During revolution and national unification, Vietnamese government nationalized agricultural and forest land throughout the country. While agricultural land was de-collectivized in the Doi moi reforms since mid-1980s, the majority of forest and forest land has continued to be managed by state enterprises. For members of Vietnam’s 53 recognized ethnic minority groups, the formation of state-owned forest enterprises (SFEs) has meant the end of customary tenure arrangements, leading to exclusion from traditional lands used for agriculture, hunting, and collection of non-timber forest products.

Issue poster about Indigenous Peoples in Asia and their common experiences and issues.

Law is society's institution which
articulates rules to govern legal and non-legal
institutions. Rules of legal institutions aim to protect the
citizen against discretionary and arbitrary power, ensure
equality with others and guarantee procedural fairness.
Impartial administration of the law through independent
accessible courts and a democratic process of law-making,
defines and enforces the limits and powers of state

Gender issues, particularly with respect
to women's status and rights, have for a considerable
period, been in the forefront of donors' dialogue on
social issues with Africa. While Africa countries have fully
acknowledged the seriousness of the issues and the urgent
need for action, the dialogue has been largely donor-driven
and issues and priorities been donor-set. Recognizing the
need for a new approach in this important area for

Throughout the 20th century, the debate on women's rights and their role in Afghan society has been closely interlinked with the national destiny. Women not only carry the burden of symbolizing the honor of the family, but often are seen as embodying the national honor as well. Gender has thus been one of the most politicized issues in Afghanistan over the past 100 years, and attempts at reform have been denounced by opponents as un-Islamic and a challenge to the sanctity of the faith and family.

There is compelling evidence of the
importance of gender equality for poverty reduction and
sustainable growth. So it should come as no surprise that
most development actors-international agencies, bilateral
donors, and most developing countries, have an official
policy for promoting gender equality. Millennium Development
Goal 3 (MDG3) on gender equality and women's
empowerment is shared global commitment. With only seven

This report examines the legal,
administrative, and regulatory barriers that are preventing
women in Kenya from contributing fully to the Kenyan
economy. Building on the 2004 Foreign Investment and
Advisory Service (FIAS) report, "Improving the
Commercial Legal Framework and Removing Administrative and
Regulatory Barriers to Investment," this study looks at
the bureaucratic barriers facing women in Kenya through a

This study is intended to be a
systematic and practical guide to the basic features of
modern forestry legislation. It identifies a range of issues
that should be considered in assessing the adequacy of
forest laws and presents options for addressing those issues
in ways that may improve the effectiveness of law as a
foundation for sustainable forest management. Part One
locates forestry law within the wider legal framework,

This paper develops a framework and some
hypotheses regarding the impact of local-level, informal
legal institutions on three economic outcomes: aggregate
growth, inequality, and human capabilities. It presents a
set of stylized differences between formal and informal
legal justice systems, identifies the pathways through which
formal systems promote economic outcomes, reflects on what
the stylized differences mean for the potential impact of

Son preference is known to be found in
certain types of cultures, that is patrilineal cultures. But
what explains the fact that China, South Korea, and
Northwest India manifest such extreme child sex ratios
compared with other patrilineal societies? This paper argues
that what makes these societies unique is that their
pre-modern political and administrative systems used
patrilineages to organize and administer their citizens. The

This paper examines three systems of
courts of justice, each in a different country in the region
of South Pacific islands known as Melanesia, where state
legal systems have been adopted from former European
colonial governments. The systems discussed are, by
comparison, 'hybrid', each of them having been
established with the intention of addressing disputes among
small-scale social groups by less formal means or by taking

This paper develops a framework and some
hypotheses regarding the impact of local-level, informal
legal institutions on three economic outcomes: aggregate
growth, inequality, and human capabilities. It presents a
set of stylized differences between formal and informal
legal justice systems, identifies the pathways through which
formal systems promote economic outcomes, reflects on what
the stylized differences mean for the potential impact of