ABSTRACT
The processes that produce additions to and renewals of the built environment are initiated and carried out by three main sets of interests – profit-seeking private investors, legally defined public authorities, and ‘voluntary’ organisations, groups or individuals. Public authorities and organisations have for most of their history operated on quite different motivations from profit-seeking promoters. NDA agencies can be subject to different forms of accountability and thus are driven by a range of motivations. Private developers, financial institutions, construction companies, estate agents and property professionals such as architects and engineers are normally accountable to a set of shareholders, depositors or partners. The model of the built-environment provision system presented in the chapter therefore not only disaggregates the various discrete stages of the process and identifies key ‘players’ at each stage, but it also highlights a number of the central policy issues to be considered when analysing the evolution of the environment.
