Past building codes (including many that are still in place today) are called prescriptive and are basicly tyranny. They tell you EXACTLY how to build a building (example: plywood must be secured with eight-penny ring-shank nails at a maximum spacing of six inches apart) and if you deviate from that they can withdraw your permits or fine you or even demolish your building and charge you with criminal penalties. You can’t build with a different material, like earthbag or dirt-filled tires, because they haven’t written prescriptive codes for those materials.
There is a newer method called performance based building codes that has slowly been picking up steam in the last few decades and in some parts of the world this is the main standard. A fictional example would be that a wall has to withstand 100 mph wind for 1 hour without collapse. A performance based standard allows for the use of any material to build with.
If LL is to have a building code, then it is obvious that a fully performance based standard is the way of the future. I would strongly caution against copy-and-pasting a different country’s building code because, from what I understand, many areas still have a mixture of prescriptive codes and performance codes. LL’s building code should be written from scratch or borrowed bit-by-bit and be completely performance based because anything else is tyranny.
And of course, I do not believe in building codes at all for personal structures built for yourself and non-commercially. You do not need some stranger from the govt coming onto your property and dictating to you what sort of structure you are allowed to build for your family.
There are many grey areas here. But going off of Vit’s recent interview on the Free Cities Podcast, it may be that the only structures in Liberland that need to have any sort of building code is buildings that are financed or have insurance. This is only because the financier or insurance company requires it, not that the govt requires it. So based off of this, maybe the LL govt should have an “advised” building code that is performance-based, but not legally required.
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Some technical articles about performance-based building codes: