Ariadne's Thread on Property
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  John Speaking

Speaker There are some libertarians who attribute no moral obligations to those who initially acquire property in natural resources. In their view, those who acquire the resources owe nothing extra to those who do not. Nozick believes that those who acquire natural resources owe something to those who do not if the non-owners are net losers in the process.

But I want to point out that there are also libertarians who argue for obligations that exceed those recognized by Nozick.

Peter Vallentyne is a libertarian who believes in a strong form of self-ownership, strong individual rights, and strong property rights -- but he also believes that those who initially acquire property in natural resources owe something substantial to those who do not. Here's a taste of what he says:

Nozick is surely right that his version of the Lockean proviso is a necessary condition for acquisition of rights over unowned things. It is, however, arguably too weak to be the only necessary condition....One can allow that the appropriator obtains rights over the entire object, but insist that this is conditional on her paying back to the members of society the competitive value (based on supply and demand; e.g., based on an auction or a competitive market) of the rights she has claimed over the resource in its unimproved state. This leaves the appropriator any profits or benefits that she can reap from the improvements (value added). [Peter Vallentyne, "Nozick's Libertarian Theory of Justice," p. 20]

The point is that there are right-libertarians and left-libertarians. Left-libertarians allow strong property rights, but also insist on certain obligations to non-owners.





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