In Chapter Six, Corey Brettschneider sets out to argue that citizens of ideal democracies are entitled to basic “welfare guarantees.” In the two previous chapters, he has argued that democratic citizens are owed certain “negative rights” against state interference; here, he shifts his attention to what he calls the “positive rights of individuals to be given some particular good by the state” (114). The argument of the chapter develops in three steps. First, Brettschneider argues that private property in its modern form depends, for its very existence, on state coercion. Second, he argues that private property must therefore be justifiable to all citizens (using the canons of justification he has defended so far in the book). Third, he holds that any plausible justification of property must involve a guarantee of welfare rights to citizens.
Brettschneider begins by arguing that private property is best understood as a “bundle of rights” that fall into two categories: “vertical” and “horizontal” rights. Vertical rights describe the owner’s relationship to the property itself and include her right to use, trade, destroy, and conserve that property. Horizontal rights, on the other hand, describe the relationship between the property owner and other people. The most basic of these horizontal rights is the right to exclude others, to prevent non-owners from exercising any control over one’s own property. This right to exclude, says Brettschneider, requires the power of coercion.
Does this power of coercion necessarily implicate the state? Brettschneider acknowledges that there is some disagreement between liberals and libertarians on this question. It is conceivable, he grants, to argue that owners could exercise such coercion themselves, or contract with others to provide it. Such is not, however, the case in contemporary societies, where property ownership depends on state enforcement. The duty to respect others’ property, and the corresponding right to exclude, are now enforced by law. They must therefore be justified publicly.
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