Customary Land Tenure in Liberia - Land Tenure and Property ...

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appreciation. Other clans where daughters are sometimes given gifts of land and farm on their own include
Ylan, Little Kola, and Gbanshay.
For land dedicated to seasonal farming, daughters often inherit an entitlement to farm on their extended
family‟s land or on the land of their town. Where rights are bestowed on immediate families, daughters may
inherit land jointly with their brothers (with the eldest brother typically acting as the one who administers the
allocations for use by the siblings) or the land will be apportioned between siblings. When land is divided,
daughters tend to receive lesser portions than their brothers. Likewise, individualized holdings, including land
planted in tree crops, are either bequeathed jointly or to individual children. When land is bequeathed
individually, daughters generally receive smaller shares or are excluded altogether. Among all the studied
clans, the only place where daughter inheritance was not practiced was Saykleken (although daughters
sometimes receive gifts of land and house plots). In this clan, sons are expected to take care of their mothers
and sisters and to ensure that they have enough land to farm subsistence crops.
In some clans, daughters are increasingly inheriting or being given land. This is the case in Gbanshay, where
daughters have a growing tendency to remain in the clan as compared to sons who are increasingly seeking
opportunities outside the clan. In both Gbanshay and Upper Workor, increasing inheritance of land by
daughters is attributed to trends of irresponsibility among male youth. Gifts and bequests of land in Little
Kola were reported to be directed to those children who would take care of their parents in their old age. In
Tengia, women told us that they received inheritances of land for lowland and upland rice and gardens from
their parents, as well as land planted in cocoa, coffee, and oil palm. If a woman were to marry outside the
clan, she would put this land in her brother‟s care and may or may not ask that he share a part of the harvest
with her; this land would always belong to her.
It is very uncommon for women to administer rights to her family‟s land, especially in the case of joint
inheritance. This is primarily because customary rules stipulate that one can only administer the land of their
own extended family and most women leave their natal communities when they marry. As a result, men are
almost always the ones to administer land on behalf of their families or extended families. The only exception
that we found to this was in Dobli Clan where the oldest child will manage inherited land on behalf of his or
her siblings, regardless of sex. Here, too, women frequently farm on both land in their natal community and
their husband‟s community.
Women have rights to access land in their spouse‟s community when they marry and relocate to his
community. All clans reported that a woman has the right to return to her natal community and access land
for subsistence farming there, particularly if the marriage breaks down (e.g., divorce, abandonment, death of
her husband). In such cases, women will need to rely on their natal families to contribute and help mobilize
the labor required for subsistence farming. In Tengia, women reported that they must petition their brothers
to be allocated a parcel. Unlike widows, a divorced woman cannot continue to access land in her husband‟s
community, but this also appears to be the case for divorced men when the couple has settled in the wife‟s
community. In Dobli, citizens confirmed that a stranger husband loses rights to land he lived on and farmed
in his wife‟s community.
While we encountered polygamy in nearly all clans, its prevalence varied. In Ylan, clan members reported that
it is very common. Here, a husband will divide up land he acquires in his quarter for seasonal farming among
his wives, though some wives cultivate together. In Motor Road, more men are reported to be polygynous
than monogamous. In this clan, wives reside together in the same household and cultivate the same parcel of
land together.
In the studied clans, it was reported that widows have the right to remain in their married community. Most
retain rights to the house plot, the right to access land for seasonal farming, and rights to continue to manage
tree crops where these are present. This right to retain land in her husband‟s community is strengthened
when a woman has children, who forge a widow‟s tie to her husband‟s lineage. Widows‟ rights are more
precarious in the absence of children and will often depend on her rapport with her in-laws and her
continued ability to remain in their good graces. In some clans, such as Ylan, Little Kola, Tengia, and Nitrian,
CUSTOMARY LAND TENURE IN LIBERIA