PROPERTY AND RIGHTS

In: Social philosophy & policy, Band 27, Heft 1, S. 101-134

Abstract

AbstractI present what I take to be the "classical" approach to property rights, in which property is basically a unitary concept: owners are the ones with the right to do, and prohibit others from doing, whatever there is to do with the thing owned, within the limits imposed by the rights of others totheirthings. I expound and defend the idea of "first acquisition" in more or less Lockean mode. I also point to the many difficulties of application of the general idea, leading to the need to negotiate at many points. For example, the vagueness of land ownership as we consider what goes on in the earth below or the sky above; to consideration of not just possible physical damages to others by virtue of ownership, but also aesthetic ones; and to the increasingly important area of intellectual property. I argue that the original idea continues to hold, though it underdetermines any number of specific issues.