South African property law

The floodplains of the Luvuvhu River and the Limpopo River.

South African property law regulates the "rights of people in or over certain objects or things."[1] It is concerned, in other words, with a person's ability to undertake certain actions with certain kinds of objects in accordance with South African law.[2] Among the formal functions of South African property law is the harmonisation of individual interests in property, the guarantee and protection of individual (and sometimes group) rights with respect to property, and the control of proprietary management relationships between persons (both natural and juristic), as well as their rights and obligations.[3] The protective clause for property rights in the Constitution of South Africa[4] stipulates those proprietary relationships which qualify for constitutional protection. The most important social function of property law in South Africa is to manage the competing interests of those who acquire property rights and interests. In recent times, restrictions on the use of and trade in private property have been on the rise.[5][3]

Property law straddles private and public law,[6] and hence "covers not only private law relations in respect of particular types of legal objects that are corporeal or incorporeal, but also public law relations with a proprietary character, and the resultant rights and interests."[7] Property in the private-law sense refers to patrimonial assets: those, that is, which comprise a person's estate. The law of property defines and classifies proprietary rights (for instance, as either real or personal), and determines the methods whereby they are acquired, lost and protected, as well as the consequences of their exercise and the limitations imposed by factual proprietary relationships which do not qualify as rights.[7]

  1. ^ Mostert & Pope 5.
  2. ^ A "legal object" is something in respect of which a person may hold a right (Mostert & Pope 7). Although in some circumstances the term may signify purely one's right of ownership in a legal object, in others it refers to the legal object (tangible or incorporeal) to which that right pertains.
  3. ^ a b Mostert & Pope 6.
  4. ^ s 25.
  5. ^ Wille 406.
  6. ^ Mostert & Pope 8.
  7. ^ a b Mostert & Pope 12.