This paper seeks to understand the changing dynamics of the ownership and governance of land and
natural resources, in the context of rapid change in a remote province (Ratanakiri) in north east
Cambodia. Due to historical inaccessibility and 30 years of civil war, this area has had limited
exposure to outside influences. As well as having to rebuild their communities after conflict and
displacement, local indigenous groups which make up the majority of the province's population have
to adapt to market driven economic development in less than a generation. Land ownership has been
rapidly changing from communal to private. This is resulting in landlessness and dispossession and
widespread forest clearing by large scale land concession companies and cash cropping farmers.
Action research into traditional conflict resolution and management systems in Ratanakiri carried out
in 2006 and 2009 is complemented by investigations into land use and social changes in different
villages, and into recently completed pilot communal land titling.
A key element of this analysis is understanding how traditional systems of land and natural resource
management systems function, and the role they could potentially play as the basis for communities
negotiating their place in a changed world. Learning about how traditional institutions, ownership
and governance models function, and could be adapted, can offer options for redefining our key
culture-land relationships, and lead to alternative social and environmental land use dynamics which
support sustainable agricultural and livelihood pathways for local communities in culturally and
biologically diverse forested upland areas.