Barbuda Land Act

Barbuda Land Act is the 2007 law that Sand heists and property rights in the Caribbean (Summer School) says formalized Barbudans’ collective land ownership. It turns Communal Land Tenure from only historical practice into a legal institution.

The episode places the act inside later conflict. Gaston Browne argues that Barbudans’ communal ownership belief is a myth and that the law violated the constitution, while Barbudan residents rely on the same legal history to defend collective authority over development.

Key Claims

• A law can formalize a commons without eliminating future constitutional or development conflict.
• The act matters because it gives Barbudans a legal vocabulary for collective ownership, not only a customary one.
• Post-disaster title reform can reopen apparently settled institutional arrangements when capital access, reconstruction, and foreign investment become urgent.

Connections

• Barbuda, Antigua and Barbuda, Albert "Patty" Simon, and Gaston Browne - source context.
• Communal Land Tenure, Disaster Recovery Privatization, and Property Rights And Community Obligations - legal conflict branch.
• Path Dependence - historical-institutional explanation.