From informality to formality to informality: Extralegal land transfers in an upgraded informal settlement of South Africa

Abstract

The paper discusses the nature of extralegal land transfers in an upgraded informal settlement in South Africa. The paper investigates these extralegal transfers in terms of the notion of property and property law as a social construct. The paper researches two main but contradictory conclusions, namely that either extralegal transfers are the result of the current social construct of property (also related to the historic lack of formal property for black people in South Africa) and / or that they are the result of the excessively high transaction costs of a formal transfer process.