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The phenomenon of illegal construction has attracted a considerable volume of research, in the fields of theory, policy making, practice and implementations. The dysfunctionality of laws, corruption and clientelism of the administration, the impunity of the law breakers, and the inability of the planning system to provide adequate housing and land uses suitable for development, were considered as the main reasons for illegal construction. Consequently, there was a general assumption that illegal construction was mainly met in developing countries. This was proved inaccurate in recent years, where research has shown that developed (or Global North) countries were also experiencing this phenomenon -and in fact, they always had. An interesting approach to this, was the investigation of cases where legal and constitutional frameworks were also imperfect, and enforcement mechanisms were not serving social justice. This was a diversion of the axiomatic rule that laws should always be obeyed, while, at the same time, there was an assertion that in some cases noncompliance should be regarded as justifiable. The proposed presentation will refer to cases of noncompliance, as described above, but will focus on another dimension of the phenomenon, frequently met in real life situations, but seldom considered as an issue worth scientific research. This aspect deals with the innovation element frequently employed by actors trying to circumvent the existing laws and rules in planning implementations. The degree of innovation invested in the illegal operations, usually transforms the particular action from “breaking the law” to “bending the law”. Researching the innovation element in cases of illegal construction is particularly useful for lawmakers, law enforcers and theoreticians. By analysing these innovative actions, lawmakers can identify the loopholes and deadlocks of legislation which appear in specific cases and under specific conditions and correct them before they provoke generalized judicial complications. Law enforcers can detect weak points in grossly under-researched enforcement functions and improve the related organization processes. Finally, innovation in illegality in the sector of planning implementations can enlighten the researchers in exploring the weak points of planning systems, identify cultural elements in social behaviours -for which the type of innovations described above has encapsulated a high exploratory value- and inject a very much needed sense of humour in the scientific research
Kokkali et al. (Tue,) studied this question.