Recent debates in social anthropology on land acquisitions highlight the need to go further back in history in order to analyse their impacts on local livelihoods. The debate over the commons in economic and ecological anthropology helps us understand some of today’s dynamics by looking at precolonial common property institutions and the way they were transformed by Western colonization to state property and then, later in the age of neoliberalism, to privatization and open access.

An evolving land governance context compounds the case for practitioners to closely track developments as they unfold. While much research sheds light on key trends, questions remain about approaches for collective bottom-up analysis led by land governance practitioners themselves. This study presents findings from an initiative to test such an approach. Drawing on written submissions made in response to an open call for contributions, the study discusses global trends in land governance over the period 2015–2018.

Climate and land use/cover changes are potential drivers of change in hydrology and water use. Incidences of these factors on Bandama hydrological basin and Kossou hydropower generation (1981–2016) in West Africa are assessed in this present work. Using Landsat products of United Stated Geological Survey, results show that water bodies areas and land use have increased by 1.89%/year and 11.56%/year respectively, whereas herbaceous savanna, savanna, forest and evergreen forest coverage have been reduced by 1.39%/year, 0.02%/year, 2.39%/year and 3.33%/year respectively from 1988 to 2016.