Land ownership and distribution: Modeling the relationship to property law in the Norwegian case

Abstract

Issues of land distribution and ownership matter in an industrialized and post-industrial world. In rural areas, land is still the livelihood of a large portion of the people and thus central to the viability of local communities. Land ownership is also central to national politics through issues of self-sufficiency, food sovereignty and recourse management. This study applies a historical approach combined with system dynamics modeling to the case of Norwegian odelsrett between 1814 and 2014. The odelsrett is a familial right of redemption regarding landed, agricultural property, which has roots going back more than a millennium in Norway. The aim of this study is to identify the impact of the odelsrett on the distribution of land ownership in Norway as a case. The results indicate that the odelsrett in Norway helped to increase wider distribution of land amongst the agricultural population only with the help of external historical events. We furthermore demonstrate how land ownership is an exclusive right, and how the legal system of which the odelsrett is part is designed to and operates to reproduce this right.