The Property Rights Paradigm

A short programmatic article setting out what came to be called the property-rights approach to economics: that what matters is not who nominally owns a resource but the specific bundle of rights to use, exclude and transfer it, and that the way those rights are assigned and enforced determines how the resource gets used. Alchian and Demsetz apply the frame to historical cases to argue that institutional arrangements are economic phenomena and can be explained the same way prices are.

Why it’s on the list: It sits in the Institutions, Property Rights, and the Law section as the paradigm statement the rest of the section builds on — the piece that turned property from a legal category into an economic variable.

Where I saw it: On Brendan McCord’s Philosopher-Entrepreneur Reading List, in the section on Institutions, Property Rights, and the Law, saved to Kyle’s “Books To Read” Apple Note. The full 211-entry transcription lives on The Philosopher-Entrepreneur Reading List.

Connections

• Institutions — what the paradigm is used to explain.
• Economics — the discipline whose scope this article widened.
• The Philosopher-Entrepreneur Reading List — the list this came from.