I am a Libertarian. I believe that market processes based on secure property rights and competitive ‘exit’ provide the best hope of discovering ‘solutions’ to the vast majority of socio-economic problems including environmental ones. Profit-driven capitalism and its desire to ‘make people pay’ for goods they were previously consuming ‘for free’ provides the key to solving most environmental dilemmas – it is the embodiment of the ‘polluter pays principle’. Seen through this lens, there are many environmental assets currently held under ‘open-access’ conditions or subject to government ownership and/or regulation that could and should be ‘privatised’ – whether at the level of individuals or companies, or as suggested by Elinor Ostrom at the level of cooperatives and mutual associations. These include land-based assets such as forests, minerals, and wildlife, which can be subject to various ‘fencing’ technologies; stationary resources such as oyster beds; and water-based assets such as rivers and…
View original post 739 more words
Utopia, you are standing in it! 
Recent Comments