“If someone builds on your property without your permission, are you an idiot for making them take it down?”
Yes. If someone builds a 16 story bldg on your property you are worse than an idiot, you are a moron. To let this get to the point where they are now going to do what? Tear it down? Pathetic.
You'll see this in this country, a developer will go into "hurry up" mode to try to get grading and foundations done before the neighbors catch on. But here, we have stop work orders and judges that will enforce them if the county building department won't. Not every country in the world has an independent judiciary or city/county officials.
It speaks well for the archbishop that he was persistent.
And, yes, if somebody builds in violation of an order, they have to tear it down. It's "build at your own risk" if you violate the building code.
You didn't read the article did you? The building was constructed in an illegal method outside of the proper procedures (the Chicago way), and the construction was protested from the very beginning. Only after a long legal battle did they win. How exactly does this qualify as "let it get to this point"?
The party who built the building now has to except the consequences of their actions. They gambled that they would get away with it, and they lost that bet.
This sort of thing goes on in the U.S. on a regular basis, where the well connected construct a building outside of normal zoning laws and then expect it to be approved after the fact, because 'hey, whatchya gonna do?'.