You’re the only person I know besides myself to point out the problem of Real Property Record Titles systems in the rest of the world. It was written up about 8 years ago, I think, in connection with the problem of fighting poverty in Egypt, a country where one might get a deed in the form of a bill-of-sale, but.........there’s no place to file it to perfect one’s property claim. However, I’d have thought that with South America and the natural follow-on from Spanish Law there would have been central registries for the recordation of deeds/mortgages, etc. And I’d have thought they’d have the infamous “Notarial” records systems. I know they do in Puerto Rico.
The rest of the place is a mishmash of semi-systems, ancient traditions with no standing in law, as well as non enforcement.
Mexico encumbers it all with land tenancy laws that hurt the poor and help the rich ~ that was part of the Revolucion's land reform ~ it kinda' backfired so you end up with more concentration of ownership than before the Revolucion. Part of that, though, is their need to compete in agriculture with the US, else cheap American crops would swamp their country.
I keep my eye on this just in case any real news pops up but ever since the Commies were demonstrated to have no use for the poor either, you don't hear their Socialist brethren hyping any sort of land reform ~ or enforcement of titles.
The big deal here, given the availability of land, was to issue the smallest grant in terms of 1,000 arpents!
The grantee ~ which might have been a government agent at a Villa Real (yup, St. Louis wasn't the only one of those), would subdivide it into 10 arpent sites which were just big enough to feed a horse and family ~ plus, they'd cut roads in there to provide for circulation around the townsite.
One place in Illinois not far from Champaign, going South, was enclosed in a stockade fence all the way around ~ with towers in the corner to fight invaders.
The Spanish may well have provided title to the properties but when they pulled out of the region after the end of Queen Anne's War they took the records ~ whatever they were ~ with them. I suspect many of them still exist.
In some cases I have been able to identify an earlier Spanish resident of one of these grants simply by looking to see who the first fellow was to file for a title under the American government. These guys are ALL hispanic! The French, with a different system, chose to file claim with the US government and wait 25 years for a title. The Spanish went right to the government's land agents to make their claims.
Obviously all the earliest settlers knew about land titles and the power they gave an individual. Even the Oneida were as exacting as the Spanish in their own land grants ~ look up a guy named Allen who was the first settler of Rochester ~ trace his story back to the grants the Oneida gave him. They were far from primitive savages.
From the earliest times American land title systems have protected the poor from the rich, and the rich against each other.
The economist Hernando de Soto wrote about this. I have his book "The Mystery of Capital: Why Capitalism Triumphs in the West and Fails Everywhere Else" at home.
I thought there was an economist who either won a Nobel Prize, or was nominated for one, who wrote a paper or book on the relationship between property rights and the economic prosperity, or lack thereof, of a country. However, I can’t seem to find the article.