Assessing the Potential of Adaptive Reuse in South Africa: An Integrative Review using PESTEL Analysis

South Africa is in critical need to structure its future building and construction on the principles of sustainable construction to counteract the negative effects of the building and construction industry on the environment, society, and the economy. Since South Africa became a democratic state in 1994, sustainability has been ingrained in its laws and policies. However, despite the country's adoption of various global frameworks and protocols for environmental preservation, these initiatives have not been fully implemented across all economic sectors. Adaptive reuse (AR) as a concept for sustainable housing development is still in its infancy among South African construction industry professionals. This research examines the contextual factors that affect how AR operations are applied in the building and construction industry, with a focus on the South African private sector. An integrative literature review of a systematic search in the Scopus database, supplemented with a purposive search in Google Scholar was conducted to achieve the PESTEL (political, economic, social, technical, environmental, and legal) analysis. As a result, factors, and variables such as a lack of resources, knowledge, technological know-how, and policies were recognized and contextually described. The government must create relevant enabling legislation, including laws and regulations, tax reductions, and financial and economic incentives for AR initiatives. The data acquired is used as a preliminary step for the design of the necessary tools and models for assisting the private sector in sustainable adaptive reuse initiatives in South Africa.