A Man Who Owns a River
On August 5, agents of the Environmental Protection Agency released more than 3 million gallons of pollutants into the Animas River. At the time, I wrote an article about how private property rights in a stateless society offer a better solution to the problem of water pollution than government environmental regulations. A response that I received in a discussion group regarding that article posed a variant of a common criticism of anarcho-capitalist theory, namely that of a wealthy person buying up vast swaths of land and using private property rights over those lands to perform malicious acts, such as encircling people to trap them on their land. In this case, the proposed troublesome scenario is that of one man owning an entire river from source to sea and using his property rights over the river in a way that harms other people. Let us examine this scenario.
We must begin by asking what it means to own a river. We can deduce this from what it means to own something in general. Ownership is a right to exclusive control over a scarce resource. Such ownership is rightfully gained in a state of nature by mixing one’s labor with unowned natural resources. This is because one owns one’s physical body, and therefore is responsible for the actions committed with that body. Once a property right is established, it may be sold or gifted to another person if the property owner so chooses. Given this theoretical framework, the river owner owns the land upon which the river flows, and ownership of the riverbed may be gained by laboring upon it, such as by dredging the river to make it more navigable or by growing aquatic crops in it. However, the water in the river is not labored upon and is not static upon the property. It will eventually either evaporate or flow into another body of water that is outside of the man’s property claim. Wildlife that resides within the river are likewise unowned, but the man may claim them by mixing his labor with them in the form of foraging, fishing, or hunting. Finally, we may expect that the man would own a reasonable clearance above his river, large enough to allow him to peacefully enjoy his river but not large enough to impede commercial air or space travel overhead.
Next, let us consider the various types of rivers. A river may end through evaporation, through infiltration, or through emptying into an ocean, a sea, a lake, or another river. Rivers that infiltrate back into the water table or flow into another body of water have all of the concerns of an evaporating river plus more, so we will concern ourselves only with these types of rivers.
Now let us look at the problems that a man who owns a river may cause and the issues he will face. The whole discussion is moot if it is impossible for a man to gain control of an entire river in the first place. In order to do this for a river of any significant size, he must either have an enormous amount of money or perform an enormous amount of labor, depending on the extent to which the river is currently owned or still in a state of nature. There are unlikely to be any rivers which are not claimed in part by someone, so a man who wishes to own a river will need to buy at least part of the riverbed. If an owner does not wish to sell and cannot be persuaded, then the quest to own the river ends in failure. Unlike a statist society, there is no eminent domain power in an anarcho-capitalist society that the man can call upon to force the owner to sell him the riverbed. Even if there were, the use of such force by the man or his agents and accomplices would be legitimate cause for the riverbed owner to employ any amount of defensive violence necessary to stop the aggressors who are trying to force the riverbed owner to sell the property. Unlike a private citizen taking up arms against the military might of a state, the riverbed owner in an anarcho-capitalist society is not limited by government laws restricting certain weapons and can have as much military might as he or she can afford, and the man who seeks to own a river is likewise limited by his finances. Even if the man wins such a fight, he is likely to face economic ostracism and attacks from other people, as his disrespect for the property rights of other people would estop him from making claims against other people for disrespecting his property rights in turn.
Regardless of what theories a group of people have concerning the legitimate ownership of property, the fact remains that one’s effective property is whatever one can take and defend. And defend it one must; just as there are people in communist societies who oppose communism and there are people in democratic societies who oppose democracy, we may safely assume that there will be people in anarcho-capitalist societies who will oppose anarcho-capitalism. It is also safe to assume that common criminality will not suddenly vanish when the state is abolished. (These are really two ways of saying the same thing, as the only way that one can act in opposition to the functionality of anarcho-capitalism is to commit crimes against people and/or property.) Therefore, the man who owns a river must take measures to secure his property if he wishes to have an effective ownership. A river of any significant size is going to present an enormous logistical challenge. Over hundreds or even thousands of kilometers of riverbanks, one must either keep watch to repel squatters, thieves, vandals, and other such undesirables or learn to live with their offenses. Doing the latter for a long enough time period constitutes abandoning the property, which defeats any purpose of acquiring the river and loses the man the principal of his investment therein. To take on such an obligation would require some enormous benefit in order to make the venture worthwhile, and there is likely to be no such benefit that could not be gained by owning only a section of the river, which is smaller and easier to protect.
Now let us suppose that the enormous barriers against acquiring and defending a river have not deterred the man. He will still face several concerns which will place limits upon his use of the river. The right to own property is a logical consequence of the right to own one’s body, as discussed above. That which is dependent cannot supersede that upon which it is dependent, so one person’s right to property cannot be used to aggress against another person’s right to life and liberty. This has several important implications. First, the man cannot use his ownership of the river to prevent everyone from crossing or navigating it. As long as a person’s life and/or liberty depends upon crossing or navigating the river, the person does not stay in or on the river longer than necessary, the person does not violate the life and/or liberty of the river owner, and the person does not damage the river owner’s property, the person must be allowed an easement. Second, the man cannot pollute the river. While he owns the riverbed, he does not own the water in it; he only has the right to make use of it as it passes by or to take some of it out of the river for his personal use. If he pollutes the water, he will be sending his pollution downstream to a location owned by someone else, whether it is an ocean, a sea, a lake, an aquifer, or another river. This is an act of aggression against that person’s property, and perhaps that person’s liberty and/or life as well should the pollution cause illness or death. The owner of that property would be justified in using any amount of defensive violence necessary to stop the man’s pollution and get restitution for the damage done. Third, if the river flows into a sea, a lake, an aquifer, or another river, then the man cannot dam the river in such a way as to deprive anyone downstream of the water that they need to survive, as this would be an act of aggression against that person’s life.
It is clear that a man who owns a river faces nearly insurmountable challenges for insufficient benefit, and that he can get all of the benefits with less of the drawbacks by owning only part of the river. It is thus extremely unlikely that this problem would ever occur without a state. Before concluding, it is worth mentioning that this is yet another problem which is theorized to occur without a state but actually occurs with a state. Unlike a person in an anarcho-capitalist society, a state does not observe the non-aggression principle and does not usually face military defeats when using force against its citizens to make property claims. The end result relevant to the issue at hand is that governments have monopolized control of the waterways within their geographical areas. Politicians could therefore cause all of the problems discussed above if they so desired, and they have a long history of doing so. Governments have a habit of using rivers as boundaries and refusing to let people cross them, especially if those rivers are used as a border between nation-states. Treating the waterways as common spaces also creates perverse incentives. No one owns a common space, so everyone is incentivized to exploit it as much as possible and do as little to maintain it as possible. Pollution is also not prevented by government regulations, but rather is limited in quantity, with much of the damages for exceeding the limit coming in the form of fines paid to the state rather than damages paid to those affected by the pollution. Governments also like to build dams to create reservoirs and hydroelectric power plants, and to alter the path of a river. This tends to destroy homes and deprive people of water that used to flow next to their properties without their consent (not that consent could truly be given, as any such consent would be under duress).
It is best to choose that which may work (and in this case, is almost certain to work) over that which is proven not to work. A stateless society clearly provides better protection against abuse of property rights on water.
<<Anatomy of a Cuckertarian++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++Bring Back the Joust: A Modest Proposal>>