Ownership matters: Forestland concentration in rural Alabama

The land tenure literature theorizes relationships between land tenure patterns and rural well‐being which have application in the analysis of contemporary trends in forestland ownership in the U.S. South. Of particular interest are impacts of landown‐ership concentration on the well‐being of rural areas. In this article, we review the literature on land concentration and well‐being; describe current forest ownership patterns in the state of Alabama; discuss the possible relevance of such patterns to economic, social, and environmental well‐being; and propose a research agenda for measuring forestland concentration and testing hypothetical relationships between forest tenure and rural well‐being.