University, Osaka, Japan
*
Corresponding author: Bin Jia; Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

The persistence of customary land use practices is a significant focus in the sociology of law. This paper examines this issue by analysing the ongoing practice of farmland reallocation in rural China, where villages periodically reallocate farmland based on household size. Although the Rural Land Contract Law (RLCL) prohibits this practice and emphasizes the protection of farmers’ property rights, it continues to persist. Research has found that village elites who are well versed in the RLCL often maintain this practice by exploiting legal exceptions. However, for this practice to continue, it requires the support of ordinary farmers, making their legal knowledge crucial. Based on this, the paper hypothesizes that the practice persists because legal knowledge has not yet widely spread among farmers. While this hypothesis was not confirmed through the survey, the findings suggest that state law remains distant from ordinary farmers, almost as if it is irrelevant to them.

Keywords

Rural Land Contract Lawcustomary farmlandlegal knowledgefarmland reallocationlegal consciousness
Type
Research Article
Information
Asian Journal of Law and Society , First View , pp. 1 - 21
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2025. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Asian Journal of Law and Society

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