Who Owns the Sky?
Our Common Assets and the Future of Capitalism by Peter Barnes
Island Press, Washington, 2001 £19.50
What meaning can it have in everyday terms to ask who owns the sky? Peter Barnes poses the question as part of his argument that polluters should pay for the privilege.
The book investigates the sky as one of mankind's common economic assets for an economic asset it is setting this ownership question in the context of an exploration of the future of capitalism. Few will have asked themselves the question Barnes puts forward and no-one has much by way of preconception on the matter: something that works to the advantage of reformers like Barnes. “The future of the economy, Barnes hopes will be “one in which we can retain capitalism's virtues while mitigating its vices. His book proposes the reestablishment of common property rights in natural and societal resources. Acknowledging the historical use of the term 'commons', “as pasture or woodland used collectively by ordinary citizens, he offers a modern interpretation: “a natural or social asset that is [properly] neither privately nor state-owned.
With this in mind the author seeks a new structure of capitalism with a new mode and system for its operation. Drawing distinctions between wealth and 19th century economist John Ruskin's idea of “illth" (his name for acts "causing various devastation and trouble") in the process. In his book Barnes' proposes a system which would work to discourage the creation of the illth, while promoting the creation of wealth specifically looking at how it could work in terms of the sky. The main manifestation of illth the book addresses is the issue of how to deal with sky-borne pollution. Barnes is concerned with practical solutions to the economic and ecological problems of the atmosphere's limited capacity to absorb the waste-products of industry and Western lifestyle. He argues that many environmental, health and monetary costs to society resulting from industrial, business and life activities are considered to be external to the actual process in hand. For most businesses and industries these costs are external to the balance sheet (the down-the-line healthcare cost of picking up the pieces of a dangerous industrial process, for instance, are seldom directly borne by the offending industry). Such economic subterfuge means the full cost of releasing pollution into the atmosphere is not borne by polluters.
With the limited capacity of the atmosphere to absorb and to recycle industry's pollution, a de facto “scarcity rent should be imposed on this natural resource says Barnes. Such “external expenses must be incorporated into the balance sheets of industry by formalising, recognising and incorporating all the real costs into economic calculations. Barnes proposes that the most just and economically efficient means to achieve this is by recognising a new set of property rights in the sky. These rights, according to the writer, must recognise the common property of mankind. This notion is not new, Barnes points out “Roman law distinguished between four types of property the private (res privat ); the public (res public ); the common (res communes), and; the (for the moment) unowned (res nullius). If the sky can be deemed res nullius Barnes wants it to be recognised as res public .
Barnes' proposal concerns the sky in terms of the value of its atmospheric functions. It is to these functions Barnes proposes the attachment of new property rights. That resource as property, must be clearly distinguished from the space itself above land. As this space may be subject to landlords' extensive rights under common law. Similarly governments may claim rights of sovereignty over the space above their territory.
The author works through various forms of measure to solve the problem his book identifies. His favoured solution is the establishment of a new societal institution A Sky Trust, to administer our common rights in the sky, and collect the value of those rights from those who use them (see page 12).
Who Owns the Sky? is certainly insightful: it is also exciting in its expectation proposing practical and creative solutions to emerging and acknowledged global problems. But perhaps just as importantly it uses and develops modern, universally understandable language and concepts. That is an important area of development for the resource rents debate.
By asking of people who owns the sky? reformers who are seeking a reestablishment or recasting of our common and individual rights in the landed part of earth, may have a tool they can easily apply to their advantage.
Peter Gibb.
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