Impacts of land acquisition across communities: Exploring the special economic zones in Bangladesh

Abstract

Special economic zones (SEZs) are delineated geographical places established with distinct regulations for attracting investment to achieve diverse economic benefits. The emergence of the SEZs has aggravated the contentious issue of land acquisition and development globally with substantial gaps between their anticipated and actual benefits for the land-acquired communities. Bangladesh is establishing 100 new SEZs across the country acquiring rural community lands and proposing numerous benefits, the impacts of which are unknown from the community context. The existing literature highlights the impacts of land acquisition in Bangladesh from the perspective of land loss without considering the development benefits of implemented projects. The resettlement policy and implementation issues are also understudied in the land acquisition literature in the Bangladesh context, which are crucially linked to the impacts.
Conceptualising through the capabilities approach, this study aims to examine the impacts of land acquisition on the capabilities of individuals within communities in the recently developed SEZs. Positioning freedom of choice over wealth and opulence, the capabilities approach provides a wider perspective for capturing nuances of impacts. Based on a qualitative review of policies relating to land acquisition and resettlement, semi-structured interviews with community members as well as experts in government and NGO personnel were conducted. Three SEZs of Bangladesh with distinct geographical features and at different development stages are selected to understand the impacts on economic, social–affective, and personal (physio-psychological) aspects of well-being through the core capabilities of individuals across the livelihoods of locales and occupations.
Findings with novel insights into dispossession reveal that land acquisition with poor implementation of resettlement policies affects the capabilities of the land-losing as well as evicted individuals who are dependent on land and natural resources. Findings also suggest that SEZs with employment and other opportunities advance the capabilities of the individuals from land-losing, without land-losing, and previously landless households. Findings further suggest that despite experiencing capability deprivation in the land-losing context, women were able to enhance their capabilities relating to economic, social–affective, and personal well-being through participation in paid work and other economic activities. This study contributes by filling the knowledge gap in understanding the impacts of SEZs, extending the application of the capabilities approach, and providing new insights into drivers of dispossession. Other implications of this study lie in providing policy recommendations for Bangladesh and beyond—e.g., in countries with similar land–livelihoods relations—as well as opening scopes for further academic research.
Keywords: Land acquisition, special economic zone, displacement, dispossession, resettlement, capabilities, well-being, livelihoods, communities, Bangladesh.

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Identifiers

ORCID for Md Moniruzzaman: orcid.org/0000-0002-5685-1950

ORCID for Craig Hutton: orcid.org/0000-0002-5896-756X

ORCID for Darja Reuschke: orcid.org/0000-0001-6961-1801

ORCID for Chris Hill: orcid.org/0000-0003-4344-6734

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