9.2.2 |
FOR PRIVATE PROPERTY |
Traditional arguments for private property are often
based on the same principles (or lack thereof) as traditional
arguments against private property.
—'From each traditional theory of property as it makes believe; to
each traditional theory of property as its make is believed in'.—
Given the principles, a difference in conclusions must be due to the
empirical (also past-regarding) presuppositions the theorist
selects, to inconsistences and/or to the ambiguity of the terms
used. Expressions such as liberty and desert may also
have the same emotive meaning or positive connotation for those using
this language; they do not have any, or hardly any, descriptive
meaning or denotation commonly accepted by the same people. Thus
strictly speaking, it is the formulation of the principles
which is the same, not so much their interpretations.
Because of the actual discrepancies, reasons of liberty, desert, virtue,
labor and utility may lead in
practise to
contradictory propositions on the value or disvalue of the institution of
private property, or of property in general.
Perhaps the oldest argument for private property is the
argument from first occupancy. It appeals to the right of the
original discoverer and occupant to the exclusive use of what
'e
discovered and occupies. Now, there is nothing self-evident in
this findings is keepings dogma, but it has been argued that
the idea that a discoverer or first occupant should be protected
can be justified by a more general principle that possession as
such should be protected. Yet, the argument would then be
security of possession, something that is of secondary import
for an occupation theory.
Whether the justification of first occupancy is ultimate, or
whether it is a question of security, there is always a number
of conditions which must be satisfied, such as the obvious
condition that the thing occupied must belong to no-one (else).
Vaguer is the condition that occupation would have to be actual.
Some say that this is determined by the person's purpose in
occupying the thing and
'er carrying out of this purpose
at the time of occupation.
(Note that such a condition is purely
doctrinal and could only justify an
intrinsic property right, that is, a
property right intrinsic to a first-order doctrine.)
Truly controversial may be the condition that the occupation must not
extend beyond a person's share, when it is questioned what would be a
person's share.
The classical 'simile of the theater' illustrates very well
what kind of reasoning is definitely fallacious in this respect.
According to this simile the world belongs to no-one (the
theater is common for anyone who comes) but it is open for the
first taking of anyone (the place someone sits in belongs to
'im
from then on). When the theater fills to capacity, those who are
left outside have no right to a seat. It was already objected to
this long ago that the world (the theater) belongs to everyone
and that those already in it have the duty to move over and make
room. Such an objection immediately shows three fatal deficiencies
of this theatrical representation of the world: (1) in a
theater the size of a human, or other animal, body is significant and the
size of the subdivision of the space of the theater
(the seats) was determined by the size of that body; in the
world at large the size of individual bodies is insignificant,
and the issue of private property does not really concern the
one square meter or so somebody needs to stand, sit or lie on;
(2) if people could be left out of the theater, then the
representation fails because all living people are already in
the world and cannot be left out of it; and (3) in the theater
birth and death are exceptions (other than on the stage,
maybe): so far as the public is concerned, they are supposed to
take place outside the theater, but in the real world birth and
death occur in it — and how does this affect the seating
arrangement and the share every living person has?
First occupancy is no argument for private property, not only
because of deficiencies such as those of the simile of the
theater, but also because it has to be assumed that the part of
the world which is not privately owned, and which is accessible,
would belong to no-one, rather than to everyone. A more
ingenious attempt is to justify property on the basis of
people's labor.
But this never justifies ownership in a thing irrespective of its
description (or 'to the whole thing'); at most, it can justify ownership
in the value a person's labor adds to a thing.
Only if the thing a person works on was already 'er
property before 'e began to work on it, may one conclude that
the person, as a laborer, is entitled to the whole thing, not
only the value added. This, however, requires another, (more)
basic, justificatory principle or theory in addition to the labor
theory. A defender of the labor theory may reply that the
added value and the original thing the value is added to are inseparable.
Since 'e does not recognize any ownership that is
not based on labor, the original thing was no-one's and only the
worker in question would have the right to use it.
(In this person's eyes, plain marble is not the community's property but
no-one's, and only the sculptor who has used it may do with the sculpture
what 'e likes.)
But, firstly, this inseparability is too vague a notion: where does
a sculpture start, for instance, and where does it end?
What about a renowned artist for whom the whole world itself is a piece of
art 'e is presently working on? And, secondly, the notion of 'adding
labor' is an equally vague one (not to speak of "mixing one's
labor with the thing", which is a metaphorical fright). If there
is no criterion to establish the boundaries of a person's
'mixture', an internationalist proletarian could claim that 'e
changed the whole world by doing one thing; or by 'committing'
one act, for in the labor theory it is immaterial whether a
person adds a value or a disvalue.
Now, it has been granted that there always must be 'enough and as good
left in common for others', but the value of this addition can only be
assessed —again— on the basis of another non-labor-,
non-desert-principle (for example, that one ought to preserve 'mankind' or
oneself).
It is claimed by some that the situation of people who are
not able to appropriate anything anymore is not worsened by a
system which allows the permanent appropriation of holdings. On
this view the proviso 'that enough and as good are left over'
would not be violated, and the sacredness of private property in
an absolutist sense could still be justified. The underlying
nonphilosophic considerations favoring private property are
familiar enough: 'it increases the social product', 'it encourages
experimentation', 'it leads to specialized types of risk bearing',
'it protects future persons' and 'it provides alternate sources
of employment'.
The argument from productivity is especially noteworthy: a society with
private appropriation is said to be far more productive.
Assuming that these theorists do know
exactly what they are talking about, this last claim that the
recognition of private property is advantageous for the society
or community concerned, is of an empirical nature.
It may be true at one place and time, false at another place and time,
and the empirical assumptions in question,
altho characteristic of
some ideologies, are not characteristic of ours (nor are the antithetical
empirical assumptions in disfavor of private property in general).
More interesting in the present context are the one or more
normative principles which seem to have entered such theories of
property surreptitiously: increase in production and efficiency
have either become ends in themselves or are means to some
other, hidden end. (Even the anti-utilitarian's hidden end-state
principle may thus turn out to be the maximization of happiness.)
But if productivity and efficiency are acknowledged as
ends in themselves or as important means to other ends, who
assures us that individuals or private corporations are, then,
still the best organs to guarantee productivity and efficiency
or those 'higher' objectives (like happiness?). If the
privatizer is lucky, they are; if not, a state without private
property might do a better job. And if production is so
important, why should only the entitlement to the produce of
one's labor stimulate it and not the entitlement to the things
one needs in order to be able to produce? The enthusiasm for the
argument must evaporate altogether when those who are left with
no private poperty in land turn out to prefer eating the fruits
provided by nature and the freedom of going to a common beach to
a society in which all the fruits of the land and beaches have been
privately appropriated, and which not only produces ever more
goods, but also ever more waste. Who has the right to deny them
that preference in 'er calculations?
We have now arrived at arguments for private property from utility.
They rest on the
modal condition that purposeful
activities require the use of tools and materials, on the need of clarity
and harmony with respect to the use of things, and on the idea that the
acquisition, possession and use of those things would be essential to the
expression of people's personality.
It has been correctly pointed out, however, that the
absence of individual ownership rights must not be confused with
the absence of the individual duties of care. It has also been
said already that economic utility arguments may be given for a
general justification of property rights, while being used to
override them at the level of particular justification, but the
rights would be normative in the former case and nonnormative in
the latter (unless based on another justificatory principle).
It is obvious that insofar as the thesis of property's
utility depends on arbitrary or weak, empirical assumptions
concerning property's influence on the total happiness of sentient
beings or people, or their wants, desires or preferences,
it produces its own antithesis of disutility. In either case the
founding principle remains a doctrinal one which can solely
explain the existence of intrinsic rights or the absence
thereof.
Whereas utility arguments can only justify intrinsic property
rights, pure arguments from liberty can only justify
extrinsic
property rights. When it is asserted that everyone has the right
'to act as a free personality', or that 'each is at liberty to
do what 'e can do', this is an active, discretionary right
correlating with the nonactivating duty not to interfere, or not
to infringe the material liberty of others. Those speaking of
'political liberty', that is, a liberty guaranteed by the state,
want to express that the argument from material liberty should
support the incorporation of the moral liberties with respect to
property into a legal system. The crucial questions remaining,
however, are How big is the 'sphere of self assertion' a person
needs in the external world?, What is an infringement upon a
person's material liberty if this is to concern more than the
1 m² or so 'er body occupies, or more than the area 'e needs to
preserve 'imself? and Is it possible to interfere justifiably
with someone else's material liberty, and if so, when?. (Note
that speaking of "the need of a sphere of self-assertion" in
some absolute sense independent of the spheres of others and the
room available implies that the foundation is doctrinal, and the
right intrinsic.) Everyone agrees that 'people should not interfere
unjustifiably', but the assertion of this analytical truth only
shows that those who agree about this belong to the same speech
community, not in the least that they adhere to the same, or
even a similar, theory of property rights. And if freedom has
some common descriptive meaning and is used as an argument for
private property, there are those who take the liberty of
declaring that the primary effect of property on a large scale
is to limit this very freedom.
A variety of other arguments in favor of private property
have been offered. One of them is that good things should go to
good people. But the first good means something like making
happy or improving one's situation, whereas the second
good means virtuous or praiseworthy. It has been
rightly argued before that it may be 'true that what is earned is
deserved, it does not follow that what is unearned is undeserved'.
Virtuousness or praiseworthiness is in this context a thoroughly
doctrinal notion (as it may be assumed that it is not really
meant to apply to those who do whatever they like, albeit
without interfering with others). A related belief is that
private property is necessary for the development of moral
character. This is not more of an argument than the belief that
communal or collective property is necessary for such a development.
The institution of private property has also been scorned
for its vicious effects on people's characters. Finally, those
distinguishing organization from spontaneous order have
insisted that private property is not only indispensable to
society as a spontaneous order, but that historical experience
shows that it develops with the advance of 'civilization',
inclusive of large landownership and private property in the
means of production. But then, historical experience also shows
that large landownership and private property in the means of
production can be abrogated by the advance of revolutions,
whether 'organized' or 'spontaneous'.
