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COMPROMISE AND ORIGINAL ACQUISITION: EXPLAINING RIGHTS TO THE ARCTIC

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 October 2015

Cara Nine
Cara Nine*
Affiliation:
Philosophy, University College Cork
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Abstract:

Up until now, political philosophy has explained the acquisition of natural resources, in one way or another, through the terms of human settlement. An agent acquires natural resources by moving into the geographic area that contains these resources. Even how we make claims to the ocean floor depends on settlement — claimants must be adjacent to settled land. This essay extends original acquisition theories so that they can respond to cases that do not presuppose any conditions of human settlement. I suggest that resource rights in the deep sea may be created, alternatively, through acts of compromise. Compromise can alleviate conflict, allowing for claimants to move beyond stalemate to acquire goods. It also allows for a large degree of flexibility in the specification of rights, and thereby can explain nontraditional rights over areas of migration. The tricky part of a theory that grants rights through agreement is explaining why external parties, those not part of the agreement, have a duty to respect those rights. A compromise under certain conditions, I argue, places all persons under a duty to respect the rights created by the compromise. Thus, when two parties compromise, they may acquire goods from the commons — creating a duty for all others to respect the parties’ rights over these goods. Importantly, rights created through compromise are constrained by a set of concerns for those excluded.

Type
Research Article
Information
Social Philosophy and Policy , Volume 32 , Issue 1 , Fall 2015 , pp. 149 - 170
Copyright
Copyright © Social Philosophy and Policy Foundation 2015 

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References

1 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), December 10, 1982, http://www.un.org/depts/los/convention_agreements/texts/unclos/UNCLOS-TOC.htm, Part VI. A claim to up to 350 miles of seabed from a state's shore is also allowed.

2 Nine, Cara, “Resource Rights,” Political Studies 61, no. 2 (2013): 232–49.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

3 Another limitation of this essay is its lack of engagement with the difference between collective and individual rights. I assume that collectives may be agents with the moral facility to acquire resources from the commons. Raz, Joseph, The Morality of Freedom (Oxford: Clarendon Paperbacks, 1986)Google Scholar; Nine, Cara, Global Justice and Territory (New York: Oxford University Press).Google Scholar

4 Locke, John, “The Second Treatise of Government” in Two Treatises of Government and A Letter Concerning Toleration, (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2003 Google Scholar [1690]), chap. 5, sec. 27. (Hereafter, Treatise).

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10 Pufendorf, De Officio, i.8.2.

11 Ibid., i.9.2.

12 Pufendorf, Samuel, De Jure Naturae et Gentium Libri Octo [1672], trans. C. H., and Oldfather, W. A. (New York: Oceana Publications, 1964)Google Scholar, iv. 4. 6. (Hereafter, DJNG).

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14 Pufendorf, DJNG iv.4.6.

15 Ibid., ii.3.15.

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19 I mean “productive” here in the literal sense. The land does not produce anything new of value, as would be the case in, for example, agricultural use.

20 Pufendorf, DJNG iv.4.4

21 Fumurescu, ibid., 195.

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29 Lepora, ibid.

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31 Nine, Cara, “Territory in a World of Limits: Exploring Claims to Oil and Ice,” in Environmental Philosophy: the Art of Life in a World of Limits . Advances in Environmentalism and Sustainable Justice, ed. Leonard, Liam (Bingley, UK, Emerald Press, 2013): 137–55.Google Scholar