Document Actions
Ruth Hall
- Senior Researcher: Land Rights and Agrarian Reform
Email:
rhall@plaas.org.za
Phone:
(021) 959-3959
Biography:
Ruth Hall holds a Masters degree in Development Studies from the University of Oxford and an Honours degree in Political Studies from UCT. She is currently registered for a doctoral degree in Politics at Oxford.
Before joining PLAAS, she was Senior Researcher at the Centre for Rural Legal Studies (CRLS), Stellenbosch, where she led research on farm workers’ wages and conditions of employment in South Africa as part of an investigation by the Department of Labour into minimum wages for farm workers. She has also done research on land reform policies and practices in South Africa and in India, focusing on gender equity.
Ruth joined PLAAS in 2002 to work on an evaluation of land and agrarian reform in South Africa. Since then she has led several national research and advocacy projects, published widely, advised government, established partnerships with civil society organisations, and taught on PLAAS’s postgraduate programme. Her major publications are Another Countryside? Policy Options for Land and Agrarian Reform in South Africa (2009) and, co-edited with Lungisile Ntsebeza, The Land Question in South Africa: The Challenge of Transformation and Redistribution (2007). Her recent projects have focused on Limpopo province, and addressed the tenure rights and livelihoods of farm dwellers, and the experiences of Zimbabwean migrants on commercial farms.
Ruth’s
current work focuses on the Southern Africa region, and deals with two
themes:
- pressures towards commercialisation of land uses and ‘land grabbing’, the impacts of these processes on rural communities, smallholder production, food security and rural politics, and policy options for ‘pro-poor agro-investment’; and
- the position of smallholder farmers and small-scale fishing communities within value-chains, the potential for them to move out of poverty through market participation, and options for ‘pro-poor value chain governance’.
Recent publications
include:
- Hall,
Ruth. 2010. “Reconciling the Past, Present and Future: The Parameters
and Practices of Land Restitution in South Africa” in Cherryl Walker,
Anna Bohlin, Ruth Hall and Thembela Kepe (eds.) Land, Memory,
Reconstruction and Justice: Perspectives on Land Claims in South
Africa. Athens, OH: Ohio University Press and Scottsville:
University of KwaZulu-Natal Press: pp 17-40.
- Hall,
Ruth. 2010. “
Two
Cycles of Land Policy in South Africa: Tracing the
Contours” in
Ward Anseeuw and Chris Alden (eds) The Struggle over Land in Africa:
Conflicts, Politics and Change. Cape Town: Human Sciences
Research Council Press: pp 175-192.
- Hall,
Ruth (ed). 2009. Another
Countryside? Policy Options for Land and Agrarian Reform in South
Africa.
Cape Town: Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies, University
of the Western Cape. (including seven single or co-authored
chapters)
- Hall,
Ruth. 2009. “Land Restitution in South Africa: Rights, Development and
the Restrained State” in Alan Jeeves and Greg Cuthbertson (eds).
Fragile Freedom: South Africa’s Democracy since 1994. Pretoria:
University of South Africa Press: pp 142-156.
- Hall, Ruth. 2009. “Land reform in South Africa: Successes, challenges and concrete proposals for the way forward” in Land Reform in South Africa: Constructive Aims and Positive Outcomes – Reflecting on Experiences on the Way to 2014. Johannesburg: Konrad Adenauer Stiftung: pp 5-35.
- Hall, Ruth. 2009. A fresh start for rural development and agrarian reform? Policy brief 29. Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), University of the Western Cape.
- Hall, Ruth. 2008. “Rural Livelihoods and Human Security: HIV/AIDS and Land Issues” in Angela Ndinga-Muvumba and Robyn Pharoah (eds). HIV/AIDS and Society in South Africa. Scottsville: University of KwaZulu-Natal Press: pp 124-144.
- Kepe, Thembela, Ruth Hall and Ben Cousins. 2008. “Land” in Steven Robin and Nic Shepherd (eds). South African Keywords. Cape Town: Jacana: pp 143-156.
- Hall, Ruth. 2008. State, Market and Community: The Potential and Limits of Participatory Land Reform Planning in South Africa. Working paper, No 7. Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies, University of the Western Cape.
- Rother,
Hanna-Andrea, Ruth Hall and Leslie London. 2008. “Pesticide Use Among
Emerging Farmers in South Africa: Contributing Factors and Stakeholder
Perceptions” in Development Southern Africa. October 2008. Vol
25(4), October 2008: pp 399-424.
- Hall, Ruth. 2008. “Land reform and poverty eradication: in search of solid ground” in Susan Brown (ed). Transformation Audit 2007: Leadership and Legitimacy. Cape Town: Institute for Justice and Reconciliation: pp 72-88.
- Hall, Ruth. 2008. The Impact of Land Restitution and Land Reform on Livelihoods. Cape Town: Programme for Land and Agrarian Studies, University of the Western Cape (Research Report 32).
- Hall, Ruth. 2007. “South Africa” in Martin Adams and Robin Palmer (eds). Independent Review of Land Issues in Southern and East Africa: Volume III. Electronic publication. June 2007. Oxford: Oxfam: pp 33-41.
- Hall, Ruth and Lungisile Ntsebeza. 2007. “Introduction” in Lungisile Ntsebeza and Ruth Hall (eds) The Land Question in South Africa: The Challenge of Transformation and Redistribution. Cape Town: HSRC Press, pp 1-24.
- Hall,
Ruth. 2007. “Transforming
Rural South Africa? Taking Stock of Land Reform” in
Lungisile Ntsebeza and Ruth Hall (eds) The Land Question in South
Africa: The Challenge of Transformation and Redistribution. Cape
Town: HSRC Press, 87-106.
- Moyo, Sam and Hall, Ruth. 2007. “Conflict and Land Reform in Southern Africa: How Exceptional is South Africa?” in Adekeye Adebajo, Adebayo Adedeji and Chris Landsberg (eds). South Africa in Africa: The Post-Apartheid Era. Scottsville: University of KwaZulu-Natal Press: pp 150-176.
Education:
- BSocSc Hons (UCT)
- MPhil (Oxford)
WORKSHOP: Can land and agrarian reform in South Africa create opportunities for smallholder farmers and help reduce rural poverty?