Nature of common lands in a post-communist country - The Polish perspective

Since the unregulated legal status of land results in the violation of its legal and economic security, intensified land marginalization, a decrease in local government income caused by tax revenue loss and hinders effective real estate management and trade, national governments try to regulate legal rights to real estate. This paper presents an analysis of common land (acr. CL). This form of management combines the features of real estate whose legal regulation is unclear, which is located between the private and public (state/commune) ownership and the common law associated with the possibility of using or gaining interest. This study aims to examine the extent of common lands in Europe, to analyse the possibility of regulating the legal status of common lands and to demonstrate the effects resulting from the possibility of free law interpretation. An interdisciplinary concept was employed, combining the historical approach based on archival sources and the quantitative-qualitative approach based on descriptive, normative, and statistical information. This made it possible to estimate and compare feasible solutions that take into account the size (and market value) of a share in common lands. These methods were applied in the case of a medium-size common land situated in the Mazowieckie Voivodship (Poland). The findings quantitatively showed the scale of the freedom with which legal regulations can be interpreted, which can be up to 100% of the share. This research problem is of particular importance to users of CL situated near urban areas.