Power monopoly and rural land expropriation compensation conflict: Construction of an evolutionary game model and empirical evidence from China

Land expropriation systems are policy tools to address market failures, but local governments’ monopoly power triggers compensation conflicts. Breaking from the production–distribution dichotomy, this study constructs an evolutionary game model between governments and farmers, using two Chinese datasets. The findings of the study are as follows: (1) under monopoly power, compensation is more associated to fiscal revenue than agricultural land value or geographic location, with no significant interaction between the latter two, and (2) farmers resist only if governments lose sanction power and conflict costs are low. Compensation is not significantly related to farmers’ conflict capabilities. Reforms should strengthen farmers’ land rights, reduce government monopoly, and enhance oversight.