Acquiring land with no owners?

[Costa]

I have a question about property and property rights regarding anarcho-capitalism.

 

If there's land that doesn't belong to anyone, how do you acquire it?

For example: I want to build a house somewhere, the land where I want to build my house isn't for sale and isn't owned by anyone. How do I register that land as my property and at what costs? 

 

This might be a stupid question, I hope not.

[DaVinci]

I have a question about property and property rights regarding anarcho-capitalism.

 

If there's land that doesn't belong to anyone, how do you acquire it?

For example: I want to build a house somewhere, the land where I want to build my house isn't for sale and isn't owned by anyone. How do I register that land as my property and at what costs? 

 

This might be a stupid question, I hope not.

 

Someone will probably correct me on this, but I think in an anarcho capitalist world you acquire unowned land by improving it. In other words, you can't just stake a claim and hold the land forever. You have to improve it in some way. A house. A fence. A barn. Cows. Crops. Something like that. Some form of use

[aviet]

I don't know exactly what sort of reply you are wishing to solicit. In my opinion anarcho-capitalism is an oxymoron.

For me, anarchy is the absence of government and complete individual freedom. Anybody can do whatever they want to anyone. Whereas I see capitalism as the right to bear property; enforced by a legal mechanism. Capitalism is thus not compatible with anarchy. When people say 'anarcho-capitalism' they actually mean 'capitalism' and maybe a few other things thrown in that are not specifically stated.

In an anarchist context, you can just take property and displace or kill previous occupier(s).

In a pure capitalist context, in my opinion, there is a requirement for a universal code for property rights. I don't see competing resolution organisations with possibly conflicting interpretations of property rights as viable - this would be anarchy, i.e. anyone can come up with their own interpretation of property rights and start enforcing it.

So in a pure capitalist context with a universal code for property rights, the process for assuming land is whatever has been laid out.

Here in the UK there is a common-law code for property rights, which has been bogged down in statute, but in essence I only see one thing wrong with it. All land in the UK is owned by the monarch, Elizabeth II. They grant freehold tenure of land, which is essentially absolute ownership of the land, with the courts for recourse. There is also leasehold land, where land is possessed for a given period of time. On the death of the freeholder, the land passes to their named legates or nearest relatives if they have not left a will. Its illegal to occupy residential property owned by someone else without agreement. All other property can be occupied, though the owner can take legal action to remove you. If you occupy a property for ten years and can document that, you can apply for leasehold of the property; and after 20 years you can apply for freehold of the land. This is done by applying for registration at the Land Registry, which costs a relatively small fee. Even though it is illegal to occupy residential property under statute law, you can still do so, but the owner has rights of recourse against you. Once you have occupied the land for the before stipulated period and you successfully register the land, their right to the land is void.

The process of claiming the land is called adverse possession:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/adverse-possession-of-registered-land/practice-guide-4-adverse-possession-of-registered-land

This provides a simpler overview for Britain:

http://www.johnantell.co.uk/adverse-possession-of-land

Someone will probably correct me on this, but I think in an anarcho capitalist world you acquire unowned land by improving it. In other words, you can't just stake a claim and hold the land forever. You have to improve it in some way. A house. A fence. A barn. Cows. Crops. Something like that. Some form of use

It depends what is meant by anarcho-capitalist. If there is a universal rule that can effectively be enforced that says to stake a claim to previously owned land or land that there is no record of ownership you have to improve it; then that is the reality; though it is not anarchy.This notion is not compatible with anarchy. As there is nothing stopping someone coming along and saying something different in an anarchist setting.

Personally I do not think it is a good idea to start using idealogical labels, such as anarcho-capitalism, as people have varying definitions of what that actually is. As I outline in my previous post, anarcho-capitalism is an oxymoron.

To have what the OP describes and what DaVinci comes up with a loose universal for you need: law that has a provision for property rights and method of enforcing those provisions when they are broken. So a better literal title for this is legally enforceable universal property rights, rather than anarcho-capitalism.
 

[Mister Mister]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homestead_principle

 

It's an interesting question, but problems like this have been solved, or at least, fairly reasonable solutions have been developed, which could be improved upon.  Please realize, that property rights, and ethics in general, only become necessary when there are conflicts, or disputes.  If you want to stake a claim to land in the wild in order to improve it, no problem.  The problem comes when someone else comes along and wants to build a house on land that you have already claimed, or someone has reason to believe that your plans to develop land will have negative consequences on their land.  This is why we need a rational, just, and consistent methodology to resolve disputes over property, one that is simple enough for everyone to understand and have access to.

[TheRobin]

Well, either you want to build a house where no one is near and no one cares, then that's not a problem anyway. OR you want to build a house near to people or in a town/city, then you're not the first one and can just ask what the common procedure is there. I'd just guess with 7 billion people on the globe there's no one universal way that is that exact same in every single location, so asking for a general rule is rather impossible, imo.

 

 

Also, just by the way for both Aviet and Costa, I can only recommend the free books and podcasts on this webpage, as most of these questions have been answered already time and time again. Especially the "how do rules get enforced in a free/anarchic society"-thing.

Also, aviet, please don't create unnecessary confusion just becaue YOU don't get what anarchy means and how it works. Else every post will end up with conflict over definitions and that will usually lead nowhere.

[aviet]

Also, aviet, please don't create unnecessary confusion just becaue YOU don't get what anarchy means and how it works. Else every post will end up with conflict over definitions and that will usually lead nowhere.

I get what anarchy means. It is a word people load with their own meaning, which is not the same as others. I know someone who lived in an anarchist community in the 1980s and their definition of anarchy was different from what yours seems to be. They had no property rights and the whole thing ended up spiralling out of control and none of the participants talk to each other any more. And I've come across people who call themselves anarchists and have a number of different things they add into the blend that you would probably disagree with. And if I take your brand of anarchy to any of these people I will undoubtedly get the same thing: "please don't create unnecessary confusion just becaue YOU don't get what anarchy means." Yet it is people who have called themselves "anarchist" but given the word different meanings who have created the confusion.

 

I prefer to stick with literal meanings of words, for anarchy: absence of government and complete individual freedom. Yet I think all people who call themselves anarchists, add a number of other things into the mix, such as ethics and anarchist law, the latter of which is a literal oxymoron. Essentially anarchists have, for lack of a better word, manifestos. You can't sum up your ideology in one word and by doing so you will end up with conflicts with people who claim the same word, but have a different "manifesto."

 

 

 

Also, just by the way for both Aviet and Costa, I can only recommend the free books and podcasts on this webpage, as most of these questions have been answered already time and time again. Especially the "how do rules get enforced in a free/anarchic society"-thing.

 

Do you have any links to hand? I've listened to Stefan Molyenux and he has provided a pure anarchic explanation, but it was a bit brief and he ended up conceding with something along the lines of, "This isn't something I expect to happen any time soon. This will take generations." And I hope that statement is true. But personally I am not convinced, in the here and now, by this assertion that there could be laws that are not enforced, but they are somehow "enforced." i.e. I have an implied right to property, but if someone infringes that right a dispute resolution organisation can somehow remedy the situation without using force against the infringer.

 

When I am speaking to statists, I will bring up possible solutions for human issues; and because these solutions lack or limit government, I will get a statement something along the lines of what you will all have heard:

 

There will be anarchy in the streets.

The world will fall apart.

 

And so on. To these people I say, "Go back to Celtic Britain, when people were so violent they had to built giant mounds to hide a few families behind wooden barricades. And try telling them that they need to stop carrying out vigilante justice and practical tribal dictatorship and replace them with a common law legal system and a representative democracy." My point is that they are refusing any progress, being under the impression that a pinnacle has been reached, this as good as it gets and afraid to try anything new; and that is the same mentality of the tribal Celt. If there wasn't an impetus to try new ways of interacting, we would still be living in hill forts, dying in our 30s and 40s etc. However, I fully recognise that you couldn't just go back to that period and drop in a system that would lead to increased standards of living and more freedom. And I doubt you could drop in your idealised anarchy into that situation in a few generations. Humanity has been moving in great cycles. The paradigm doesn't shift in one day. In Europe we had brutal tribalism. It was brutally replaced by the Roman Empire, which allowed some level of enlightenment, freedom and standard of living. Then we had Christian monarchies, which brought about the basic ethics we take for granted like thou shall not kill. Then there was the enlightenment and so on. None of this was perfect or even consistent, but to some extent it was the best that could be done at the time. Just as you cannot expect the people of DR Congo to have a world-class healthcare provision the time next year, you can't expect for idealised anarchy anywhere in the world next year or probably any time in our lifetimes. This is something we will have to work towards and I think Molyneux has identified the quickest mechanism to get there with peaceful parenting.

[ProfessionalTeabagger]

I have a question about property and property rights regarding anarcho-capitalism.

 

If there's land that doesn't belong to anyone, how do you acquire it?

For example: I want to build a house somewhere, the land where I want to build my house isn't for sale and isn't owned by anyone. How do I register that land as my property and at what costs? 

 

This might be a stupid question, I hope not.

It's a good question, especially considering most people can't imagine doing this without a third party who has some exceptional power to grant property rights. If the land is not owned then you just use it. If you are putting it to legitimate use then that particular area of land is yours. Although that also means you are now responsible for it. 

I don't know exactly what sort of reply you are wishing to solicit. In my opinion anarcho-capitalism is an oxymoron.

 

For me, anarchy is the absence of government and complete individual freedom. Anybody can do whatever they want to anyone. Whereas I see capitalism as the right to bear property; enforced by a legal mechanism. Capitalism is thus not compatible with anarchy. When people say 'anarcho-capitalism' they actually mean 'capitalism' and maybe a few other things thrown in that are not specifically stated.

That's pretty silly. How you "see" capitalism is irrelevant. 

[TheRobin]

I think you're now even more confusing things. Yeah, sure most anarchists (especially in Europe) are left anarchists (though they just call themselves anarchists) and yeah they reject property rights, but that has nothing to do with anarchy.
As you said (sort of) anarchy means no rulers, not no property rights. It is your personal conclusion that no rulers => no enforcable rules => no property rights. But that, again, has nothing to do with the term anarchy.

 

As for recommendations: Try Stefs "Practical Anarchy" where he goes into detail of that kind of stuff.

[green banana]

The basic answer comes straight out of John Locke's Second Treatise on Government. Anybody improving land and marking it as distinct has made a rightful claim to it.

[kenshikenji]

the whole idea of property rights is idiotic.  have any of you tried using the exclusion criteria to define what IS property to explore the desireable consequences? i suggest you try it.

[LibertarianSocialist]

The basic answer comes straight out of John Locke's Second Treatise on Government. Anybody improving land and marking it as distinct has made a rightful claim to it.

Not forgetting the lockean proviso, which in many ways invalidates anything but a socialist conception of property.