Women’s Community-Based Organizations, Conservation Projects, and Effective Land Control in Southern Mexico

This paper examines outcomes for women’s effective land control from engagement of women’s agricultural community-based organizations (CBOs) with conservation projects in southern Mexico. Through ethnography and interviews with one hundred women in three communities, the author assesses whether women’s organization, as a response to availability of project resources, has led to increased access to, and control over, land, as well as gender empowerment. A binary logistic regression model predicts CBO participation and suggests that who participates in these groups is defined in part by the varied position of women within community class and power structures. Women’s land access has increased through participation in CBOs, but effective land control does not automatically follow. Women differ within and among CBOs in the three crucial aspects of effective land control: participation in control over land-use decision making, over the land’s disposition, and over resultant land-based income. The type of CBO and its community position play important roles, with groups functioning outside of ejidal structures leading to greater rates of women’s effective control of land and potential.