Property rights and conservation: the missing Theme of Laudato si'.

• Author: Booth, Philip

The defense of private property has generally been a key principle of Catholic social teaching. In some senses, this defense reached its zenith in Rerum novarum published in 1891. Often described as the "workers' encyclical," this papal letter by Leo XIII also had a vigorous defense of private property grounded in natural law. In later Catholic teaching, the importance of the institution of private property has often been stressed, but it has also been qualified. Furthermore, in writing about environmental issues, not only has the importance of private property rarely been put forward as a solution to environmental problems, but it has also been hinted that private-property rights may be one of the causes of environmental problems and that limits must therefore be put on private property to prevent environmental degradation.

This line of reasoning is interesting because in modern economics it is generally thought that better definition and enforcement of property rights are an important solution to environmental problems. (1) Thus, despite the Catholic Church's belief in the importance of private-property rights in general, the church seems to regard them as problematic in the very context that many modern economists see them as helpful.

This paper examines the importance of private property in Catholic teaching. It then considers the qualifications that the church has made in relation to private-property rights and their role in environmental protection. Finally, it presents some of the economic work that shows how the institution of private property is crucial for the protection of environmental resources and amenities. The paper concludes by making the case that the recent papal encyclical Laudato sil (Francis 2015) would have been a more rounded document if it had considered the importance of private property for the protection of the environment. In the paper--explicitly so in the later sections--private property is broadly defined to include community control of property, too. This is something that Pope Francis is likely to be sympathetic with but that the encyclical does not explore systematically.

Private Property and the Early Church Teaching

Hermann Chroust and Robert Affeldt (1951) trace the church's attitude to private property from its earliest days. They argue that early Christians were initially hostile to private property, to large degree because they believed that the Second Coming was imminent and therefore that Christians should not focus on earthly things. (2) As time went on, this apocalyptic view of the world changed, and Christian societies became more integrated with wider society. The result of this integration was greater acceptance of private property. However, in most cases the argument was still made that private property should be put to social--in particular charitable--use.

Despite this greater acceptance of private property, in the fourth and fifth centuries St. Athanasius and St. Basil were still very critical. The latter, for example, suggested that individuals who owned property had usurped what should be common to all (Chroust and Affeldt 1951, 166). St. Ambrose of Milan and St. Jerome also argued that before the Fall all property was held in common. Taking a similar view, St. John Chrysostom said in his eleventh homily on the Acts of the Apostles that all people should sell their possessions and deliver the receipts to the community (3) and that private property was a product of the Fall. (4)

In his magisterial work on Catholic social teaching, Rodger Charles suggests, however, that the ownership of private property was widespread and that, taking the early church as a whole, the general view was favorable toward private property as long as those with riches were generous to those without (1998, esp. 42M:3, 92-94). Thus, although views may have been divided and important figures in the church spoke out against private property (and, in particular, against riches), there was clearly some acceptance of private property in practice, even in the early church.

Beginning in the medieval period, the concept of private property became much more widely accepted among Christian thinkers, especially if it was put to good social use--an issue I return to later. As Chroust and Affeldt put it,

The ecclesiastic conception of property rights was cogently expressed by William of Auxerre, who says that the motive which induces one to acquire property is the element that determines the good or badness of the act. If a man accumulates property from the mere desire of possession, he commits a mortal sin. If, however, he does so from the practical realization that the weakness and greed of human nature demand distinct and pronounced property rights, the abolishment of which would lead to a war of all against all--then he does a good act. (1951, 176) Furthermore, it can be reasonably argued that although private property was not necessary before the Fall, the reality of the Fall requires adaptations in sociopolitical-legal systems. Chroust and Affeldt continue: "Hence it might be said that despite the radically idealistic exhortations of the Apologists and the Church fathers, a practico-social attitude of toleration toward private property and individual wealth finally prevailed and became accepted in the social teachings of the Church" (1951, 176).

Indeed, this was an important aspect of the teaching of St. Thomas Aquinas. He developed and clarified thinking on the right to property and expressed it in a form that has, in essence, remained the mainstay of the Catholic Church's teaching ever since. According to Chroust and Affeldt, Aquinas argues that the natural law can be used to justify the position that all property should be held in common, but this does not mean that natural law prevents persons from having possessions of their own (1951, 180). Indeed, according to Aquinas, reason and experience suggest that private property is a product of the intelligent coexistence of human persons. This was especially true in the developing urban societies. As Aquinas states in Summa theological. (2), "Community of goods is ascribed to die natural law, not that the natural law dictates that all things should be possessed in common and that nothing should be possessed as one's own: but because the division of possessions is not according to the natural law, but rather arose from human agreement which belongs to positive law, as stated above. Hence the ownership of possessions is not contrary to the natural law, but an addition thereto devised by human reason" ([1265-74], 1969).

Aquinas and others believed that private property should be encouraged because it served important social purposes. According to Aquinas, private property has at least three important social functions (see Charles 1998, 207). First, it encourages people to work harder because they are working for what they might own--otherwise, people would shirk. Second, it ensures that affairs are conducted in a more orderly manner--people would understand what they are responsible for rather than everything being everybody's responsibility. And third, private property ensures peace if it is divided and its ownership understood.

The late Scholastics continued to articulate the case for private property. (5) Indeed, Domingo de Soto (1494-1560) was explicit in defending it. He states: "[I]n a corrupted [i.e., fallen] state of nature, if men lived in common they would not live in peace, nor would the fields be fruitfully cultivated" (qtd. in Alves and Moreira 2010, 67). Here we see a relationship drawn between cultivation and caring for property and private ownership of property. As we shall see, this is something that is important in the context of the preservation of the environment.

Andre Alves and Jose Moreira elaborate on this point, noting that the position of the late Scholastics can be described in the following way: "the prime goal of material goods created by God is to allow the flourishing of human life.... [The late Scholastics] then followed (and significantly developed) the Thomist line of associating the justification for private property with its importance for the common good" (2010, 67). In this framework, it was generally recognized that private property led to incentives for the better use of resources.

It was argued that although private property is essential for the functioning of society, it must serve society and not be an end in itself. Thus, the extinguishing of private property through the extreme forms of socialism is not acceptable and is contrary to reason, but the existence of private property does not give human persons an untrammeled freedom not to use property for a social purpose, and the state may also own property for the good of society. The social purposes of private property can, though, be defined widely. For example, a social purpose may include housing one's family, running a business, and so on. But wantonly destroying property would not be a social purpose, and this distinction is of relevance to debates about private ownership and the environment.

It is worth noting that there is some debate in Catholic teaching as to whether private property is a natural right or a prudent device adopted because of its social benefits. I discuss this issue briefly later. Alves and Moreira argue that the late Scholastics, like Aquinas, held the belief that "die justification for property was regarded as deriving from the promotion of the common good (and not as an absolute natural right)" (2010, 44). When it comes to the issue of the protection of the environment, it is private property's social role that is important and that will form the basis of the subsequent discussion.

Private Property and Rerum novarum

In 1891, Pope Leo XIII published what can be regarded as the Catholic Church's first modern social encyclical. In that document, Rerum novarum, there was a trenchant defense of private property...