ABSTRACT
This chapter places the expansion of a market-oriented agro-industrial model in Turkey in the context of land configuration by the state. It elaborates on the increasing commercialization in land use and land access and the concentration of landholdings through the various institutional and technical innovations adopted by governments. In Turkey, the state does not typically demand the expropriation of lands from small-scale agricultural producers. Rather, it uses land surveys, land registration, and cadastral techniques in the reclamation of public lands to be brokered for private commercial use. The state reclamation of public lands, land-titling and land-consolidation schemes – as a reworking of land commodification for private use – represents a historical break from the long-held practices of the old Muslim–Ottoman and early republican traditions on agricultural production and small producers’ access to lands for subsistence needs. In drawing a general picture of this historical break, the chapter addresses the issue of state reclamation of public lands and their redirection toward private-investment projects in agriculture. Land-consolidation schemes that re-group privately owned, small-scale agricultural lands into larger parcels are also discussed in relation to the nature of the transfer of ownership and use rights. Future implications are considered as well. Finally, the chapter explores the promotion of a neoliberal development project by successive governments since the 1980s, setting in motion, for the first time in Turkish history, the state-led commodification of land for the expansion of large-scale capitalized commercial agriculture.
