Abstract
Effective ownership, management and access to land are central for sustainable development and can impact significantly on the opportunities for local enterprise. In 1998, Scotland’s Land Reform Policy Group concluded that ‘Land reform is needed on the grounds of fairness and to secure the public good’ Consequently, Scotland has introduced various schemes that facilitate or compel the transfer of land from an existing landowner to a community body. Sustainable development is a primary objective of all these regimes making them exceptional both in UK and global terms and worthy of in depth examination. This article critically explores how the laws and policies relating to sustainable development within these community right-to-buy regimes have matured and evolved from their introduction in 2003 to the present. It reveals the beginning of a fourth era in sustainable development policy in Scotland which moves away from a single ‘one size fits all’ approach to one where both sustainable development itself and wider sustainable development equations are tailored to land-use in Scotland and to the needs of each of the different community right-to-buy regimes. These developments evidence a significant maturity in the implementation and delivery of sustainable development in Scotland.
Highlights
Over thirty years have passed since the World Commission on Environment and Development defined sustainable development as ‘development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’ (‘the Brundtland definition’) [1] Since sustainable development has become a significant objective worldwide and the Brundtland definition its most widely accepted iteration
In 1998, Scotland’s Land Reform Policy Group concluded that ‘Land reform is needed on the grounds of fairness and to secure the public good’ [3] and following on from this, Scotland has introduced various schemes that facilitate or, in some cases, compel the transfer of land from an existing landowner to a community body
The article concludes that the new community right-to-buy regimes herald the beginning of a fourth era in sustainable development policy in Scotland which moves away from a single ‘one size fits all’ approach for the whole of Scotland to one where both sustainable development itself and wider sustainable development equations are tailored to the specific requirements of individual regimes and contexts
Summary
Over thirty years have passed since the World Commission on Environment and Development defined sustainable development as ‘development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’ (‘the Brundtland definition’) [1] Since sustainable development has become a significant objective worldwide and the Brundtland definition its most widely accepted iteration. The article explores how the interpretation of sustainable development itself and the process of assessing what is sustainable development has developed and been tailored to the particular context of compulsory acquisition by community bodies within the more recent community right-to-buy regimes established by the CESA 2015 (in Part 3A LRSA 2003) and Part 5 of the LRSA 2016. The article concludes that the new community right-to-buy regimes herald the beginning of a fourth era in sustainable development policy in Scotland which moves away from a single ‘one size fits all’ approach for the whole of Scotland to one where both sustainable development itself and wider sustainable development equations are tailored to the specific requirements of individual regimes and contexts
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