Agrarian reforms and their impact on property rights in the emerging economy

Abstract

The concept of legalizing properties and constructions without permission is currently under debate in Kosovo’s field of property rights. Efforts to establish an appropriate legal framework have led to the enactment of laws and by-laws aimed at addressing illegal construction. Constructions on “social” properties without permission, informal acquisition, failure of ownership transfer, and unresolved matters related to properties confiscated under the 1933 agrarian reform have not yet been dealt with, except for their inclusion on the waiting list, which denies legal certainty. The study finds that the main cause of the issues evident in the property legalization process and the exercise of development rights on these properties is Yugoslavia’s agrarian reform of 1933. The research concludes that legalizing properties requires a normative approach and utilizing similar experiences from other Western Balkan contexts. Therefore, the objective of this paper is to analyze, using analytical, legal-dogmatic, chronological, and qualitative methods, the policies for property legalization and thus recognizing citizen property rights. The research is of great importance for decision-making institutions because it can be used as an impetus for finding the right approach, aside from the normative one, to address the issue of property legalization.