[net.politics.theory] from Walter Wego

esk@wucs.UUCP (Walter Wego) (02/20/85)

[After a slight mix-up of identities in our last postings,]
[this one's really from me]

From: nrh@inmet.UUCP
> >How could fencing off an area so that all others are no longer free to 
> >use it increase everyone's freedom?  (Sevener)

> Certainly in the most obvious sense, it does not increase the freedom
> of the people who don't own the land.  On the other hand, this isn't
> kindergarten (at least, I hope not) so let's look a little deeper.
> If you cede, to everybody, the right to own land, and parcel it out
> somehow, you increase everybody's freedom because they are now free
> to use their parcel of land without consulting "everybody else".

This isn't elementary school either, so let's look a little deeper.  
WHO "parcels out the land", and HOW?  Does everybody get an equal
share?  What if your parcel's soil is better than mine?  Do I get
more land to compensate?  How much more?  Any answer to these
questions will be too subjective to provide a basis for justice.
And now you have a problem.  What if I'm not satisfied with my
share?  Has my freedom been increased?  If so, what kind of freedom
are you talking about -- obviously not freedom from coercion.

> Get the picture?  If you can't own land, you can't build on it (one 
> of the other people, just a-roamin through, might object (he's used
> to roaming, remember), and then where would you be?)

He can roam *around* your buildings.  Where's the problem?  Neither
of you has to have exclusive ownership of the land.

> Do you wish to argue that industrialization and agriculture haven't
> made people freer?

Again, what kind of freedom are you talking about?  You're following 
Torek down the garden path, I think, if you define "freedom" as anything
other than absence of coercion, and try to enforce such "freedom".

From: mck@ratex.UUCP (Daniel Kian Mc Kiernan) 
> In point of fact, Libertarians DO consider the justification and original
> source of such rights, as you would know if you read the philosophical 
> journals that Libertarians appear in, or if you read a Libertarian 
> philosophical treatise (such as, say, *Anarchy, State, and Utopia* by 
> Robert Nozick).  
>                                        Up to my waist in disgust,
>                                        Daniel Kian Mc Kiernan

Nozick's argument for private property rights is unsound.  If a government
were to enforce such "rights" as Nozick thinks people have to property,
it would be coercive.  (I will argue this in detail if you want.)

From:  tim sevener   whuxl!orb
> How do you determine what constitutes "use" of property that thereby
> legitimates or negates the right to property?  If I have a car hanging
> around that I no longer use, does that mean somebody else is free to use 
> it?  And then such use constitutes a valid claim for ownership?
> I am glad to see Libertarians beginning to shed an absolute defense of
> property.  I hope discussion continues in this vein.
     
Good point.  Your hope will be fulfilled; see my next article.

From: carnes@gargoyle.UChicago.UUCP (Richard Carnes)
> [Lindblom:] A hidden assumption in the conventional argument is that 
> private property, on which exchange rests, does not itself constitute 
> a barrier to freedom and is, in addition, noncoercively established 
> and perpetuated.  

Private property *can* be noncoercively established.  But it makes me sick
to see some of the things endorsed by people who claim to be libertarians,
i.e. claim to be opposed to coercion.  See my next article for more...

> Nor if we are all born into a world in which property rights are 
> already assigned, as indeed they are, does it follow that exchange 
> supports our freedom unless we own a great deal.  

Indeed, someone born into a world in which everything is claimed by 
someone else, has few obligations to respect such alleged property
rights.  I will explain why in my next article.

> Was it noncoercively achieved?  Obviously not.  The distribution of
> wealth in contemporary England, for example, is a consequence of
> centuries of conflict, including Viking raids, the Norman Conquest,
> [etc.]  --Charles E. Lindblom

Another good point.  The prevalence of coercion in history makes many
claims to absolute ownership dubious.  I won't address this issue in
detail next time; I want to concentrate on the origin of property rights.

From: gam@amdahl.UUCP (Gordon A. Moffett)
>> An immediate objection to [free transactions] is that it simply ignores
>> the effect of a transaction on persons not a party to it--those who must
>> endure the smell of a new factory in the area, the noise of motorcycles
>> breaking the quiet of their neighborhood, or the risk of accident in a
>> nuclear power plant.  [Lindblom]
> If people don't like the neighborhood, they leave.  When people leave
> they take their property with them.  This produces a decline of wealth
> for the area.  It is not in the interests of people wanting to maintain
> a lively economy to encourage the native wealth to leave.
 
No.  In a Free Economy, such harms to third parties must be considered
coercive, and dealt with accordingly.  Your economic argument here isn't
right either.  A polluting factory might not care whether anybody stays
in the area or not, if their customers lived elsewhere.

From: eder@ssc-vax.UUCP (Dani Eder)
>> >     The difference is between the land, which was not made by anyone,
>> >and the fruits of human labor.
>> 
>> Any land I might come to own will be paid for by the fruits of
>> my labor.  I therefore find your distinction between land and
>> other kinds of property to be nugatory.	[Ken Montgomery]

>> >You may think of this as an indirect payment to the rest of society
>> >for restricting their access to the land.	[Dani Eder]

>> Why do they have the right to access my land in the first place?
>> Either they have the right to use all of my property [...] or land
>> is a special case (which I find hard to believe).  [Ken Montgomery]

>     The point I was trying to make in my previous article was that
> when formerly unclaimed land is homesteaded, the rest of society loses
> the right of access and use of the land that they formerly enjoyed.
> If there is no compensating payment made by the homesteader, what will
> limit a greedy, somewhat wealthy person from fencing off great chunks
> of land?  [...] The compensating payment to the rest of society for
> restricting their access to the land you claim can be considered a tax 
> if you wish.  Dani Eder / Boeing / ssc-vax!eder

Dani Eder is close to the truth here.  In order to obtain a property
right to something, you must compensate others for the loss of access
to it, OR you must get them to agree to call it yours.  (As an example
of how the latter might work:  all the people in an area could get
together and agree on a contract as to who gets to own what land.  Such
a contract would only hold against those who agreed to it.)  I will
try to explain why this is so, in my next article.

From: decvax!genrad!mit-eddie!cybvax0!mrh [Mike Huybensz]
> My, it all sounds so equitable.  Until you consider that it's only the 
> FIRST one to perform that labor who can benefit.  "I'm sorry, you were
> born into the wrong historical time-frame to perform this labor to
> claim land, so you are denied access to the primary means of production. 
> Because we all own it already.  Nyah nyah."  Perhaps if infinite
> resources were available at the same rate....	

> The bare fact is that access to capital (in the form of land, resources,
> money, education, etc.) is an extremely important requirement for production.
> While bodies/minds are essential, they are seldom enough.  Otherwise, India
> would be extremely rich.  Thus, there is inequity involved in private
> ownership of resources when that excludes others from some sort of reasonable
> access. [Mike Huybensz]

Worse:  there is coercion involved.  People have the right to do what they
want, short of interfering with the similar liberty of others.  Having (as
you say) reasonable access to resources does not interfere with the similar
liberty of others.  Therefore people have the right to (i.e. it is not
wrong of them to) do so; therefore it is wrong to force them to "keep off"
land that was all claimed before they were born, leaving none for them.
I'll explain in more detail in my next article.

From: Ken Montgomery
>> At some point in the past someone came out to your land, pounded some
>> stakes in the ground, and said 'this is my land'.  His ownership of the
>> land didn't come from any 'fruits of labor', he just claimed the land.
	[J. Giles]
> Actually, the fruits of someone's labor allowed someone to claim it.
> You have to reach the land to claim it.  Reaching unclaimed land [...]
> is very much labor.  The best source of unclaimed land now is not on this
> earth, and you can bet your toenails that when someone claims it, there
> will have been quite a bit of labor going into that claim. [Ken Montgomery]

Reaching unclaimed land:  Biiiig deal!!  Whoop-tee-do!!!  Very much labor:
Ha!  Maybe now, but certainly not in most of history.  In any case, how much
labor went into it is irrelevant -- the question is whether others are made
worse off if the government treats the land as "property" and uses *force*
to keep them off.  If so, the arrangement is coercive.

From: Martin Taylor (dciem!mmt)
> How is it possible to reconcile the ownership of property with maximizing
> freedom?  I would have though that the availability of the property was
> what counted, not the ability to exclude other people from its use.

It *is* possible, in the ways I explained in my reply to Dani Eder, above.
(Think of it not as "maximizing freedom", but "minimizing coercion".  That 
way any confusion, resulting from a definition of freedom other than non-
coercion, can be avoided.)

From: Laura Creighton
> Some libertarians believe that by living in a certain area one, by one's
> continued existence there, have agreed to support the minimal state. They
> use this argument to say that a head tax to pay for the upkeep of the
> government defence and judicial system is just. 

Well they're wrong!  (And here we go arguing about government again!)

Stay tuned for my next article, which I hope will clear things up...

--apparently a dying breed, the TRUE libertarian,
				Walter Wego, c/o wucs!wucec1!pvt1047
Don't hit that 'r' key!  Use this address.  Mark mail "for Walter Wego."