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The Failure of British Land Policy at the Cape, 1812–281

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 January 2009

L. C. Duly
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Extract

During the first years of British rule at the Cape, a complacency, reinforced by a disregard for colonial conditions and by a disdain for day-to-day supervision, relegated land administration to a marginal function of the Cape Town and London governments. The first major change in the land code was made in 1812 by Governor Cradock, who wanted to obtain the loyalty of the Boer in order to ensure continued British overlordship of the colony, but from 1813 to 1828 and beyond, Government failed to develop an effective administrative system for processing the applications for land grants under the Cradock code. No check was made on the incompetent officials in Cape Town who were entrusted with transforming the decrees of government into a workable land alienation system. On occasion, London, which had but a fleeting interest in land policy in the period under review, imposed new restrictions on the administrative process in order to obtain some other goal. The persistent lack of constructive activity by the British suggests that they did much to prevent the Boer from identifying himself with the Cape Town government.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of African History , Volume 6 , Issue 3 , November 1965 , pp. 357 - 371
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1965

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References

1 The author wishes to thank the Sub-Sahara African Area Committee of the Ford Commonwealth Studies-International Relations Fund of Duke University for its generous support. Also, he expresses his gratitude to Professor H. M. Robertson, University of Cape Town.Google Scholar

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