BORA CMI: The Effects on Agrarian Contracts of a Governmental Intervention into Bonded Labor in the Western Terai of Nepal

Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: http://hdl.handle.net/10202/56

Title:	The Effects on Agrarian Contracts of a Governmental Intervention into Bonded Labor in the Western Terai of Nepal
Authors:	Hatlebakk, Magnus
Keywords:	Tied labor Agrarian institutions Nepal
Issue Date:	2006
Publisher:	Chr. Michelsen Institute
Series/Report no.:	CMI Working paper WP 2006: 6
Abstract:	We study an effective intervention into a specific form of bonded labor. The intervention led to a shift in agrarian contracts, from bonded labor to sharecropping. By comparing the pre- and post-liberation contracts we evaluate theoretical models of agrarian contracts. We suggest three mechanisms that jointly explain why landlords offered bonded labor contracts pre-liberation. One mechanism we apply to define bonded labor in contrast to tied labor. The mechanism, where the outside option as casual labor is endogenously determined by the choice of long-term contract, implies a trade-off for the landlord between efficiency and redistribution of surplus.
URI:	http://hdl.handle.net/10202/56
ISBN:	82-8062-145-8
ISSN:	0804-3639
Appears in Collections:	CMI Collection (Reports, Working Papers, Articles etc.)

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