The New Economics: Possession vs Property (Apple Trees II)

The obvious flaw with John Locke's analysis of property is that he confuses possession with property. If possession was property then the person picking the acorns or apples would own those acorns and apples. Yet in reality the owner of the land owns them and possession amounts to theft. Ownership makes possession a crime if you are not the owner and so they cannot be the same.

Now English law does however value possession: they say "possession is 9/10th of the law". If "de facto" one is in possession then they have a very strong case for ownership. However clearly anyone claiming that because they live in a house, or live on land, they own the house or land is not getting very far. There are cases where landlords have been careless and allowed their land to lapse in use, and I believe courts will "de facto" respect the current tenant. But generally ownership is aggressively protected, and especially the financial returns on that land. In more modern economics shares in companies are another important class of ownership from which income can be extracted.

Ownership has a very special quality that makes it differ from possession. The best example of this I saw in Arrian of Nicomedia. Alexander the Great is marching his huge army past some Indian sages taking a stroll and the account continues thus:

At the sight of him and his army they did nothing else but stamp with their feet on the earth, upon which they were stepping. When he asked them by means of interpreters what was the meaning of their action, they replied as follows: "king Alexander, every man possesses as much of the earth as this, upon which we have stepped; but thou being only a man like the rest of us, except in being meddlesome and arrogant, art come over so great a part of the earth from thy own land, giving trouble both to thyself and others. And yet thou also wilt soon die, and possess only as much of the earth as is sufficient for thy body to be buried in."

[The Anabasis of Alexander by Arrian, translated by E. J. Chinnock. Book VII, Chapter II. Alexander's Dealings with the Indian Sages]

Possession is limited by our physical dimensions. We can only occupy so much land, our bellies can only eat so much, our eyes can only see so much, our minds can only think so much. But by virtue of records in paper we may claim ownership of an indefinite amount. Alexander in written accounts was leader of a huge empire that he had conquered and been accepted as leader of. Yet this is an imaginary and paper Alexander. The real Alexander as these sages pointed out could never occupy any more land than they or any other person. In Anarchism possession is highly valued, while ownership because it depends upon quite abstract social departments and document to enforce it is considered unnecessary.

The absurdity of Ownership is well captured by an anecdote I was told recently. An extremely wealth Indian family were travelling in London to set their daughter up for college. She saw a house she liked in Chelsea and the father promised to buy it for her. After making enquiries his staff informed him that he already owned it. When we are so removed from what we own that a multi-million pound house in Chelsea can be unknowingly owned one wonders the purpose of ownership. It is pure abstract paperwork. I believe a similar thing happened in the early days of The Simpsons cartoon. It came to the attention of some keen lawyer that the cartoon had made some libellous comments about Fox. He quickly realised he wasn't going to get far with the case when he was discovered that Fox owned The Simpsons. You can never be fooled about what you possess, but what you own is infinite and can become extremely tenuous.

I meant to discuss the next part in Property and Soul but will start briefly here. Possession is primarily a physical attribute. It is not just people who may possess. A tree may possess a magnificent canopy of blossoms. A flower may possess a heavenly fragrance. A mountain may possess a snow covered cap, and the light of the setting sun may possess a dreamy hue. Possession is very natural and organic, it is how the world is, quite free from documentation and metaphysics. No one needs ask of the clouds when they possess a heavy indigo countenance whether they are conscious and whether they have a right to ownership of that appearance: it is what they are.

With Ownership it is quite different. A mountain that owns the clouds that attend the high seat of its summit we would expect to send an army after anyone stealing those clouds, or at least send a barrister to represent them in court as they enforce their ownership. When we speak of ownership we are speaking of the structure of our society and the active powers that be. As already mentioned those powers have been very reluctant to accept most of human race, let alone finer metaphysical questions of what creatures can have a right to ownership.

So where did Ownership come from? I believe ownership is based in violence. In Britain the incumbent status quo was established by the Norman conquest of the Saxons in 1066. Harold was killed and William took over ownership of Britain. As if to prove the hypothesis here the first thing William did was compile the Doomsday Book which the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle records was under taken to find out "what land the king himself had, and what stock upon the land; or, what dues he ought to have by the year from the shire". Conquest of England meant income for the King. This without question is the origins of property. The Saxons were subjugated and became slaves to the Normans for the next few centuries until through marriage the Welsh King Henry took the throne and broke with Brittany. In that move not only did England become a sovereign nation again, but the Celts took power from the Saxons : the red dragon indeed did emerge victorious over the white saxon dragon as prophesied by Merlin. Under Henry the English reestablished themselves, but the divisions of the Feudal System set up by the Normans were never dismantled and to this day we have a country ruled and owned by lords and knights who get paid rent by tenants.

To remind us the violent nature of property and ownership the cost for ignoring ownership was always violence. Often death, but gradually this evolved into penal servitude and prison. Only very very recently have human rights stepped in to suggest that there is a more fundamental basis to law than ownership. But at root the system is based on ownership of property first and life second. It is the winnings of war by the victorious in battle that underpin the structure of our society.

If we have one demon in the workings of modern Economics to blame for the destruction of the planet it seems to be ownership and behind it war: possession by force.

But we have a problem because ownership is built on violence and power. Ultimately war is waged to gain power and ownership. Kings conquering, or today Nations conquering to establish property rights for economics.

Its a far cry from Adam Smith and his genteel book on property and free market to realising that the system of apparent peace and stability was built upon bloodshed, terror and brutal enforcement of ownership rights. Nietzsche would celebrate all this. In his view power was the ruling force of nature and the emergence of ruling people who subjugated other people to their Will was what it was all about. Ownership would be exactly what a ruling people would do to record and account the enslavement that they had people under. This forest belongs to Lord ABC, anyone without found trespassing without the express consent of Lord ABC will be executed. This is the reality of ownership. This is the reality of the origins of modern economics in the Georgian period.

So the New Economics must first tackle the violence between people, before it can begin to solve the violence we have committed against nature and the planet.

There is hope as much of the violence between people has been outlawed. Racism and sexism are two areas of violence where there is much hope. Next I need analysis how this has changed and how far mankind can go to end violence between ruling classes of owners and their subjects who do not own.

(todo: Nash equilibria, social contract. There is more to the status quo than simply victor and vanquished.)