Property Rights: The capitalist cure for terrorism

[Barun Mitra]

The Capitalist Cure for Terrorism

Military might alone won’t defeat Islamic State and its ilk. The U.S. needs to promote economic empowerment.

By HERNANDO DE SOTO

The Wall Street Journal, Oct. 10, 2014 4:43 p.m. ET

http://online.wsj.com/articles/the-capitalist-cure-for-terrorism-1412973796

Regards,

Barun

[Dutheuil Gisèle]

Thank you Barun.

Gisèle 

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Property Rights Forum" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to property-rights-...@googlegroups.com.
To post to this group, send email to property-r...@googlegroups.com.
Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/property-rights-forum.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

[LawDeve...@aol.com]

Barun and all:  Of course, this is excellent piece. De Soto is brilliant analyst. My issue with this piece (and his work generally) is his prescription: "To make this agenda a reality, the only requirements are a little imagination, a hefty dose of capital (injected from the bottom up) and government leadership  to build, streamline and fortify the laws and structures that let capitalism flourish."  Is that all?  Even assuming that his hefty dose of capital is the people's dead capital made live and not aid money, this is quite ambitious and, frankly, somewhat a-historical.

 

Further on de Soto criticizes Obama for not following up on his 2009 Cairo speech and doing what?  His answer; "get[ting] behind the agenda of legal and constitutional reform in the Arab world..."  Whose agenda?  De Soto and his institute have been sandbagged once by the Egyptians when Mubarak got behind the de Soto reform program, presented with much fanfare in Washington at Bergsten's Institute for International Economics. I recollect that Egypt's finance minister was the presenter.

 

Unfortunately Mubarrak's "rubber-stamp parliament" refused to rubber stamp it, and the program died. I guess now it is Al Sisi's turn to "save" Egypt. The problem is that in poor countries land is power, both political and economic. In discussing Bouazizi's self-immolation in Tunisia he says that the reason he killed himself was because "...he couldn't produce licenses that were (by design) virtually unobtainable," (my emphasis). A license is far less significant than is basic property rights dealing with land tenure. Mubarrak's son was de Soto's partner in Egypt and he couldn't make the politicians give up that kind of money and power. Can al Sisi?  Does he even want to?

 

In October of 2002 I shared with de Soto a Newsweek article entitled Slow Death about the lack of capital in the whole Middle East and how this is the root of all their ailments (http://www.newsweek.com/slow-death-146573). The authors even laud de Soto and his "recent" book Mystery of Capital. But the book has been out for 14 years and de Soto has been selling his plans for longer than that. Cato will soon publish a paper we wrote on this and I hope I can figure out how to get on to this group to post the link. Somehow figured I have been blocked for several years, and I am not sure I am able to access the Group. But if not I will rely in Linda to post it for me. Hope to see some of you in NYC for the Atlas dinner.  I am trying to shift my schedule around to attend.  All the best, Peter Schaefer

[John Bohn]

Agreed. When is the dinner?

Sent from my iPhone

[Linda Whetstone]

NEW SOLUTION TO PROPERTY RIGHTS CHALLENGES?
Bit-Nation/Land-Registery-And-Deeding · GitHub

BITNATION is an experimental form of Do-It-Yourself governance using decentralized, trustless models such as Bitcoin’s blockchain. Its key principle is that all participation is voluntary. Meaning that there’s a community consent, and approval, timestamped in the blockchain for later reference, for every claim, and transaction. Objective
Design BITNATION’s initial land registry and deed protocol that will be applicable for places where currently there are no functioning land registry and deeding services. Those could, for instance, be the Favelas in Brazil, or the suburbs in Ghana. It will help many countries to foster peace in their communities through resolving land disputes in a peaceful manner, and unlock wealth through securing properties. A deeded property enable people to lend money against collateral to start companies or get education, and encourages investments in the property itself.

https://github.com/Bit-Nation/Land-Registery-And-Deeding

Best wishes - Linda

Linda Whetstone

Network for a Free Society

Bassetts Manor,

Hartfield,

Sussex  TN7 4LA

UK

+44 0(1)892770304

+44 (0)7974314216

www.networkforafreesociety.org

http://www.facebook.com/freesociety