Middle America:
Land Distribution

The colonial legacy of Middle America and the centrifugal forces of cultural diversity have led to a series of conflicts around the realm. Although the wars in El Salvador and Nicaragua have ended, sporadic fighting continues in Guatemala and in the state of Chiapas, Mexico.

The root cause of conflict in the realm is the unequal distribution of land - a legacy of the hacienda system brought to Middle America by the Spanish. (The hacienda system was briefly was discussed in the Mainland-Rimland lecture - to review click here: mmcrimfr.htm.)

In Latin America, 17 percent of landholders own 90 percent of arable land.

To better understand the impact of this unequal distribution of land - and power, read the introduction from a much longer paper entitled GUATEMALA: DISPLACEMENT, RETURN AND THE PEACE PROCESS (April 1995) by Patrick Costello published on the internet at: http://www.unhcr.ch/refworld/country/writenet/wrigtm.htm