Real estate oligarchs: elites and the urbanization of the land question in El Salvador

ABSTRACT

This article explores the role of business elites in the conversion of rural landscapes into urban real estate in El Salvador. By analyzing elites’ imaginaries of development and strategies of dispossession, it examines the underlying rationalities that have driven rural-to-urban transformations since the postwar process of deagrarianization in the 1990s. I argue that elites have shifted their relationship with land from one centered international commodity markets to one focused on the establishment of rent-extractive property relations. In the context of financialization, this shift shapes much of the new dynamics on land and water grabbing in rural environments.

KEYWORDS:

• Real estate
• elites
• urbanization
• global land grabs
• financialization
• El Salvador

Acknowledgements

I would like to express my appreciation to the anonymous reviewers for all their comments and suggestions. I would also like to thank all the people in El Salvador who made this research project possible. Thanks also to the members of my doctoral committee at UNC-Chapel Hill and to all my peers and mentors at the JPS Writeshop 2022 who contributed to this paper with their comments.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Decrees 747 (1991), 14 (1995), and 719 (1996) all make changes to restrictions previously made by the 1980s agrarian reform to prevent reversals of land redistribution.

2 The case of El Espino is a famous one given its connection to the Dueñas family, one of the oldest families of the Salvadoran elite. Since the early years of the agrarian reform, the family implemented a series of legal tactics to recuperate the control of the estate. Ultimately, they managed to recuperate one portion and the rest was gradually sold by the cooperative’s administrative council to various real estate developers. See Labrador (2014).

3 This is revealed by one of the real estate executives involve in the project. See Audiovisuales UCA. ‘FIHIDRO. Agua segura ¿para quién?,’ April 17, 2010. https://youtu.be/LrzOAaY7wwA

4 Centro Nacional de Registros. ‘Registro de otros documentos.’

5 Imprenta Nacional. ‘Reforma a la ordenanza municipal para la regulación de los usos del suelo y las actuaciones urbanísticas del municipio de Nuevo Cuscatlán,’ Diario Oficial de El Salvador, 5 de abril del 2013. Web, URL https://imprentanacional.gob.sv/ (Accessed June 2019).

6 Just in 2014, the town of Nuevo Cuscatlán granted the right of 1493 tap water connections to three luxury real estate projects. Despite the incomplete status of these projects, the amounts of water reserved for them was enough to serve at least 5000 people, approximately 45% of Nuevo Cuscatlán’s total population. For a detailed account on Bukele’s process of water grabbing in Nuevo Cuscatlán see.

7 DW. ‘El Salvador: desplazados en aras del turismo,’ January 15, 2020. https://www.dw.com/es/el-salvador-desplazados-en-aras-del-turismo/a-51970239

8 Instituto de Acceso a la Información Pública (IAIP). Hoja de vida de Edgar Romero Rodriguez Herrera. https://www.transparencia.gob.sv/institutions/mop/officials/11311.pdf

9 Instituto de Acceso a Información Pública (IAIP). Hoja de vida de Lcda. Michelle sol. https://www.transparencia.gob.sv/institutions/ilp/officials/13487.pdf

10 MBN Digital. ‘Nayib Bukele y Aeroman inauguran hangar 6 en aeropuerto San Oscar Arnulfo Romero,’ June 10, 2019. https://www.youtube.com/live/6UFaMmVixJY?feature=share&t=703

11 The price changes were obtained from documentation available on El Salvador’s Geographical Institute and National Cadaster.

12 Briko, S.A. de C.V. Environmental Impact Studies for ‘Kalamanda Polígono A’ and ‘Kalamanda M+E.’

13 Departamento de Publicaciones, Centro Nacional de Registros. https://www.cnr.gob.sv/documentos/rc/noviembre_diciembre_2011/Nombramientos_y_Credenciales.pdf (Accessed August 2023)

14 Administración Nacional de Acueductos y Alcantarillados (ANDA). ‘Convenio de cooperación entre las sociedades Briko, S.A. de C.V. y Grupo Gramo, S.A. de C.V. para la ejecución de obras encaminadas al mejoramiento de la red existente del sistema de acueducto de ANDA.’ (Accessed February 2022).

15 Imprenta Nacional. ‘Ley General de Recursos Hídricos,’ Diario Oficial de El Salvador, 12 de enero de 2022. Web, URL https://imprentanacional.gob.sv/ (Accessed February 2022).

16 Radio YSKL. ‘Ley de Recursos Hídricos privatiza el agua, critican organizaciones,’ December 22, 2021.

17 El Faro. ‘Audios de Carlos Marroquín revelan que masacre de marzo ocurrió por ruptura entre Gobierno y MS,’ May 17, 2022. https://elfaro.net/es/202205/el_salvador/26175/Audios-de-Carlos-Marroqu%C3%ADn-revelan-que-masacre-de-marzo-ocurri%C3%B3-por-ruptura-entre-Gobierno-y-MS.htm

18 Human Rights Watch. ‘’We Can Arrest Anyone We Want’ Widespread Human Rights Violations under El Salvador’s ‘State of Emergency’,’ December 7, 2022. https://www.hrw.org/report/2022/12/07/we-can-arrest-anyone-we-want/widespread-human-rights-violations-under-el

19 Another famous case is the arrest of five environmental leaders of the struggle against mining in Santa Marta, Cabañas.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant 2049507; and The UNC Institute for the Study of the Americas and Center for Global Initiatives.

Notes on contributors

Julio Gutiérrez

Julio Gutierrez is a PhD candidate in anthropology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is interested in the political ecology of financialization and urbanization, particularly the relationship between speculative urbanism and land-water grabbing in Central America.