When Land Reform Backfires: How Partial Redistribution Helped Portugal’s Right

Why This Study Matters

Land redistribution is often portrayed as a straightforward political win for reformers and the left. Michael Albertus and Noah Schouela show that the political consequences can be much more complicated: who lives near the changes and how complete those changes are both shape whether reform builds or erodes support for the parties that implement it. Understanding these dynamics matters for scholars and policymakers who design redistributive programs and expect predictable partisan returns.

Theory: Who Gains, Who Loses, and Why Proximity Matters

The authors develop a theory that divides the population into four groups affected by reform: beneficiaries (those who receive land), payers (those who bear costs), eligible nonbeneficiaries (people eligible but who do not receive land), and ineligible individuals. They argue that two features—proximity to policy consequences (how directly a locality experiences land transfers) and the extent or intensity of reform—shape political responses. Incomplete or partial reform can create concentrated disappointment among eligible nonbeneficiaries and open opportunities for counter-mobilization among other groups, producing unexpected backlash against reformers.

Data and Quasi-Experimental Strategy

Albertus and Schouela test their theory using original data on Portugal’s mid-1970s land reform. They exploit variation in local land reform intensity across parishes and a plausibly exogenous “bump” in treatment that disproportionately increased proximity to reform in areas with otherwise low reform intensity. This variation serves as a quasi-experimental lever to identify how differences in reform exposure altered political support at the local level.

Key Findings

• Where land reform was intense and complete, the Communist party retained or consolidated appeal among local voters.
• In parishes with partial or uneven reform, the Communists performed worse politically, a decline driven mainly by eligible nonbeneficiaries who expected land but did not receive it.
• Subsequent counter-reform—returns of land to prior owners—fueled political polarization and produced gains for right‑of‑center parties, particularly among ineligible nonbeneficiaries.

Implications for Redistributive Politics

These results show that redistribution can backfire politically when implementation is uneven and when sizable groups are eligible but miss out on benefits. The political fate of reformers depends not only on whether they pursue redistribution, but on how thoroughly and locally that redistribution reaches citizens. The study highlights the importance of implementation fidelity and local variation for anticipating the political consequences of policy change.