The Land We Share: Private Property And The Common Good

Book Description

Is private ownership an inviolate right that individuals can wield as they see fit? Or is it better understood in more collective terms, as an institution that communities reshape over time to promote evolving goals? What should it mean to be a private landowner in an age of sprawling growth and declining biological diversity?

These provocative questions lie at the heart of this perceptive and wide-ranging new book by legal scholar and conservationist Eric Freyfogle. Bringing together insights from history, law, philosophy, and ecology, Freyfogle undertakes a fascinating inquiry into the ownership of nature, leading us behind publicized and contentious disputes over open-space regulation, wetlands protection, and wildlife habitat to reveal the foundations of and changing ideas about private ownership in America.

Drawing upon ideas from Thomas Jefferson, Henry George, and Aldo Leopold and interweaving engaging accounts of actual disputes over land-use issues, Freyfogle develops a powerful vision of what private ownership in America could mean—an ownership system, fair to owners and taxpayers alike, that fosters healthy land and healthy economies.

Customer Reviews:

Must read for Conservationists.......2004-05-28

"Few ideas have bred more mischief in recent times, for the beauty and health of landscapes and communities, than the belief that privately owned land is first and foremost a market commodity that its owner can use in whatever way earns the most money." So begins a remarkable study of the changing views of private property throughout American history. The dynamic tension is between land health, in the Leopoldian sense, and unfettered freedom. Freyfogle explores the major common law doctrines dealing with private property, as well as evolving statute law. Interwoven throughout the book are reviews of relevant Supreme Court cases. Landowner rights are seen as a "bundle" of rights that are subject to change as societal priorities shift. Although the book is fundamentally about law, it does not at all read like a legal brief. It is a very engaging read. Freyfogle reviews in detail the "tragedy of the commons", contrasting it with his own "tragedy of fragmentation." The two prophets that serve as his muses are Aldo Leopold and Wendell Berry. It is clear that we are going to have to rethink property law issues as we begin to face the limits of our growth. Freyfogle's book will be an important guidebook for us for years to come as we begin to grapple with these issues.

With an open mind.......2003-07-14

Reading this book has made me probe the fundamental assumptions that I make about what it means to own land. This book presents a fresh and very well-sustained argument that private land ownership entails public responsibilities. It also discusses what those might include. The author weaves together legal and general history, philosophy, economic theory, conservation writings, ecology, and literature into an engaging and telling story about the institution of private property in America.

Chasing the Wind: Regulating Air Pollution in the Common Law State

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Chasing the Wind: Regulating Air Pollution in the Common Law State
Noga Morag-Levine
Manufacturer: Princeton University Press
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Binding: Hardcover

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Similar Items:

Disentitling the Poor: The Warren Court, Welfare Rights, and the American Political Tradition
Dred Scott and the Problem of Constitutional Evil (Cambridge Studies on the American Constitution)
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The Constitution in Wartime: Beyond Alarmism and Complacency (Constitutional Conflicts)

ASIN: 0691094810

Book Description

The Federal Clean Air Act of 1970 is widely seen as a revolutionary legal response to the failures of the earlier common law regime, which had governed air pollution in the United States for more than a century. Noga Morag-Levine challenges this view, highlighting striking continuities between the assumptions governing current air pollution regulation in the United States and the principles that had guided the earlier nuisance regime. Most importantly, this continuity is evident in the centrality of risk-based standards within contemporary American air pollution regulatory policy. Under the European approach, by contrast, the feasibility-based technology standard is the regulatory instrument of choice.

Through historical analysis of the evolution of Anglo-American air pollution law and contemporary case studies of localized pollution disputes, Chasing the Wind argues for an overhaul in U.S. air pollution policy. This reform, following the European model, would forgo the unrealizable promise of complete, perfectly tailored protection--a hallmark of both nuisance law and the Clean Air Act--in favor of incremental, across-the-board pollution reductions. The author argues that prevailing critiques of technology standards as inefficient and undemocratic instruments of "command and control" fit with a longstanding pattern of American suspicion of civil law modeled interventions. This distrust, she concludes, has impeded the development of environmental regulation that would be less adversarial in process and more equitable in outcome.

Governing the Frozen Commons : The Antarctic Regime and Environmental Protection

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Governing the Frozen Commons : The Antarctic Regime and Environmental Protection
Christopher C. Joyner
Manufacturer: University of South Carolina Press
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Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 1570032394

Who Owns the Sky?: Our Common Assets And The Future Of Capitalism

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Corporations Own the Sky?
Creative ways of making clean air a sustainable business
Don't waste your time and/or money
A Way Out For George Bush ?
A brainstorm of workable solutions

Who Owns the Sky?: Our Common Assets And The Future Of Capitalism
Peter Barnes
Manufacturer: Island Press
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Binding: Paperback

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Valuing the Earth: Economics, Ecology, Ethics
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ASIN: 1559638559

Book Description

Global warming has finally made clear the true costs of using our atmosphere as a giant sponge to soak up unwanted by-products of industrial activity. As nations, businesses, and citizens seek workable yet fair solutions for reducing carbon emissions, the question of who should pay -- and how -- looms large. Yet the surprising truth is that a system for protecting the atmosphere could be devised that would yield cash benefits to us all.

In Who Owns the Sky?, visionary entrepreneur Peter Barnes redefines the debate about the costs and benefits of addressing climate change. He proposes a market-based institution called a Sky Trust that would set limits on carbon emissions and pay dividends to all of us, who collectively own the atmosphere as a commons. The Trust would be funded by requiring polluters to pay for the right to emit carbon dioxide, and managed by a non-governmental agency. Dividends would be paid annually, in much the same way that residents of Alaska today receive cash benefits from oil companies that drill in their state.

Employing the same spirit of innovation that brought millions of dollars to the nonprofit sector through his company Working Assets, Barnes sets forth a practical new approach to protecting our shared inheritance -- not only the atmosphere, but water, forests, and other life-sustaining and economically valuable common resources. He shows how we can use markets and property rights to preserve and share the vast wealth around us, allowing us not only to profit from it, but to pass it on, undiminished, to future generations.

Who Owns the Sky? is a remarkable look at the future of our economy, one in which we can retain capitalism's virtues while mitigating its vices. Peter Barnes draws on his personal experience as a successful entrepreneur to offer viable solutions to some of our most pressing environmental and social concerns.

Customer Reviews:

Corporations Own the Sky?.......2003-04-24

In the book, Who Owns the Sky?, Peter Barnes makes a compelling and interesting theoretical argument of the need to address a systematic problem, which is how to allocate common resources and issue them a value in a manner congruent to capitalism. Barnes's revelation examines the idea of the putting a price on our common assets (natural resources) through our capitalistic market ideals. The market, therefore, would set prices on natural resources that the common people of our country have inherited through mutual ownership, and use the ideas of the market to charge for the use and exploitation of the resources. This idea of placing ownership of natural resources into a common trust is Barnes's most dynamic point or theory. His theory basically would charge anyone (mainly corporations) exploiting the resources and give the money back to the people in dividends. The companies that are environmentally sound would also be given subsidies for taking the effort reduce resource use or degradation.
A trust is a legally supported concept of an entity designed to hold and manage assets or in this case natural resources for the well being of the people, the beneficiaries. Barnes uses this democratic idea in a modern way where resources and their value can be assimilated into capitalism without throwing off the market. His catastrophic finding is that people will benefit from dividends and more importantly the wealth and health of environment will become sustainable through the market. This theoretical scheme seems like a solution that would the allow the environment and capitalism to mutually coexist in some form of harmony, which almost seems like an oxymoron.
This book was an excellent road map for a feasible change in democracy for the better. Capitalism would be able to continue thriving, the environment could begin thriving, and the people of this democracy would actually get rewarded in a fair way for the abstinence in resource use and abuse. However, my optimism in Barnes's theory is minute because of the corporation's ability to act as such a catalyst in the government's decision making. Corporations have so much money that I find it hard to believe Barnes's theory is highly plausible. The corporations will use every mechanism in the book including, lobbying, donations to high government officials, and mass communication to disable the theory of a general trust that would take money from the rich and give to the poor.
The last argument against Barnes's theory of a general trust is the idea of capitalism in itself. Big government involvement is a taboo issue where less is more. The idea of a trust is seen as a socialist idea where the government intervenes with the innocent corporations in attempt to play good cop, bad cop.
Who Owns the Sky?, is an incredible book with magnificent ideas, but the answer to the question of who owns the sky is simple. As of right now the corporations do and to change that would take more than a theory that benefits the people as a whole, but rather a theory that somehow benefits the driving force of the market, the corporations.

Creative ways of making clean air a sustainable business.......2003-04-22

Who Owns the Sky presented a very ambitious plan for conserving the atmosphere. In this book Peter Barnes looked at earth's atmosphere as a valuable commodity that everyone owns. In many ways this argument made sense. Everyone uses air, so everyone should consider it important. Barnes explained many reasons why too much carbon secretion is disturbing the climate, not to mention the life on earth. If we need clean air to maintain quality life then the people polluting the air should pay for their damage. Writing in a time dominated by capitalism, it was not far fetched to associate ecological toll on a natural resource to a monetary tax being placed on polluters. All humans and other life needs air therefore there is already a natural sense that one should protect something that is vital to life. Barnes used the association of air as common property to all to be guarded with expensive fines for those who threaten that property. This will convince non-conservationists that the atmosphere is a resource that is valuable.
What is the Sky Trust? The Sky Trust is Barnes' economic investment system that sells rights to polluters and distributes the revenue to all citizens equally. This is one kind of cap-and-trade system that will best relate the energy companies responsible for pollution with the government and its citizens. Shareholders are all equal. All citizens are shareholders. Shares are not transferable. The Sky Trust will be a transparent pseudo mutual fund in which all shareholders will see where every dollar goes. The Sky Trust will affect consumers according to how much impact they have on the atmosphere. This will be measured in the amount of energy a consumer gets from carbon burning sources. The tax paid by the energy companies to the Sky Trust will be transferred to the consumer. This means the people driving SUV's will have to pay more because they need to buy more fuel to run their vehicle.
There are some serious questions that some people have about how the Sky Trust would work. My first one just happens to be the title of this book. Who is to say that the citizens of the United States own the sky? Sky is property of commons, in order to ration does some kind of ownership needs to take place? Why now? What is an accurate economic value to some huge space of gas? What will the effects be on the U.S. and Global economy? When the extra cost of the Sky Trust tax is passed onto the consumer who will be left out and what businesses will die? Entering all the extra charges onto every good and service might collapse the economy.
Barnes does have a working example of his plan, in the Alaskan Permanent fund. This program showed me that there could be good effects to government-organized sale of natural resources. The idea to create an investment portfolio that will outlive the natural resource, while at the same time getting the most money for a scarce resource to discourage overuse is very positive. The positive effects of the Alaskan Permanent Fund also apply to the Sky Trust. If Sky Trust money is entitled to the citizens of the U.S. then they can decide how they want to spend this extra money. Families will benefit from the tax advantages and an opportunity to start a savings because it will provide opportunities that would not be possible before. Parents that are trying to save for their children's college education will be able to give their next generation more of a chance for social and economic advancement than they had. Entrepreneurs will be able to have the capital it takes to get a small business off the ground.
I really like the idea that Barnes advances that sustainable business is possible. He talked about changing the DNA of business to be more socially conscious. Business should view giving back to the community as crucial to the business cycle. It is simple for businesses to make small philanthropic contributions but it is quite another thing to factor in the effects to the community and the environment on level terms with the dollars and cents of the bottom line. I like the ideas in Who Owns the Sky, but I question the feasibility. I would recommend this book to anyone interested in ways of changing the institutions of society to preserve the world's riches while creating social harmony

Don't waste your time and/or money.......2003-04-01

As an economics student, this book makes NO sense whatsoever. His ideas are SO far fetched it almost looks as though it is a sci-fi book. Whoever gave it 5 stars must not know how capitalism really works, and how gov't works. It was so off base that I don't even know where to begin. As soon as you read the into and the first chapter you'll notice that the author's propositions are whimsical at best. One thing is caring about our environment (I do), but to create this NGO (Non-Gov't org) to collect environemntal taxation is one of the most nonsensical ideas I've ever heard! Just do yourself a favor and don't buy this book, that is, unless you really want to make the author rich and make yourself miserable.

A Way Out For George Bush ?.......2001-10-23

Review of ‘Who Owns The Sky’ by Peter Barnes pub Island Press 2001

Chris Rose

This is a great little book that should be read by any environmentalist who really wants to save the atmosphere. Original and iconoclastic, its main fault is that it is so packed with big and new ideas so that it is in danger of being overlooked as too complicated.

Really it should be called ‘Let’s Own The Sky’ as it’s a rationale and rallying cry to take the common asset of the sky into common (as distinct from state) ownership. Barnes suggests a way to get Americans (or anyone) to take a stake in the sky as a waste disposal resource, and then charge for polluting it. Americans want to protect the climate says Barnes, but only if they can do so without any economic pain. Done right, via a ‘sky trust,’ Barnes says, would be a money-earner for most. Result – incentives to pollute less.

In the Barnes plan a Sky Trust would be funded by emission permits sold to energy companies at the top of the ‘carbon chain.’ The revenues would be paid out to citizens in equal dividends, like the Alaska Permanent Fund does with that State’s oil revenues.

Barnes is an entrepreneur with impeccable capitalist if Californian credentials. He has proposed a cap-and-trade system which charges polluters rather than handing out emission rights for nothing. As such it might appeal to less-government libertarians and egalitarian environmentalists alike.

...and you can get a notional non-transfer-able share of America’s sky. Barnes has a blueprint but is it a Bushprint ? Where else though is George Bush to go if he is to regain any credibility on the climate, after rashly rejecting the Kyoto Protocol, the climate treaty accepted by every other nation ? America needs some fresh thinking and this might be it.

A brainstorm of workable solutions.......2001-10-10

Who Owns The Sky?: Our Common Assets And The Future Of Capitalism offers opinions and economical solutions to the complex problem of global warming. Author Peter Barnes (cofounder and president ofthe socially responsibile telephone company "Working Assets") argues persuasively in favor of treating the sky as a commonly owned asset, through a non-governmental Sky Trust that would charge rent for carbon emissions and pay equal yearly dividends, which would make the burden easier to bear for workers and firms that have the most difficult transition to a lower-carbon economy. A unique melding of capitalism, enlightened self-interest, environmentalism, and hope for the future, Who Owns The Sky? is just what the world needs most - a brainstorm of workable solutions to one of the potentially most monumental of global environmental problems.

Protecting the Commons: A Framework for Resource Management in the Americas

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Protecting the Commons: A Framework for Resource Management in the Americas

Manufacturer: Island Press
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Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1559637382

Book Description

Commons-lands, waters, and resources that are not legally owned and controlled by a single private entity, such as ocean and coastal areas, the atmosphere, public lands, freshwater aquifers, and migratory species-are an increasingly contentious issue in resource management and international affairs.

Protecting the Commons provides an important analytical framework for understanding commons issues and for designing policies to deal with them. The product of a symposium convened by the Scientific Committee on Problems of the Environment (SCOPE) to mark the 30th anniversary of Garrett Hardin's seminal essay "The Tragedy of the Commons," the book brings together leading scholars and researchers on commons issues to offer both conceptual background and analysis of the evolving scientific understanding on commons resources. The book:

gives a concise update on commons use and scholarship
offers eleven case studies of commons, examined through the lens provided by leading commons theorist Elinor Ostrom
provides a review of tools such as Geographic Information Systems that are useful for decision-making
examines environmental justice issues relevant to commons

Contributors include Alpina Begossi, William Blomquist, Joanna Burger, Tim Clark, Clark Gibson, Michael Gelobter, Michael Gochfeld, Bonnie McCay, Pamela Matson, Richard Norgaard, Elinor Ostrom, David Policansky, Jeffrey Richey, Jose Sarukhan, and Edella Schlager.

Book Description

Walter J. Hickel, former Secretary of the Interior and twice Governor of Alaska, describes in fascinating detail how Alaska faced the crisis in the commons and created a solution that could transform how we live on the planet.

Customer Reviews:

Textbook for the Future.......2002-05-15

Imagine a world where humankind is considered part of the environment and our elected leaders consider the needs of the commons when making decisions. Imagine a world where neither unbridled communism or capitalism reign. This is the world described in Wally Hickel's new book, "Crisis in the Commons: The Alaska Solution."
If you haven't read this book yet, you should. It is a well-written lesson for every citizen of the planet. Even if you don't agree with all of his ideas, Wally Hickel's book will make you think about how we can co-exist with nature and how our potential as residents and stewards of the planet is limited only by our imagination.
The story he tells is a lesson in Alaska's battle for statehood and the world's struggle to find balance between bottom-line exploitation and lock-it-up environmentalism.
It is a story every student should read. Our youth need to understand the battles that were fought by some of Alaska's greatest leaders to win statehood. They need to learn about how the federal government has broken its promises to the people of Alaska. They need to read about how outside commercial interests have exploited Alaska's resources at the expense of Alaska's citizens and the environment. They need to learn about how the environmental movement is trying to lock up Alaska and take humans out of nature's equation.
Everyone should listen to his message of entitlement. He explains with refreshing clarity how the creation of Alaska's Permanent Fund has fostered an atmosphere of doubt, greed, and narrow-sightedness. And his theory that the Permanent Fund has stolen Alaska's pioneering spirit is worthy of consideration. As Alaska faces its current fiscal crisis, it would do every Alaskan good to understand that the Permanent Fund was established as a "rainy day account" and not as a giant trust fund.
Our local, state, and federal leaders would serve us well to read this book, debate its ideas and concepts, and consider the arguments. Perhaps then they would move beyond the rancor of political jousting and act in the best interests of Alaska, the nation and the world.
Wally Hickel's life has been one of challenges, victories, defeats, vision, leadership, and controversy. This book is the culmination of an amazing life. It brings into focus an idea that has been nurtured over 50 years - an idea from a man respected around the globe for his vision and straight forward manner.
"Crisis in the Commons: The Alaska Solution" is a textbook - a textbook for the present and the future.

Don Stolworthy
Juneau, Alaska

A View from the Top.......2002-04-27

Walter J. Hickel's "Crisis in the Commons" is must reading for anyone interested in land use patterns and environmental issues. Hickel's analysis is truly a view from the top as he has shaped land use policy both as an advocate for Alaska statehood,as governor of Alaska, and as U.S. Secretary of the Interior under Richard Nixon.

Hickel takes the reader through his trials in negotiating a state land grant for Alaska in the 1958 statehood bill. We then move to the builidng of the trans-Alaska pipeline and later examine the issue of oil drilling in the Santa Barbara channel when Hickel was Secretary of the Interior. Hickel provides insightful analysis into various crises in the Nixon administration, including an account of his own firing.

The book is also a view from the top in its discussion of a new form of land ownership that has emerged in America's most northern state. Hickel calls this the "owner state." In Alaska the state, rather than the federal government or private individuals, owns a vast portion of land, including the Prudhoe Bay Oil field. Unlike earlier American states, Alaska's goal is not to place such land in private hands, but to develop it for the benefit of all the people of Alaska.

All readers may not agree with every policy that Hickel developed to "manage" the owner state. But there is no question that the "owner state" points to a new concept and vision of the public lands.

Book Description

In this provocative new book, Bruce Yandle explores the relationship between common law and environmental protection, and he discusses how people can limit environmental impact while living in a world of common access. Yandle examines today's most pressing environmental and natural resource management problems, including water quality, the ozone layer, acid rain, and access to groundwater contained in aquifers. He argues that common sense should dictate the simplest, least costly ways to address the problem of access to limited natural resources. Yandle challenges readers to invent methods for creating wealth by building appropriate institutions and enforcing intelligent laws. This book is essential reading for students and scholars of environmental economics, politics, and law.

An Ecological Approach to International Law: Responding to the Challenges of Climate Change

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An Ecological Approach to International Law: Responding to the Challenges of Climate Change
Prue Taylor
Manufacturer: Routledge
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Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0415162602

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This book asks the question, "Why has international law failed to respond to global climate change?" and in so doing, offers the first major critique of international law based on environmental ethics. By examining particular international legal responses to global climate change, it shows that current international environmental law is fundamentally flawed and not equipped to meet global challenges.

Environmental Protection and the Common Law

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Environmental Protection and the Common Law

Manufacturer: Hart Publishing (UK)
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Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 1901362930

Our Common Lands: Defending The National Parks

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Our Common Lands: Defending The National Parks

Manufacturer: Island Press
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ASIN: 0933280580

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Explains the complexities of key environmental laws and how they can be used to protect our national parks.

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