Fragmented Laws, Contingent Choices: The Tragicomedy of the Village Commons in China

Abstract

Based on an eleven-month fieldwork of an informal real estate market in Shenzhen, China, this paper focuses on how property norms interact with the fragmented and layered property laws. It also serves as a case study of the mixture of tragedies and comedies of collective land governance in China, defining the direct conflict between law and social norms as a tragedy and their reconciliation as a comedy. The term tragicomedy captures such a mixture. This paper reveals that the different identities that village leaders simultaneously assume under different social control systems are key to understanding the co-evolution of property law and norms. It also highlights the essential roles of the laws and communities’ legal strategies in governing the commons.