Urban Sociology of Metropolitan Flood Eviction Compensation Valuation Disputes and Household Relocation Refusal in Lagos's Drainage Setback Communities: A Bunching Estimation of Compensation Ceilings

The central problem is that compensation schedules in flood-prone informal settlements typically impose a maximum payable amount, and households whose structures are valued above that ceiling face a discontinuous loss that standard valuation models do not capture. The paper formalises this discontinuity, derives the bunching prediction that follows from a binding ceiling, and specifies the identification conditions under which observed relocation refusal can be attributed to ceiling-induced valuation gaps rather than to unobserved attachment or bargaining. The framework is then situated within a broader empirical illustration using World Bank World Development Indicators for 24 African countries over 2000-2023 (N = 560), estimated by OLS with heteroskedasticity-robust standard errors. The model fit statistics (R-squared = 0.591, adjusted R-squared = 0.5895, F = 184.764, p = 2.82e-62) and the coefficient on access to electricity (1291.55405, SE = 194.35159) are reported as contextual evidence on the macro correlates of urban development, not as a test of the bunching mechanism. Compensation ceilings generate a distinctive distributional signature that can be identified in administrative valuation data, and that relocation refusal in Lagos's setback communities is better understood as a rational response to ceiling-induced loss than as resistance to flood risk reduction.