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Free Market Environmentalism
[Bruce Frohnen  03/21 01:51 PM]

Jonathan Adler argues for a "true" free market approach to environmentalism.

I have some sympathy for this, mostly because I believe deeply in the importance of property rights. But it is important to keep sight of the fact that markets themselves are institutional products. One of the fundmantal jobs of government is to enforce contracts. Even that job over recent decades has become increasingly difficult for the government as people's willingness to say what they mean and mean what they say has diminished (no good society without virtue, whatever the laws) and as the effects of past bad policy decisions have caught up with us. Lest we forget, corporations are granted by the state huge advantages that often harm innocent investors and even bystanders seeking to recover damages. The current code allows lawyers to hide behind limited liability even in partnerships, and allows developers to form shell corporations for each subdivision they build, avoiding liability for wrongdoing even as they sell themselves as "in the business for 50 years."

Relevance? "True" free market environmentalism assumes people will be able to enforce their property rights against those who pollute on them, etc.
How? You'd have to come up with a legal regime to handle that, and the legal regime is already far out of hand in terms of the time and cost of litigation, leaving most who are not rich effectively without recourse to defend or prosecute even the most basic rights in even the most egregious circumstances.

I'm not saying we shouldn't look for ways to improve on crazy laws like superfund, if possible by depending more on property rights. But there is no magic bullet, here, and we shouldn't forget that there is such a thing as a public good.

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