Speaking truth to power is an art, but increasingly a lost art. This goes as much for academia as for the rest of the world. Indeed and unfortunately, much of academia reflects the world in which it functions and often makes the challenge of deepening social justice harder rather than smaller. To put it bluntly, much of academia has resorted to instrumental and naïve beliefs in innovation, technology and efficiency (which dominate the natural sciences) or (as in much of the social-economic sciences) increasingly arcane niche debates that too often revolve around virtue-signalling, methodological-theoretical wizardry or apolitical pragmatism. What we seem to have lost to a good degree – though to be sure: it was never a dominant endeavour and at the same time it has never been absent either – is the art of speaking truth to power.
After a four-year hiatus, the World Bank Land Conference took place again in Washington, D.C. this May, convening one thousand government, civil society, and land stakeholders in person and thousands more online. The theme of the 2024 conference was "Securing Land Tenure and Access for Climate Action," an exciting and meaningful frame for discussing an issue near to our hearts – open access to land information.
The Land Portal organized a panel on building a robust and open land information infrastructure for tenure security and climate action in Africa, moderated by Romy Sato. The session featured an outstanding panel of speakers from the public and private sectors representing perspectives on land data from Malawi, Madagascar, Mozambique, Namibia, Senegal, and Uganda.
Rapid response mechanisms (RRMs) are a new, proactive legal approach designed to provide legal and technical support to communities facing nascent conflicts related to land-based investments. RRMs provide preventative rather than reactive legal help the moment a conflict arises or community members’ rights are threatened, rather than trying to reverse rights violations once they have already occurred.
After a four-year hiatus, the World Bank Land Conference took place again in Washington, D.C. this May, convening one thousand government, civil society, and land stakeholders in person and thousands more online. The theme of the 2024 conference was "Securing Land Tenure and Access for Climate Action," an exciting and meaningful frame for discussing an issue near to our hearts – open access to land information.
The Land Portal Foundation, in partnership with Transparency International, hosted the webinar titled "Breaking New Ground: Insights and Stories on the Impact of Land Corruption on Discriminated Groups in Africa." The webinar brought together a panel of distinguished experts to delve into the challenges and complexities of corruption intertwined with discrimination in land rights and governance. This session provided crucial insights through detailed case studies and expert analyses, offering pathways towards more equitable land management practices.
Under the umbrella of the Land Dialogues series, the first webinar of this year’s series “Leading the Way : How Indigenous Youth Combat Climate Change Through Land Rights” took place on April 11th, 2024. The webinar drew in a little over 200 participants and featured young Indigenous and local community leaders from around the world. The series is organized by a consortium of organizations, including the Land Portal Foundation, the Ford Foundation and the Tenure Facility and this particular webinar was organized by organization YILAA and TINTA.
How will the next generations be able to access land to support their livelihoods and what ideas they bring to make agriculture and other land-based activities more sustainable?
A Recap of the Recent Land Portal-MRLG Webinar on Gender Equitable Land Governance in the Mekong Region
On Thursday 15 February, the Mekong Region Land Governance (MRLG) project and the Land Portal launched the first webinar in the State of Land in the Mekong series. The series, which will consist of three webinars across 2024 and 2025, aims to shine a spotlight on land issues in the Mekong region during a time of immense rural transformation.
The Hague Institute for Innovation of Law (HIIL) and the Netherlands Enterprise Agency (RVO) are delighted to announce a new collaboration for complementary LAND-at-scale activities in Iraq. Activities focus on justice innovation and support: by scouting, vetting, selecting and supporting promising local and existing justice initiatives in Northern Iraq, HIIL aims to strengthen the localization of justice solutions for Iraqi people.
This webinar took place on February 15th, 2024, under the title “Women’s Participation in Land Governance in the Mekong : Moving Beyond Quotas to Meaningful Inputs and Influence”. The webinar featured panelists from researchers to youth representatives. The webinar was jointly organized by the Land Portal Foundation and Mekong Region Land Governance (MRLG).