The preceding discussions demonstrate that there is lack of consensus on the economic basis for ULUP intervention in the urban property market particularly in a capitalist society. However, ULUP as noted in (Chapter 1) and acknowledged by avowed capitalists has become an indispensable tool for socio-economic development of societies. Nevertheless, the success of any ULUP regime is dependent on compliance with regulations that underpin the regime (see Webster, 1998; Mckay, 2003, 2007; Buitelaar et al., 2011). Compliance with ULUP regulations means land users or developers acting in a manner that is consistent with regulations (Lai et al., 2007).
However, there is a range of factors that determines whether people will direct their actions in compliance with regulations. Consequently, with a full understanding of the factors that motivate people to act in a particular way, it is possible to fairly predict compliance even before regulation is formulated. People could either be compelled by coercive force accompanied by a threat of sanctions or violence to act in a particular way (Scholz, 1997; Tallberg, 2002). Alternatively, people could be impelled by incentives to behave or act in a particular way. Studies, such as Pogodzinski and Sass (1990), Malpezzi and Mayo (1997), Pejovich (1999), Tiesdell and Allmendinger (2005), Lai et al. (2007) and Buitelaar (2011) have provided insights on how incentives can be used to promote compliance with ULUP regulations.
Threat of sanctions to ensure compliance with regulations; involuntary compliance is based on traditional deterrant philosophy (McKay et al., 2003). This philosophy is premised on certainty and severity of sanctions as predictors of compliance with regulation. Thus, compliance with regulation is expected to be high where there is the greater likelihood that violation will be detected, and expeditious, certain and huge sized sanction will be imposed (Sutinen and Kuperan, 1999; Winter and May, 2001). Therefore, to promote compliance, regulations must be unambiguous and agencies charged with the responsibility of enforcement will have to control regulated entities through a comprehensive programme of monitoring, surveillance and enforcement. This can be executed through competent judiciary system with up-to-date courts and effective public machinery with proactive leadership, adequate and competent staff, and logistics, among others things, to detect violation and implement threats of sanctions to ensure compliance albeit with huge financial costs (see Tallberg, 2002). Sutinen and Kuperan (1999) note that compliance with regulation based on deterrent philosophy is the most
costly item in natural resource management programmes accounting for 25% to over 50% of all public expenditures.
This suggests that jurisdictions with very weak and unreliable justice systems and public administrative set ups have limited prospects of achieving compliance with ULUP regulations entirely based on deterrent enforcement model. In SSA the judicial and court systems are weak and under resourced (GOA, 2004; Keith and Ogundele, 2007; Platteau, 2009). Besides, they are plagued with bureaucratic and complex court procedures, high cost of litigation, corruption and ineptitude (Platteau, 2009). Similarly, ULUP institutions in the sub-region are weak, under-resourced both in terms of human and material resources and suffer from political interference in the execution of their functions (see UN-Habitat, 1999, 2009a; Rakodi, 2001, 2006b; Mwimba, 2002; Kironde, 2006; Aribigbola, 2007; GoG, 2009). This coupled with unwieldy legislative mechanism where colonial legislation operate side by side with new laws and customs of the people, has made authorities charged with enforcement of regulations to turn a blind eye to non- compliance with regulations to eschew confrontation or promote compromise (Blocher, 2006; Platteau, 2009; see also Rakodi, 2006c: p 278).
Even in developed jurisdictions such as the UK where there is comparatively better justice and public administration systems, studies like Mckay (2003), Mckay et al. (2003), McKay (2007), Lai et al. (2007), Harris (2010) assert that enforcement of planning regulations is weak due partly to poor detection of violation, lack of financial resources and discretion in enforcement. Additionally, it is argued that the deterrence model does not explain the available evidence very well and its presciptions are usually not practical since expected small sized sanctions do not always result in non-compliance (Sutinen and Kuperan, 1999).
Given the foregoing discussions, voluntary compliance with regulations based on incentives should, thus, be given a large scope in any system of ULUP in SSA if it should have any chance of success. What constitutes incentives at a particular point in time and jurisdiction as well as its sustainability is usually milky (see Pejovich, 1999; Buitelaar, 2011). Also incentive may be contrived or instinctive. To utilise contrived incentives, ULUP and urban development regulations must ensure appropriate levels of incentives to impel people to act in compliance. This, for example, may be construed as reduction in title formalisation cost or assistance with cost of developments to ensure compliance with ULUP regulations. Undoubtedly, promoting this type of incentives’ could be very difficult
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and expensive as was the case with such schemes in countries like Uganda, Nigeria, Botswana and Kenya, which had to be abandoned due to their huge cost implications (UN-Habitat, 1999; see further Section 3.2.2).
Instinctive incentives, therefore, offer the more feasible option with a greater likelihood of achieving maximum compliance with ULUP regulations. That is, regulations stand the greater chance of being complied with, if they incorporate large doses of instinctive incentives. The human action theory offers an effective explanation of instinctive incentives towards voluntary compliance with ULUP regulations in SSA and is, thus, employed to devise a conceptual framework for the research. The choice of the human action-based framework also allows the quantification of individuals’ choices towards contributing to the wider ULUP policy debate given the argument of public choice economics scholarship that the rationale for ULUP is to advance private interest (see Section 2.3.2).