Compulsory purchase and the state redistribution of land: A study of local authority-private developer contractual behaviour
Journal of Property, Planning and Environmental Law
ISSN: 2514-9407
Article publication date: 9 March 2020
Issue publication date: 18 March 2021
Abstract
Purpose
The compulsory purchase of land forms the subject of much legal and urban regeneration research. However, there has been little examination of the contractual arrangements between local authorities and private sector property developers that often underpin the compulsory purchase process. This paper aims to examine local authority/private developer contractual behaviour in this context.
Design/methodology/approach
An empirical examination of property development contracts made for the “Silver Hill” project in Winchester, a small city in southern England, and the Brent Cross shopping centre extension in north London. Drawing on Macneil’s (1983) relational contract theory, the paper analyses key contract terms and reviews local authority documentation related to the implementation of those terms.
Findings
The contracts had two purposes as follows: to provide a development and investment opportunity through the compulsory purchase and redistribution of private land; and to grant the private developers participating in the projects freedom to choose if they wished to take up that opportunity. While the contracts look highly “relational”, the scope for flexibility and reciprocity is both carefully planned and tightly controlled. This exposes an asymmetric power imbalance that emerges in and is rearticulated by this type of contractual arrangement.
Originality/value
The empirical analysis of contract terms and contractual behaviour provides a rare opportunity to scrutinise the local authority-private developer relationship underpinning both property development practice and compulsory purchase.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The author wishes to acknowledge the advice, comments and criticisms received from two colleagues at the University of Essex, Matt Stone and Maurice Sunkin. The author also wishes to thank the two anonymous reviewers for their constructive criticisms in relation to the study. Views, errors and omissions remain the author’s own.
Citation
Mitchell, E. (2021), "Compulsory purchase and the state redistribution of land: A study of local authority-private developer contractual behaviour", Journal of Property, Planning and Environmental Law, Vol. 13 No. 1, pp. 1-16. https://doi.org/10.1108/JPPEL-07-2019-0041
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2020, Emerald Publishing Limited