9.4.3

THE EXTRINSIC OWNERSHIP OF PERSON-MADE THINGS

Suppose that everyone possesses (in the empirical sense) a block of marble of the same volume and quality, and that there is still so much marble left that fluctuations in the size of the population will not decrease a person`s share in a way that its value will become less than the value of the block of marble a person possesses. These conditions are sufficient to call everyone "the owner of a block of marble". A person who now starts to carve `er block of marble into a certain shape, may not only call the marble `er 'property', `e may also call the sculpture `er 'property'. It is not important in this situation whether the object is described as a piece of marble or as a sculpture, and it is not important whether the marble got better or worse because of the owner`s work on it.

If, next, there are two other people who desire to have the sculpture and are willing to exchange their blocks of marble for it, and the sculptor agrees, then they become the new owners of that sculpture, and the sculptor becomes the owner of two blocks of marble. If `e uses one of these blocks to make a new sculpture, and also exchanges this one for two blocks of marble, `e is left with three blocks of marble, whereas no-one else has more than two. At the same time, there are two couples with a sculpture no-one else has, but even if they completely destroyed their sculptures, let`s say, because they had become bored with them, the sculptor would still rightfully own `er three blocks of marble. Thus the right to personhood guarantees every living person`s equality as a person but not as an owner of pieces of marble or of sculptures, if the inequality results from the person`s own free actions. The metadoctrinal principle underlying the right to personhood is therefore by no means a nontemporal or (exclusively) future-regarding end-state principle. What it does guarantee tho, is initial equality for every living person with respect to the allocation of goods if, and insofar as, they are not person-made. A new-born person will therefore have a right to `er own block of marble, even if all other people had already sold their block to the sculptor. And conversely, if someone who has sold `er block to the sculptor dies, the block 'sold' returns to the common stock, or becomes the property of a new-born person, because what is sold is always a share only, even when it is a 100% share (in natural land or resources). Should this be impracticable or impossible, money will --again-- be the more convenient medium of compensation in a more complex society.

Now assume, more realistically, that there are far more people than blocks of marble. In that case no-one has the right to just take a block of marble and to start carving it into a fancy shape. Should `e do so, the marble will remain the property of the community (whatever labor theorists or other theorists on property may contend). If the sculpture turns out to be of a higher economic value than the marble as material substance --however that is assessed--, the added value is the laborer`s and `e may claim it (for example, when the community sells the object as a sculpture, not as a piece of marble). However, if the sculpture turns out to be of a lower value, because of a loss of marble, for instance, it is the laborer`s fault, and `e will have to compensate the community for it. In no way can the laborer (the sculptor in this example) claim ownership in the object concerned if no agreement is reached on the amount of compensation. If agreement is indeed reached, this is nothing else than a case of selling and buying the material in question. And of course, a smart worker does not espouse the labor theory of property: if the material `e needs is scarce, that is, if it is an economic item, `e first buys it using the money `e can safely consider `er property. `E buys it before `e starts 'to mix `er labor with it'. (This presupposes that the other resources cannot all be so scarce that the number of items or units is smaller than the number of living people. For many, if not most of them, the number of items or units must be greater than the number of people, so that a person may be sure that `e owns at least one or a certain number of items or units, which can then rightfully be exchanged for scarcer goods or materials.)

If the worker did only use material of a kind and to an extent which does not exceed `er rightful share in it, or if `e did buy or receive this material, `e owns the whole thing `e produced. The ownership in the whole thing is not absolute, but ownership in the change of value is, because of the unique relationship between the person changing the value of the raw material and the change of value itself. It is not so much that the person owns `er body and therefore also the product of `er body`s labor under the relevant description; it is rather that the kind of relationship between the person and the product of `er labor under the relevant description is equally unique as that between the person and `er body. Whereas the person`s body is the medium of `er personhood, the things `e produces under the relevant description are the product of `er personhood. Thus a painting is a product of someone`s personhood but not the paint and canvas, or other material, it is made of; and so is a piece of music but not the paper or tape, or other material, on which it is recorded, altho all these materials themselves are, in turn, the product of other people`s personhood. In saying that there is a unique relationship between a particular person and the change `e produces in a thing, it is not in any way suggested that the person could ever accomplish such a change as an isolated individual, and that `e should also from a doctrinal point of view have the exclusive right to the whole value added. It may be that people can only produce something worthwhile as social beings, but this does not change the phenomenal uniqueness of the relationship between this one individual and this one thing `e has made at one stage of a perhaps enormously complex, social process. If the individual did not make or add something `imself at all, `e is no laborer.

Person-made things cannot only be sold, leased, given away or loaned like shares in natural resources, they can also be bequeathed, unlike shares in natural resources. This is possible because if, and insofar as, a thing is person-made, extrinsic ownership in the thing is absolute. (This is quite something else than believing that the ownership of a thing is absolute regardless of its description.) Ownership in the person-made thing is no share dependent on the thing`s scarcity, that is, the amount of it available, and the size of the (living) population. Even if the thing is the only thing of its kind left, and even if the population has increased enormously, the owner keeps `er absolute extrinsic property right in the thing under the relevant description of it. The owner and maker of the thing need not be only one person --`e probably seldom is--: the owner of a person-made thing may be a group of two or more people, in which case every person has an equal or proportional share in the absolute property of the thing made. This 'share', however, is only affected by the number of workers, or living workers, involved, and is of an entirely other kind than the fluctuating share in things which are not person-made. If all the people who have made a thing agree, they can be looked upon as one person and bequeath it to a particular person or group of persons. (Should they not agree, they will have to define their absolute shares.) The owner must somehow clearly state `er wish because automatical inheritance is a legal institution based on doctrinal rules alien to the right of personhood. On the metadoctrinal view the owner may bequeath a thing made by `im to whomever or whatever `e likes. The person or group of persons does not have to be `er partner or spouse, or `er children. (But obviously, `e cannot on `er own bequeath something `e co-owns with `er partner or partners.) No state or community ever has the extrinsic right to discriminate between wills in which individual property is left to a partner or spouse, or to someone`s own children, and wills in which such property is left to other people or groups of people.

It might be objected to this that a parent will have to bequeath enough to `er children to keep them alive when they are still too young to fend for themselves. Such an objection is evidently of a doctrinal nature, altho correct on that level. On the metadoctrinal level the extrinsic right to give is in no way dependent on the situation of the person or group of persons to whom the prospective donor wants to give something, so long as they are prepared to accept the gift. Furthermore, the objection is probably made against the background of a society in which the right of every living person to an equal share in all things which are not person-made, or to an income of equivalent value, is disregarded. It is especially in such a kind of society that the patchwork of a familially exclusivistic inheritance institution, and also of an unpredictable social security system, is and need to be cobbled together.

Things can solely be bequeathed if, and insofar as, they are person-made. No object is person-made under every description: at least it has some material content. The property in this material substance is part of a total, personal share which varies, and which has to be reallocated when the person who made the thing in question has died. If the person inheriting the thing has no right to the material substance (and it cannot be reallocated to `im), `e has therefore the duty to compensate the other person or group of persons (such as the community or the state) for the loss of their part of the share (for example, by paying an inheritance tax or succession duties). In the case of paintings or pieces of music this may amount to (almost) nothing, in the case of land which has been cultivated or developed the compensation to be paid by the heir may be enormous, assuming that the person or persons who have a right in the land as a natural element are willing to renounce their title at all. The problem we are confronted with here is that of the proportion of the original value to the added value. It has been said that no 'workable or coherent property scheme has yet been devised' to solve this problem. Nevertheless, there is already a long established institution of value-added tax, based on the very calculation of the increase of value of a product at each stage of production or transference. It cannot therefore be denied that the calculation of the original, or material, value is also feasible in principle. Since from a metadoctrinal perspective even some of the main features of the politico-economic scheme adopted are immaterial (like the proportion of private to collective ownership), the details of such a scheme certainly are. What we can be sure about is that, on the one hand, people`s rights of personhood are not to be infringed upon (including their right to accept or refuse a certain politico-economic arrangement) and that, on the other hand, their property claims are not to be recognized if, and insofar as, they are not morally entitled to the objects concerned in the light of those same rights of personhood.