ABSTRACT
It is claimed by some development experts that private property both brings economic benefits for the owners, and enables the sustainable exploitation of a natural resource. This chapter explores a contrasting case where the private ownership of forest led to deforestation. Engaging the concepts of property rights, access and patronage, the chapter shows how a historically deprived ethnic group in post-socialist Romania has been engaged in a patron-client relationship by those who have access to the post-socialist state. Here, land restitution has re-created older forms of inequality and injustice.
