Ownership 211

There is, however, at least one objection to the necessity thesis that is independent of the discussion thus far. Unless Becker has some heretofore unappreciated solution to the Humean principle of induction, he can hardly claim that ‘the data’ themselves are sufficient to ‘indicate’ that property rights are necessary to all social organizations. Even if we grant universality, necessity remains to be established.

The most extended argument Becker presents for the necessity thesis is made via a passage he quotes from the sociologist Irving Hallowell. ‘Since [sic] valuable objects in all human societies must include, at the minimum, some objects of material culture that are employed to transform . . . raw materials . . . into consumable goods, there must be socially recognized provisions for handling the control of such elementary capital goods as well as the distribution and consumption of the goods that are produced.’ Thus far, we have an assertion of a kind familiar to readers of structural-functional sociological theory. Certain functions, it is alleged, must be performed if a society is to maintain itself; therefore certain structures or arrangements, which perform those functions, are necessary. Even if we waive the well-rehearsed objections to this mode of reasoning, Becker’s endorsement of the inference Hallowell draws from it is a truly arresting example of begging the question at issue. ‘Consequently’, Hallowell continues, ‘property rights are . . . an integral part of the economic organization of any society.’

No doubt property rights are one familiar device for ‘handling the control of elementary capital goods’ and for regulating the distribution of consumables. Equally, in societies for which the hypotheticals Hallowell had earlier enunciated are true, property rights are ‘extremely fundamental’. But what in this argument demonstrates that property rights are the only possible device for doing these things?

Strictly speaking, of course, the answer to this question is ‘nothing whatsoever’. Judging from the passage Becker quotes, Hallowell had found that property rights performed this function in numerous societies and, drawing on a deeply controversial general theory, illicitly transformed an empirical generalization into a necessary truth. Whatever Hallowell may have been doing, the most likely explanation for Becker’s use of the passage seems to be along the following lines. Becker is operating with a highly latitudinarian concept of ownership, one that gives plausibility – although perhaps an illicit plausibility – to the claim that property rights are universal. This concept of ownership was derived from an analysis of societies in which property rights arguably do ‘perform the functions’ that Hallowell discusses. Thus when Becker has satisfied himself that the same concept is at work in all societies, he implies that the property rights denoted by the concept do the same job in all societies.

Notes and Questions 6.4

1 Are Flathman’s criticism’s based upon a private property notion of ownership?

2Can you, or for that matter Flathman, offer a picture of a society (either existing, past or as a theoretical construct) in which property rights do not exist?

3How are the terms ownership and property rights used in the above passage? Do Flathman and Becker treat them as synonyms?