ABSTRACT
The first studies of land grabs rightly emphasized the scope and dynamics of recent instances of dispossession. However, scholars increasingly turn to historical analysis to better understand land grabs. This chapter contributes to this ongoing historical work by focusing on how understudied actors—technocrats—have contributed to the making of land grabs. In the mid-2000s, a land grab occurred in northern Guatemala when cattle ranchers and oil palm plantation owners took advantage of a World Bank–financed land market project to rapidly acquire lands that had belonged to Indigenous people and campesinos. This chapter examines how between the 1960s and 1990s, technocrats created conditions for this land grab through their efforts to build a property rights regime and a land market in the region. The chapter concludes by reflecting on the powers (and limitations) of technocrats to influence agrarian change.
