VI.

Review of Related Literature

The World Bank has identified land as a fundamental
asset for the rural and urban poor. They said that for
most poor people, land is the primary means of
generating a livelihood and it may also be the main
vehicle for investing, accumulating wealth, and then
transferring such wealth between generations.
Ownership of land then becomes an important factor
in improving ones economic life. !n rural areas, a
significant amount of land still remains in the hands
of a small number of people and is farmed as
haciendas. "uch inefficient and ine#uitable property
rights and land markets are a core problem of the
land subsector in the $hilippines. %World Bank&
The issue of 'grarian (eform in the
$hilippines has long been debated ever since our
colonial times. )iven that the $hilippines is being
dominated by big and prominent land*owners, it has
never been an easy struggle for the farmers who are
fighting for their e#ual rights over land ownership.
"everal policies were already made in the aim of
settling this long*standing issue but until now, none
of these in particular has fully succeeded in solving
the problem of e#ual land distribution in the
$hilippines.
With this, the concepts, theories, methodologies and
findings that the previous studies have ac#uired in
relation to 'grarian (eform and $olicy
!mplementation will be looked upon. "cholarly
literatures were consulted to better understand the
topic, to know what is already known about it and
what is yet to be known.
A. Land Reform
'ccording to Borras +r., ,ay and -odhi,
-and reform in its different forms and scale, was
carried out during the ancient times, having its
beginnings with the )reeks and (omans. !t is the
distribution of landed property rights.
%Thiesenhusen, ./0/& 1or 2oner %./34& most of the
-and (eforms seem to share two common
components, that is5 %a& land reform is invariably a
more or less direct, publicly controlled change in the
e6isting of land ownerships and %b& it normally
attempts a diffusion of wealth, income or productive
capacity throughout the society.
!n the case of The $hilippines, ,ang %4774& said that
land reform has been a futile issue even before World
War !!. 8e supported this statement by saying that the
presidential candidates in the $hilippines since the
./97s have run on platforms offering obscure vows
of land reform, but that reform has never been
pursued dynamically. "ome studies also show that
-and (eform in the country was unproductive
without e6trinsic influence because it is dominated by
puissant landlords. "awchenko %4777& on the other
hand put the blame on the design flaws of the
previous reforms and again as others has already
thought the opportunistic landowners.
:ac!ntyre %.//;5/& also added that the continuous
e6pansion of influence of the landed oligarchy can
be attributed to the futility of land reform in the
$hilippines and the routinely commandeering of the
economic policy machinery by these puissant
landed and business elites.
!n totality, all of these studies only point out to the
fact that reforms in land in the $hilippines is greatly
flawed and is far from achieving its determined end
goals. The concentration of land ownership in the
hands of a very few powerful people is the ma<or
challenge posed with regards to this.
B. Agrarian Reform
'grarian (eform on the other hand covers a
much wider scope. !t could be defined as the
rectification of the whole system of agriculture. !t is
normally done by the government where they
redistribute the agricultural land among the farmers
of the country. The agrarian reform is concerned with
the relation between production and distribution of
land among the farmers. !t also concerns the
processing of the raw materials that are produced by
farming the land from the respective industries.
%=conomyWatch, 47.7&
'nother definition of this by >arin and
Bu<ang %.//;& is agrarian reform as having the main
goal of uplifting the standard of living of the
peasantry, income redistribution through the creation
of <obs, land redistribution and an increase in the
production of agricultural product.
'grarian reform, as a national policy
instrument has already been on the government
agenda for many years. !t is being used to bring about
social <ustice, poverty reduction, and rural
development. %World Bank 477;&
?onsidering all these statements bring us
now to the conclusion that if only the goals and
ob<ectives of this reform will be met, it can bring
about a lot of benefits to our society and it can uplift
the well*being of each individual.
C. Land Reform and Agrarian Reform
?ousins %4773& defined the difference
between agrarian reform and land reform as the latter
being concerned with rights in land, and their
character, strength and distribution, while 'grarian
(eform as focuses not only on these but also in a
broader set of issues including the class character of
the relations of production and distribution in farming
and related enterprises, and how these connect to the
wider class structure. !t thus concerns economic and
political power and the relations between them.
'grarian reform does not simply stop with
the distribution of lands to the people but rather, it
provides support services to aid them in properly
developing the lands that were awarded to them.
?ompared with -and (eform, it is indeed a more
comple6 process and consumes a longer span of time.
D. Agrarian Reform and Poverty Reduction
Balisacan %4773& studied about the
relationship of 'grarian (eform and $overty
(eduction in the $hilippines as a whole. Though
acknowledging that the 'grarian (eform is not the
sole and only factor that affects poverty reduction, he
still gave emphasis to the fact that an overall
efficiency gains %economic growth& from an informed
land reform program represent an enduring source of
poverty reduction. With this he established a strong
positive relationship between an effective
implementation of 'grarian (eform and poverty
reduction.
(eyes %4774& has the same take as Balisacan
when it comes to the relationship of the two. !n her
paper, she established that the agrarian reform indeed
has a positive impact on farmer beneficiaries.
-ooking at the poverty incidence between .//7 and
4777, she saw its significant reduction and found out
that it has also led to higher real per capita incomes.
The '(Bs %'grarian (eform Beneficiaries& turned
out to have higher incomes and lower poverty
incidence in comparison to those who are not
beneficiaries. !n addition, complementary inputs
such as irrigation, credit and government services
also appear to amplify the possibility of the farmer*
beneficiaries to be nonpoor.
E. Policy Implementation
'ccording to 8ill %.//3& $olicy 'nalysts
would agree that the implementation process in
public policy making is a crucial aspect of it even
though it is unfortunately often neglected in
literatures. ,iviniemi %./0@& and -ester et al. %./03&
looked at policy implementation as a process*
decisions and actions that put a legislative decision
into effect. Brynard %4779& on the other hand
argued that while policy could be defined in several
ways, implementation can only move from originally
set political goals to results on the ground %service
delivery&.
' theory of policy implementation,
according to 8argrove %./0.& would allow analysts
to assess how government programs would actually
work. There are a number of policy implementation
styles that is being recogniAed. Terpestra and 8avinga
%477.& identified three of thisB the Traditional policy
implementation, the ?ontrolling implementation and
the bureaucratic style of policy implementation. The
first one was defined to be grounded on tradition
and traditional authority, with a limited number of
formal rules which are often not very detailed in
character. The second one on the other hand was
said to often occur in a personal relation between
implementing officer and supervisor, the officers
showing their loyalty to authority and the dominant
morality. 'nd the last one advocates for impartial,
uniform application of rules and e#ual treatment to
every citiAen.
$olicy implementation in totality can be
seen as transforming set goals to results. The way a
policy is being carried out is essential for the success
or failure of a policy. Without the realiAation of the
goals of a policy, it will be insignificant.
F. truggle! in Implementing Agrarian
Reform
:ar#ueA, Tolentino and 2ebu#ue
%477.B477@& has recogniAed at least five ma<or
hindrances to the success of 'grarian (eform in the
$hilippinesB these are physical harassment of the
beneficiaries, lack of funds, lack of political will,
backlog of land cases and land conversion. !ssues
regarding the Beneficiaries and their former landlords
were also looked upon. "ometimes the farmers have
already grown too attached to their landlords that
they themselves are the ones who refuse the lands
given to them fearing that they might get in conflict
with their former employers. Other problems include
beneficiaries selling their lands in times of
emergency need for money or to cope with poverty
and various types of violations being committed by
them.
Balisacan %4773& on the other hand in his
study, looked at the too fre#uent revamps and in the
leadership of implementing agencies, especially 2'(
and 2=C( that have seemingly constrained the
programs smooth implementation. These changes in
leadership cause the alteration of the departments
priorities which results to the set goals being not
accomplished.