Land and State Capacity During Civil Wars: How Land-Based Coalitions Undermine Property Taxation in Colombia

Abstract

Revenue, especially that from agricultural crops, has been considered fundamental for the development of state capacity. While existing research has mostly focused on dynamics of violence, we know less about the impact of commodities shocks on a key dimension of state power: property taxation. In this article, I explore how and why land-based coalitions—alliances between landowners and paramilitaries around the appropriation of land—undermine taxation during civil conflict. Focusing on the expansion of oil palm in Colombia and using a difference-in-differences design, I leverage the international price of oil palm and municipal variation in crop suitability. I find that, in municipalities with higher paramilitary violence and land concentration, the palm shock was associated with lower taxation, outdated cadastral information, and lower land values. This article underscores the deleterious consequences of land inequality for the state’s extractive capacity even in moments of agricultural abundance.

When the State Becomes Complicit: Mayors, Criminal Actors, and the Deliberate Weakening of the Local State in Colombia

“…In many cases, local politicians, owners of large portions of land, played an active role legalizing illicit transfers, hiding and changing critical information, and using their connections to other state agencies to facilitate their accumulation and impunity. This is consistent with the finding that politicians and landed elites, with the help of specialists of violence, played an important role in the forced transformation of property rights and subsequent erosion of the local state (Nieto-Matiz, 2022a; Peña-Huertas et al, 2017; Perdomo Vaca, 2021). The next section provides qualitative evidence from two Colombian municipalities.…”

“…However, my argument does suggest that those politicians who collude with criminal actors will cooperate with one another to hollow out the state. Lastly, while states can be weakened in multiple dimensions, I focus on local taxation due to its centrality in any process of state consolidation and its natural closeness to the process of wealth accumulation (Bräutigam et al, 2008; Nieto-Matiz, 2022a).…”

Evolução da composição agropecuária na Colômbia entre 1990 e 2019

“…, devido ao aproveitamento das condições geográficas do país e à crescente demanda por biocombustíveis(SALGADO, 2012; SALINAS, 2012;FELLOWS;BURGOS, 2014; POTTER, 2020; TELLEZ, 2022;NIETO, 2023). Esta situação, segundo (PNUD, 2011), levou à agricultura colombiana a se diversificar a favor de lavouras menos tradicionais como o dendê e algumas frutas.…”