Institutional collaboration: Chr. Michelsen Institute, Bergen; ITAM, Mexico; Center for Policy Research, New Delhi. 

Participants: Rachel Sieder (Project leader), Tatiana Alfonso, Helena Alviar, Lara Cortes, Jackie Dugard, Mekonnen Firew Ayano, Siri Gloppen, Namita Wahi.

Funded by: Norwegian Research Council, FRIPRO

Dates: 2020 – 2024

The PluriLand project aims to develop a theory of land claiming in plural legal regimes through cross-regional investigation of conflicts over land affecting the land rights and entitlements of vulnerable communities. Despite the protection of indigenous, traditional and/or communal lands in many legal systems, such conflicts are rapidly escalating across the globe and are often highly transnational. Yet our knowledge about the mobilization and traction of protective land regimes remains fragmented, localized, and under-theorized.

PluriLand will build on and extend current theoretical knowledge about sociolegal mobilization over land claims, determining: how this is related to different kinds of threats; the impacts of the balance of national and international legal sites and frames on both processes of legal mobilization and intra-group dynamics; and the importance of context in processes of legal mobilization. The PluriLand team will undertake an interdisciplinary comparative study of plural land claims and legal regimes and their intragroup effects across six countries – South Africa, Ethiopia, India, Brazil, Guatemala, and Colombia.

Institutional Collaboration:  Chr. Michelsen Institute, Bergen; Overseas Development Institute (ODI), London; Department of Comparative Politics, University of Bergen; CIESAS, Mexico

Participants: Elin Skaar (Project Coordinator), Pilar Domingo,  Rachel Sieder, Ruth Rubio Marin, Aslak Orre, Antonio De Lauri, Siri Gloppen, Torunn Wimpelmann

Funded by: Norwegian Research Council, NorGlobal

Dates: January 2017 – December 2020

In long-established western democracies, women have made inroads as judges only during the past few decades. In post-conflict and transitional developing countries, however, they constitute an increasingly larger proportion of judges. Why is this so? Situations of political rupture generally create new opportunity structures; some may favour the entry of women into public positions of power. Post-conflict assistance often includes gender friendly rule of law reforms, and the conflict itself may have placed rights issues in focus. How these conditions affect women’s access to, and utilization of, positions of judicial power has not received much attention in the literature. This project asks: What are the main pathways of women judges to the bench? What are the gendered experiences of women on the bench? How and in what ways does having more women on the bench impact on judicial outcomes? In essence, what difference do women judges make?