vision2020@moscow.com: land as a commodity
land as a commodity
Steve Cooke (SCOOKE@marvin.ag.uidaho.edu)
Mon, 13 Mar 1995 10:58:01 PST8PDT
Dear Visionaries,
Is land, private land, public in any sense? I think yes, in the
sense that the society must agree to respect the bundle of rights
associated with the ownership of this and all other goods or
services. Since the police are only effective at the margin, it
requires a collective act of agreement, a covenant, to protect private
property. Therefore, all property is a public fact or it is not a
fact at all.
In my view, environmentalists are attempting to renegotiate the
social contract with land owners regarding the bundle of rights that
private land ownership implies. Currently some people in society
recognize some rights of land owners that others do not. That's the
problem. Not surprisingly, land owners prefer to identify with the
groups in society that recognizes the largest bundle of rights.
Until this disagreement can be reconciled within society, the land
owners' rights are tenuous in some areas particularly.
Therefore, I believe it is in the interest of both the landowners and
the society to resolve, to the extent possible, which bundle of
rights society will recognize now and in the immediate future. This
is part of what the Nov. election was about in general and Helen
Chenoweth's election in particular, i.e., society's attempt to
reconcile private and public interests in land and water in the West.
Once reconciled, in a dynamic society, it is very likely that
these rights will again become the subject of debate in the more
distant future and the cycle of uncertainty will begin again.
For additional information on the implicit social covenant of a
market economy, see J.F.A. Taylor, The Masks of Society, "The Ethical
Foundations of the Market." (The difficulty of developing a market
economy in the former U.S.S.R. relates, in part, to the lack of
agreement within their society as to which rights to recognize for
whom across an economy's set of resources. As a result, the Russian
Mafia is doing a good business by enforcing private rights through
violence or threats of violence.)
Steve Cooke
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