Legal pluralism at the beach: Public access, land use, and the struggle for the “coastal commons”

The constantly shifting boundaries between land and sea pose fundamental challenges in resolving land‐use disputes at the coast. In the UK, these difficulties are compounded by the fact that multiple agencies and authorities are charged with managing the coastline. This means the coast is a space of legal plurality, subject to overlapping jurisdiction. This paper demonstrates the consequences of this with reference to Whitstable, on the north Kent coast, where customary law and established (“as of right”) use is clashing with private property rights concerning the ownership of, and access to, a town beach. Noting that the legal authorities are struggling to reconcile these different rights claims, the paper concludes that the effective resolution of land‐use conflicts on a changing coastline demands legal pliability and, ideally, a reduction in the overall number of organisations responsible for the regulation of the “coastal commons.” Access to the coast raises difficult legal issues about land ownership and property rights. This paper takes a case study in Kent, UK, to argue that the overlapping jurisdiction evident at the coast, together with the constantly shifting boundary between land and sea, makes pliability and flexibility essential when adjudicating over land‐use conflicts.