I'd Still Rather Be Here Than There

As Kelo v. New London rattles around the Supreme Court, Free Market News asks if China is more free than the U.S. The evidence is a new amendment to protect private property:

In March of 2005, the National People's Congress of China is expected to approve an amendment to their constitution specifically stating that private property is inviolable, and will restrict the use of eminent domain. This will have an enormous effect on Chinese ownership. According to Mao Yushi, a renowned economist in Beijing, citizens own 11 trillion Yuan in private property already, compared to State assets of about 1 trillion Yuan. [4] Clearly, China's reformation is well on its way.

Sounds good, but a look at the details in the amendment itself is less promising:

A typical public infringement of private property rights is the forcible relocation of urban and rural residents in the process of developing real estate projects or the construction of economic projects.

Millions of urban and rural residents have been forced to leave their homes with inadequate compensation.

To address this problem, the proposed constitutional amendment adds "the State should give compensation" to the original stipulation that "the State has the right to expropriate urban and rural land."

In China, urban land belongs to the State while rural land is legally stipulated as being collectively owned, which in practice means that it is owned by township governments.

However, legal scholars argue that residents' housing on State-owned land should also be compensated for as private property at a market-based price.

I assume Chinese property owners can count it as a step forward that they'll be compensated for having their property seized, but wouldn't this change merely bring China closer to the existing situation in the U.S.? Under present eminent domain practice, owners already get "fair" compensation for their losses. Cases like Kelo aren't about whether property owners should be compensated, or by how much, but whether the state should have such broad powers to take away your stuff. This amendment seems like a clear step forward, but it doesn't appear to address the more important question of where ownership begins.

Comments

[Ken Shultz]

"I assume Chinese property owners can count it as a step forward that they'll be compensated for having their property seized, but wouldn't this change merely bring China closer to the existing situation in the U.S.?"

This should supply part of the answer to the otherwise academic question of how much greater the land grab in America might be if local governments didn't have to worry about publicity as much (or as little) as they do.

That's the difference, right? In America, local government seizes land too, but unlike in China, local governments take some public criticism for doing it.

...and, of course, in a democratic system, public officials, theoretically, feel public criticism with a little more immediacy.

I've been a developer for a few years now, and I still find it amusing that cities really call it the Planning Department--Cavanaugh's right, the U.S. is a lot like the Chinese system. I wonder what the processing fees are like over there?

[Randy]

I dunno Tim...the way eminent domain is being slowly eroded away by calling tax revenues a public benefit...we're possibly on the slippery slope already. Don't get me wrong, the Chinese government is a real mofo when it comes to human rights (Falun Gong), freedom of the press, free speech...I can't stand them. But this country doesn't really seem like the one I was told about as a youngin.

[Ruthless]

I find this as hard to believe as do you, but the head-up-its-ass bank where I waste most daylight hours must have an over the top affirmative action program for Chinese folk.

As luck would have it, I was explaining the difference between a "home" and a "condo" to one today over lunch.

Wednesday, as it happens, I was talking to another whose hometown is eponymous with beer: Tsingtao. He was trying to tell me of his sympathy with the martyrs of Tienamen Square. In addition to his difficulty with English, he has a speech impediment. Plus his homecooked lunches gross out most fellow workers, but my can of smoked sprats from Riga, Latvia, can hold their own with any pesky furriner.

[Fin]

Private property is overrated anyway

[Rick Barton]

Private property is the basis of humane civilization.

[Ken Shultz]

Yeah...and I think shared water rights are the basis of civilization.

[pkd]

Just because the "People's Congress" rubber-stamps a law doesn't mean the Communist Party will force officials to follow it. In fact, the party regularly interferes in legal cases to protect corrupt local officials.

[ML]

Things may be far from ideal in the States, but it is no contest.

A few words on a sheet of paper might sound nice, but China has no institutional structure, to say nothing of a legal tradition of tolerance toward private property, to have anything but haphazard enforcement of this amendment. The Chinese courts are arbitrary and controlled by the Party to protect its own interests; property owners have little genuine redress against local Party officials. Going over local heads, which presumably this law would require, is virtually impossible.

Property owners are free to the extent that they are tolerated by Party officials. This amendment will not change that. You cannot have private property rights without rule of law, and when the ruling party is synonymous with the government ... well, good luck to Chinese property owners.

One last thing, before anyone goes on any rants about corruption in the States and how awful it is here. I live in Chicago, where there are almost daily scandals. It isn't as bad as when Richard the Elder was in power, but it's still pretty bad. Corruption will exist wherever power exists, and the city has a lot of power.

What I see here in one of the most corrupt cities in America is NOTHING compared to what I saw when I lived in China. The corruption is somewhat contained here. And it's a function of power: We are relatively free here because our traditions and because our system has institutional checks. In China, such checks remain happy thoughts in the minds of reformers within the Party. They mean well and really do want to advance the rule of law. With this amendment, they've gotten something written on paper. That's no small accomplishment. More power to the reformers.

But don't hold your breath.

[Rick Barton]

Yeah...and I think shared water rights are the basis of civilization.

No, not the basis because you already have rights. 😉

[Ken Shultz]

I think recognizing the rights of other's is the basis of society.

Now, you shouldn't be able to have civilization without society, so if rights are the basis of society and water rights were the basis of civilization, then it follows that, just as you wrote, rights are the basis of civilization.

...It takes me a while to get there sometimes.

Now, what's Kevin Carson's basis for taking the land I worked so hard for and developed?

[Rick Barton]

"Now, what's Kevin Carson's basis for taking the land I worked so hard for and developed?"

Kevin, you wouldn't really do that, would you?

[Ken Shultz]

I was kidding BTW.

[David T]

Is there any nation anywhere where governments can't take private property if they pay compensation? (And of course some don't even require that.) Admittedly some nations may have a broader definition of the "public use" for which such property can be taken than others, but from the viewpoint of the person whose property is taken, does it make any difference whether it is taken for some "traditional" use which even a minarchist would regard as a legitimate government function (say a police station or army base) or for building a shopping mall? In either case, he is losing property he may not want to lose (even if he gets as much from the govenrment as any private buyer would offer him on the free market--the point is that he doesn't want to sell)?

I don't see how you can do away with eminent domain altogether unless you're an anarchist. However limited your views of the proper functions of government, they will *sometimes* require taking the property of someone who may not want to sell at any price. (Obviously, the less broad your views of the proper functions of government, the less often it will be needed.)

[samunwise]

C'mon, we can own property here in the U.S., as long as the government isn't coveting it.

[Tim Cavanaugh]

I don't see how you can do away with eminent domain altogether unless you're an anarchist. However limited your views of the proper functions of government, they will *sometimes* require taking the property of someone who may not want to sell at any price. (Obviously, the less broad your views of the proper functions of government, the less often it will be needed.)

I'm an anarchist on even-numbered days, but this is the crux of the argument. Which is why I think you're wrong to disparage "tradition" earlier in your post. The burden of proof (and it should be a sky-high burden) must always be on the confiscating party, and it's a long American tradition of belief in private property (however honored that tradition may be in the breach) that helps keep it that way. In a country where people are taught to regard governmentally or "collectively" held property as prior to privately held property, you're going to have a harder time arguing that this old house may not be pretty but it's yours and no bigshot can take that away from you.