(De)colonization, Gender, and Access to Land in Kenya, 1963-2013

• In Event: Environmental Struggles in Africa and the Diaspora

Description for Program

Historically, land access and ownership have been foundational to food security, economic empowerment, and cultural survival in African societies. As such, land was central to anti-colonial struggles against British colonial rule. In post-colonial Kenya, land access and ownership became a pressing issue for women. Despite their significant contribution to the liberation movement, women did not gain equal land rights in the post-colonial period. Their marginalization in land ownership limited their economic empowerment at a time when land ownership became aspirational for many Kenyans as it conferred both economic and socio-cultural benefits. Although the 2010 Constitution granted women full land ownership rights, they still had limited access to it. This paper examines historical marginalization of rural Kenyan women in land ownership from 1963 until the adoption of Kenya’s new constitution, asking why, despite attaining freedom from colonial rule, women in rural Kenya continued to be excluded from land ownership and how have women fought back to attain these rights?
Using archival sources, newspapers, government documents, reports, autobiographies, and memoirs, this paper argues that formal independence from European colonial rule did not emancipate rural Kenyan women from male-dominated power structures that privileged men in resource access. At independence, patriarchal norms governed political power and access to capital, deeply marginalizing women. It was through sustained advocacy and political activism by women’s groups that demands for policy reforms and constitutional provisions led to eventual rights for women to access and own land. In essence, women had to fight a “second war of independence” after 1963. However, as this paper demonstrates, legal reforms were only a partial victory for women. Realizing these rights equitably across the gender and class spectrum remains an ongoing struggle. This study highlights the persistent efforts of Kenyan women to secure land ownership rights and advance community development since independence.

Author

• Catherine Odari, Spelman College