For social change, "ownership design is the most foundational".

- David Korten [1]

Here is where we document material on the third aspect of commons-based peer production ("Peer production, peer governance, peer property").

Endorsements and recommendations

We're big fans of the FairShares model, see New Cooperativism and the FairShares Model .

Check out the use of Redeemable Preference Shares‎‎ (also called Capped Returns, by the Enspiral cooperative coalition, which allows them to accept external funding without losing control as a coop, while being able to develop Commons-based resources.

Introduction

"Peer to peer social processes are bottom-up processes whereby agents in a distributed network can freely engage in common pursuits, without external coercion. It is important to realize that distributed systems differ from decentralized systems, essentially because in the latter, the hubs are obligatory, while in the former, they are the result of voluntary choices. Distributed networks do have constraints, internal coercion, that are the conditions for the group to operate, and they may be embedded in the technical infrastructure, the social norms, or legal rules.

P2P social processes more precisely engender:

1) Peer Production: wherever a group of peers decided to engage in the production of a common resource [2]

2) Peer Governance: the means they choose to govern themselves while they engage in such pursuit [3]]

3) Peer Property: the institutional and legal framework they choose to guard against the private appropriation of this common work; this usually takes the form of non-exclusionary forms of universal common property"

Please read: Generative vs. Extractive Ownership

See also: Common ; Commons ; Commons - Typology

On the Importance of Distinguishing Sharing Private Property vs. Commons vs. Public Property

From Natalia Fernández, translated by Steve Herrick:

"Municipal goods and services are not “commons,” and rental vehicle from a company-owed fleet is not “collaborative.” Confusing things only can lead to disillusionment and disappointment.

Anglo culture and the absence of public policies in the US tended to distort the terms “commons” and collaborative consumption/”sharing.” Municipal bicycle or car-sharing services, even though they may be shared in the sense that there is one vehicle and many users, don’t create any kind of commons, nor are they collaborative consumption. They are mere extensions of transportation services, no different from other public utilities when they are publicly owned, or from a car-rental company when privately owned.

The “commons,” that which is communal, is goods that belong to a community, a group of real people, a demos, that manages it jointly and directly. Public property is something else: it is State property.

But, isn’t public property, by definition, the common property of all citizens? Wouldn’t municipal public goods be, by definition, “communal?” No. Publicly-owned goods are managed through specific institutions that decide how they are used and where the profits go. Citizens don’t take part directly in management and decisions about these goods and their use. They are not communal.

The municipal bus business of any city can be a publicly-owned good, property of city hall, or of the wider region. But it is not a communal good. The classic example of communal goods would be the common lands of many towns, collectively owned by their users, who directly manage their use. The transportation business could be part of the urban commons if it was, simply, a cooperative of users. The “sharing economy” or collaborative consumption exists when the users share use of goods, while maintaining private ownership. If city hall or a company makes cars or bicycles publicly available (charging a rental fee) there’s no collaborative consumption. “Bike sharing” would be when you share the use of your bike(s) with others through a system of use management. If no one shares their personal property, there’s no “sharing” at all. In most municipal “biking” or “car-sharing” services, the bikes belong to a company or city hall itself. There is no collaborative consumption, but rather, hourly rental." (https://english.lasindias.com/how-to-put-an-end-to-the-urban-commons-and-sharing-once-and-for-all)

Characteristics of Generative Ownership Forms

from http://www.marjoriekelly.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/Kelly-OOF-PR-Final.pdf (visited 2016-12)

THE DESIGN OF ECONOMIC POWER — The Architecture of Ownership

EXTRACTIVE OWNERSHIP	GENERATIVE OWNERSHIP
1. Financial Purpose: maximizing profits in the short term	1. Living Purpose: creating the conditions for life over the long term
2. Absentee Membership: ownership disconnected from the life of the enterprise	2. Rooted Membership: ownership in human hands
3. Governance by Markets: control by capital markets on autopilot	3. Mission-Controlled Governance: control by those dedicated to social mission
4. Casino Finance: capital as master	4. Stakeholder Finance: capital as friend
5. Commodity Networks: trading focused solely on price and profits	5. Ethical Networks: collective support for ecological and social norms

Majorie Kelly:

"In ownership design, there are five essential patterns that work together to create either extractive or generative design: purpose, membership, governance, capital, and networks.

Extractive ownership has a Financial Purpose: maximizing profits. Generative ownership has a Living Purpose: creating the conditions for life.

While corporations today have Absentee Membership, with owners disconnected from the life of enterprise, generative ownership has Rooted Membership, with ownership held in human hands.

While extractive ownership involves Governance by Markets, with control by capital markets on autopilot, generative designs have Mission-Controlled Governance, with control by those focused on social mission.

While extractive investments involve Casino Finance, alternative approaches involve Stakeholder Finance, where capital becomes a friend rather than a master.

Instead of Commodity Networks, where goods are traded based solely on price, generative economic relations are supported by Ethical Networks, which offer collective support for social and ecological norms."

(http://blogs.worldwatch.org/sustainableprosperity/generative-economy/)

Examples:

Common Wealth Trusts

FairShares: this model of cooperative property makes a lot of sense

Typology

= a clear distinction is to be made between resources owned in common (common property) and resources for which no property rights have been defined (open access).

G.G. Stevenson compares these three forms in terms of group limitation and extraction limitation. [4]

Typology of Commons Regulation

things	Access	Regulation
Res nullius	all	non-regulated
Res privatae	owner	market-regulated
Res publicae	public	state-regulated
Res communes	community	peer-regulated

Source: The Commons: Year One of the Global Commons Movement by Silke Helfrich (29. Januar 2011)

Typology of Property Rights in Common-Pool Resources

Simon Deakin:

"Access: A right to enter a defined physical property

Withdrawal: A right to harvest the products of a resource such as timber, water or food for pastoral animals

Management: A right to regulate the use patterns of other harvesters and to transform a resource system by making improvements

Exclusion: A right to determine who will have the right of access to a resource and whether that right can be transferred

Alienation: A right to sell or lease any of the above rights "

(http://www.queensu.ca/lawjournal/sites/webpublish.queensu.ca.qljwww/files/files/issues/1-Deakin.pdf)

The 3 Property Institutions:

Open Access Property:

- Limited: members only, unlimited extraction - Unlimited: open to anyone, unlimited extraction

Common Property: members only, extraction limited by rules

Private Property: one, extraction limited by individual decision

Stefan Meretz has produced, with his daughter, a very useful and clear taxonomy of common goods, according to five criteria. Pauline Schwarze and Franco Iacomella provided translation support, from the original German to English.

Graphic at http://blog.p2pfoundation.net/wp-content/uploads/taxonomy-of-goods.png

See the graphic from Wolfgang Hoechsele: Choosing the Right Form of Common Property‎

Typology of Generative Ownership Forms

Marjorie Kelly on THE FAMILY OF GENERATIVE OWNERSHIP DESIGN:

Commons and government ownership:

Assets like the ocean, a forest, land, a park, or a municipal power plant are held or governed indivisibly by a community. This category includes, but is not limited to, government ownership.

Stakeholder ownership:

Ownership by people with a human stake in a private enterprise – including cooperatives, partnerships, credit unions, mutual insurance companies, employee-owned firms, and family-owned companies – where the central purpose is a life-serving one.

Nonprofit and social enterprise ownership:

Organizations with a primary social or environmental mission, which rely either on charity (nonprofits) or use business methods (social enterprise). This category, which includes hospitals, universities and non-governmental organizations, embraces nonprofits, subsidiaries of nonprofits, and certain private businesses.

Mission-controlled corporations:

Corporations with a strong social purpose that are owned in conventional ways (often with publicly traded shares), yet keep governing control in mission-oriented hands. These can include family-controlled firms, and the large foundation-controlled companies common across northern Europe." (http://www.gtinitiative.org/documents/IssuePerspectives/GTI-Perspectives-Architecture_of_Enterprise.pdf)

Albert Wenger's Typology

* Cooperatives.

"These have played an important role in the creation of utilities of various kinds from grocery distribution to telephone networks. Generally the members contribute capital to build some piece of shared infrastructure.

* Mutuals.

Insurance is inherently a network effects business and many insurance companies started out as mutuals. These are similar to co-operatives and may have membership fees but tend not to require an initial contribution of capital.

* Steward-Ownership.

Companies can own themselves in whole or in part via a trust, club or foundation. This is an ownership structure that has been quite common historically in Europe. The role of the owning foundation tends to be to uphold the longterm purpose.

* Decentralized.

With the invention of Blockchain Technology we may be able to unlock entirely new ownership structures, where there is no need for a central corporation at all and the network is directly owned by its participants."

(http://purpose-economy.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Purpose_Steward_Ownership_Rethinking_Ownership-in-the-21st-Century.pdf)

Introductory Articles

Copyright Monopoly Stands in Direct Opposition to Property Rights. By Rick Falkvinge.
Matt Cropp: P2P-Driven Decline in Transaction Costs and the Coming Micro-Ownership Revolution
An Ideological History of the Urge to Own. An excerpt from chapter four of Charles Eisenstein's book on Sacred Economics.
Introduction to Private and Common Property: Achim Lerch, The Tragedy of the Tragedy of the Commons. [5]
Martin Pedersen: 1) Property as a Social Relation‎ ; Free Software as Property
In a special issue of the Cornell Law Review, Vol. 94:743, four noted professors of property law wrote a brief series of propositions they identified as “A Statement of Progressive Property. [6]

Key Resources

a collection of texts that introduce the concepts of Platform Cooperativism and the Internet of Ownership ; Status: IoO site no longer available
Atlas of Ownership: an open, shared map of property rights [8]

Key Articles

The Role of the Commons and Common Property in an Economy of Abundance. Wolfgang Hoeschele. [9]

Carol M. Rose, 1) The Several Futures of Property: Of Cyberspace and Folk Tales, Emission Trades and Ecosystems, 83 MINN. L. REV. 129 (1998) ; 2) PROPERTY AND PERSUASION: ESSAYS ON THE HISTORY, THEORY, AND RHETORIC OF OWNERSHIP (1994);

New Cooperativism and the FairShares Model: in this article about the FairShares Model by Rory Ridley-Duff.

[10], there is a useful history of the evolution of thought and practice of cooperative property, with a graphic summarizing the different schools of thought and how they converge in this new model.

On the Private Nature of Cooperative Property ; "although the indivisible reserves are indisputably collective property, it is still private from the point of view of people outside of the cooperative" ; By BENOÎT BORRITS

Protecting Commons Against Cooptation. By David Darby. Focuses on:

obtaining infrastructure without debt
robust, multi-layered asset locks
resilience against sale, co-option or cancellation

Key Books

Ours: The Case for Universal Property. Peter Barnes. " a brilliant new bookthat explains how a new class of property rights and trusts can help protect common assets and generate revenues for everyone in the process".

Majorie Kelly. Owning Our Future: The Emerging Ownership Revolution. Journeys to a Generative Economy. Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2012 [11]

Owning the Earth. Transforming history of land ownership. By Andro Linklater. 2013

Pat Conaty and Mike Lewis, the Resilience Imperative. Chapter 11 focused directly upon your question about Ownership transfer mechanisms and what these look like including the roots of the idea in the 1820s with the insights of Thomas Spence the ingenious proponent of working land trusts (see chapter 4), the brilliant French Swiss political economist, Sismondi and working up from there through the Chartists, Ruskin, other co-operative commonwealth visionaries and practitioners through to Gandhi's trusteeship concepts, CLTs, Democratic ESOPs, the Co-operative Land Bank etc ... "

Property And Persuasion: Essays On The History, Theory, And Rhetoric Of Ownership. by Carol M Rose. Westview Press, 1994

Ulrich Duchrow. Property for People, Not for Profit. ZED Books, 2004: history of extractive property, and its alternatives.

The Divine Right of Capital: Dethroning the Corporate Aristocracy. Berrett-Koehler, 2001. [12]. Key thesis: the corporation is a feudal structure ; one of those mind-opening books that deserves to be read by a large audience

Property Outlaws: How Squatters, Pirates and Protesters Improve the Law of Ownership. By Sonia Katyal and Eduardo Penalver. Yale University Press, 2010

Ours to Hack and to Own. Ed. by Trebor Scholz and Nathan Schneider, fall 2016: contributions on creating Platform Cooperatives.

Liberty and Property. A SOCIAL HISTORY OF WESTERN POLITICAL THOUGHT FROM THE RENAISSANCE TO ENLIGHTENMENT. By ELLEN MEIKSINS WOOD. Penguin / Random House, 2012 [13]

Territory as property: The Birth of Territory. By Stuart Elden. Univ. of Chicago Press, 2013: " provides a detailed account of the emergence of territory within Western political thought. [14]

"On Immaterial Property"

Common Cause. Information Between Commons and Property. Philippe Aigrain. [15] Unpubished, select version of: Cause Commune.

Code. Collaborative Ownership and the Digital Commons: Rishab Aiyer Ghosh (Ed). MIT Press, 2005.: essays on 'immaterial' property

See also:

* PhD thesis - "Property, Commoning and the Politics of Free Software". J. Martin Pedersen. Thesis submitted January 2010, Department of Philosophy, Lancaster University. Examined by Massimo De Angelis.: The thesis is a philosophical and political inquiry into the material nature of immateriality and was published as the first of a two volume Special Issue of The Commoner and also presented on http://commoning.wordpress.com

On Crypto Property

* Radical Markets. By Eric Posner & Glen Weyl.[16]: "Their ideas have captured the imaginations of blockchain technologists in particular. That is because while it is hard to change real-world property law, it is easy to rewrite the rules governing ownership of crypto-assets. Thus, there is a fascinating possibility of architecting crypto-asset ownership schemes that are simultaneously more efficient and more egalitarian than the Common Law scheme governing the real economy." [17]

How-To

Assets in Common: Stories of Business and Community Leaders Remaking the Economy from the Ground Up. By Charity May, Jay Standish et al. Infrastructure for Shared Ownership, 2024 [18]: "Some of the amazing companies profiled here include the Industrial Commons, Enspiral, Mondragon Corporation, Obran Cooperative, Goodworks Evergreen, Saradex, Sumitomo Group, Clegg Auto, and Calvert Community Investment.

Key Podcasts and Videos

Peter Barnes on the Case for Universal Property

Short Citations

1.

The difference between open access and defined property rights (private or common property), by contrast, is the difference between an unregulated and a regulated condition. The difference is fundamental.

- Achim Lerch [19]

2.

For Stevenson, a “private property, common property, open access trichotomy” ultimately exists. He compares these three forms in terms of group limitation and extraction limitation. Characteristic of the common property form is that both the group and the extent of resource use are limited by the individual members.

- [20]

Source: STEVENSON, G.G: Common Property Economics. A General Theory and Land Use Applications. Cambridge. Cambridge University Press.1991, p.58

Long Citations

"One age builds upon the last. We do not go back, but carry forward the former ages in new ways. In the industrial age, we industrialized agriculture. In the age of finance, we financialized industry. As we move into a more ecologically sensitive era, we will need to ecologize finance. And we will need to socialize it — make it more inclusive, less elite. Redesigning the social architectures of our economy is a vital part of transformation—as vital as redesigning the physical architectures of our energy and product system. My sense is we are … entering an era with a multiplicity of ownership designs – a time of biodiversity in social architecture, beyond the monoculture of the corporate form."

- Majorie Kelly [21]

"The commons breaks with the individualistic vision as conceived by the capitalist tradition, a vision that has progressively transferred the idea of rights to individual people. The commons take inclusion and everyone’s equal right to access as its starting point, while property and the idea of the state that upholds it is based on a rivalry of goods, and thus on exclusion and concentration of power in institutions that insure and protect it. The commons try to situate themselves outside the subject-object reductionism that would lead to their commodification. The commons cannot be commodified (because they cannot be transferred, or alienated), and they cannot be the object of individualised possession. And so they express a qualitative logic, not a quantitative one. We do not ‘have’ a common good, we ‘form part of’ the common good, in that we form part of an ecosystem, of a system of relations in an urban or rural environment; the subject is part of the object. Common goods are inseparably united, and they unite people as well as communities and the ecosystem itself."

- Joan Subirats [22]

"Imagine a world where property is owned because it is being well stewarded rather than ownership being a priori to stewardship. Much of the worst behavior we see in the economy would be impossible, because the second any firm stopped stewarding their properties for the benefit of the larger community, they would no longer own their properties (intellectual or otherwise). In this world ownership is derived from good stewardship, rather than the other way around."

- Alan Rosenblith [23]

"Within the co-operative society based on common ownership of the means of production, the producers do not exchange their products; just as little does the labor employed on the products appear here as the value of these products, as a material quality possessed by them, since now, in contrast to capitalist society, individual labor no longer exists in an indirect fashion but directly as a component part of total labor. The phrase "proceeds of labor", objectionable also today on account of its ambiguity, thus loses all meaning. … labor [will] become not only a means of life but life's prime want

- Karl Marx, Critique of the Gotha Programme [24]

At the center of the digital revolution, with the executable bitstreams that make everything else possible, propertarian regimes not only do not make things better, they can make things radically worse. Property concepts, whatever else may be wrong with them, do not enable and have in fact retarded progress. In the network society, anarchism (or more properly, anti-possessive individualism) is a viable political philosophy … because defection is impossible, free riders are welcome, which resolves one of the central puzzles of collective action in a propertarian social system.

- Eben Moglen, in his essay Anarchism Triumphant [25]

"In Roman law, property, or dominium, is a relation between a person and a thing, characterized by absolute power of that person over that thing....Human beings can have relations with one another. But what would it mean to have a 'relation' with a thing?....[But,] Imagine a man trapped on a desert island. He might develop extremely personal relationships with, say, the palm trees....and, if he's there too long, he might well end up giving them all names and spending half his time having imaginary conversations with them. Still, does he 'own' them? ....Clearly, then, property is not really a relation between a person and a thing. It's an understanding or arrangement between people concerning things."

~ David Graeber, Debt: The First 5,000 Years [26]

"As long as we focus on types of ownership, we seem to be leaving out all who are not owners. That is one reason I argue for a civic based economy rather than a property-based economy.

I am certainly for employee ownership and worker co-ops. One needs to remember, however, that property and ownership are legal concepts, or civic concepts. In "Civilizing the Economy I tried to develop a civic view of ownership and of property.

The civic is about membership and the rights of members to control their lives, rather than have their lives control by owners. Ownership, in my view, should rest on a civic foundation."

- Marvin Brown (email, August 2013)

Subcategories

This category has the following 2 subcategories, out of 2 total.

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Licensing‎ (239 P)

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Standards‎ (1,231 P)

Pages in category "Peerproperty"

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