ABSTRACT
One of the ways people’s legitimate interests in land and buildings are protected is by recognising and protecting those interests as property rights. Property rights are a social relationship between the holder of the right and all others. The content of that relationship, and how it can be enforced (if necessary), is regulated in law. There is a huge variety of property rights, and this can be analysed by identifying some of the dimensions in those rights. Common to all those rights is that they give rights to, and impose obligations on, both the holder of the right and all others. By identifying those rights and obligations, it is possible to distinguish between four types of ‘property regime’. The exercise of a property right is never unrestricted and absolute, and it can be limited in many ways, under both private law and public law. Spatial planning is an exercise of public law, and it can restrict the exercise of property rights. For any plot of land, the ‘local regime of land rules’ – both public and private – can be identified.
