关于产权理论【外文翻译】.doc

1、- 1 - 外文翻译 原文 Toward A Theory Of Property Rights Material Source: American Economic Review; May67, Vol. 57 Issue 2, p347, 13p Author: Demsetz, Harold When a transaction is concluded in the marketplace, two bundles of property rights are exchanged. A bundle of rights often attaches to a physical comm

2、odity or service, but it is the value of the rights that determines the value of what is exchanged. Questions addressed to the emergence and mix of the components of the bundle of rights are prior to those commonly asked by economists. Economists usually take the bundle of property rights as a datum

3、 and ask for an explanation of the forces determining the price and the number of units of a good to which these rights attach. In this paper, I seek to fashion some of the elements of an economic theory of property rights. The paper is organized into three parts. The first part discusses briefly th

4、e concept and role of property rights in social systems. The second part offers some guidance for investigating the emergence of property rights. The third part sets forth some principles relevant to the coalescing of property rights into particular bundles and to the determination of the ownership

5、structure that will be associated with these bundles. The Concept and Role of Property Rights In the world of Robinson Crusoe property rights play no role, Property rights are an instrument of society and derive their significance from the fact that they help a man form those expectations which he c

6、an reasonably hold in his dealings with others. These expectations find expression in the laws, customs, and mores of a society. An owner of property rights possesses the consent of fellowmen to allow him to act in particular ways. An owner expects the community to prevent others from interfering wi

7、th his actions, provided that these actions are not prohibited in the specifications of his rights. It is important to note that property rights convey the right to benefit or harm one-self or others. Harming a competitor by producing superior products may be permitted, while shooting him may not. A

8、 man may be permitted to benefit himself by - 2 - shooting an intruder but be prohibited from selling below a price floor. It is clear, then, that property rights specify how persons may be benefited and harmed, and, therefore, who must pay whom to modify the actions taken by persons. The recognitio

9、n of this leads easily to the close relationship between property rights and externalities. Externality is an ambiguous concept. For the purposes of this paper, the concept includes external costs, external benefits, and pecuniary as well as nonpecuniary externalities. No harmful or beneficial effec

10、t is external to the world. Some person or persons always suffer or enjoy these effects. What converts a harmful or beneficial effect into an externality is that the cost of bringing the effect to bear on the decisions of one or more of the interacting persons is too high to make it worthwhile, and

11、this is what the term shall mean here. “Internalizing“ such effects refers to a process, usually a change in property rights, that enables these effects to bear (in greater degree) on all interacting persons. A primary function of property rights is that of guiding incentives to achieve a greater in

12、ternalization of externalities. Every cost and benefit associated with social interdependencies is a potential externality. One condition is necessary to make costs and benefits externalities. The cost of a transaction in the rights between the parties (internalization) must exceed the gains from in

13、ternalization. In general, transacting cost can be large relative to gains because of “natural“ difficulties in trading or they can be large because of legal reasons. In a lawful society the prohibition of voluntary negotiations makes the cost of transacting infinite. Some costs and benefits are not

14、 taken into account by users of resources whenever externalities exist, but allowing transactions increases the degree to which internalization takes place. For example, it might be thought that a firm which uses slave labor will not recognize all the costs of its activities, since it can have its s

15、lave labor by paying subsistence wages only. This will not be true if negotiations are permitted, for the slaves can offer to the firm a payment for their freedom Eased on the expected return to them of being free men. The cost of slavery can thus be internalized in the calculations of the firm. The

16、 transition from serf to free man in feudal Europe is an example of this process. Perhaps one of the most significant cases of externalities is the extensive use of the military draft. The taxpayer benefits by not paying the full cost of staffing the armed services. The costs which he escapes are th

17、e additional sums that would be needed to acquire men voluntarily for the services or those sums that would be offered as payment by draftees to taxpayers in order to be exempted. With either voluntary - 3 - recruitment, the “buy-him-in“ system, or with a “let-him-buy-his-way-out“ system, the full c

18、ost of recruitment would be brought to bear on taxpayers. I t has always seemed incredible to me that so many economists can recognize an externality when they see smoke but not when they see the draft. The familiar smoke example is one in which negotiation costs may be too high (because of the larg

19、e number of interacting parties) to make it worthwhile to internalize all the effects of smoke. The draft is an externality caused by forbidding negotiation. The role of property rights in the internalization of externalities can be made clear within the context of the above examples. A law which es

20、tablishes the right of a person to his freedom would necessitate a payment on the part of a firm or of the taxpayer sufficient to cover the cost of using that persons labor if his services are to be obtained. The costs of labor thus become internalized in the firms or taxpayers decisions. Alternativ

21、ely, a law which gives the firm or the taxpayer clear title to slave labor would necessitate that the slaveowners take into account the sums that slaves are willing to pay for their freedom. These costs thus become internalized in decisions although 11-ealth is distributed differently in the two cas

22、es. All that is needed for internalization in either case is ownership which includes the right of sale. It is the prohibition of a property right adjustment, the prohibition of the establishment of an ownership title that can thenceforth be exchanged, that precludes the internalization of external

23、costs and benefits. There are two striking implications of this process that are true in a world of zero transaction costs. The output mix that results when the exchange of property rights is allowed is efficient and the mix is independent of who is assigned ownership (except that different wealth d

24、istributions may result in different demands) .For example, the efficient mix of civilians and military will result from transferable ownership no matter whether taxpayers must hire military volunteers or whether draftees must pay taxpayers to be excused from service. For taxpayers will hire only th

25、ose military (under the “buy-him-in“ property right system) who would not pay to be exempted (under the “let-him- buy-his-way-out7 system). The highest bidder under the “let-him-buy- his-way-out“ property right system would be precisely the last to volunteer under a “buy-him-in“ system. We will refe

26、r back to some of these points later. But for now, enough groundwork has been laid to facilitate the discussion of the next two parts of this paper. - 4 - 译文 关于产权理论 资料 来源 : American Economic Review; May67, Vol. 57 Issue 2, p347, 13p 作者 : Demsetz, Harold 当市场中包含了交易，就有两束产权进行了交换。权利束虽然时常附着在实体商品或服务上，但是正是权

27、利的价值决定了所交换的物品的价值。提出权利束构成的形成与结合的问题比经济学家所共同探讨的问题更为重要。经济学家经常以权利束为基准，来寻求对推动决定价格和对这些权利附着的物品的单位数目的力量的解释。 在这篇论文中，我试图形成一些关于产权的经济理论的的基本原理。这篇论文由三个部分组成。第一部分简 略地讨论概念和产权理论在社会体制中所扮演的角色。第二部分为调查产权理论的出现提供一些指导。第三部分提出了一些与将产权合并成特定的权利束和对于确定与这些权利束联系在一起的所有权结构有关的原则。 概念和产权理论所扮演的角色 在 鲁宾逊 克鲁索 的世界中，产权没有扮演任何角色。产权是社会的一种工具，这源自它在实

28、际上帮助人们形成他可以在与他人的交易中中的合理预期。这些期望在法律上、习惯上、更多的在社会中得到了体现。一个产权的拥有者持有追随者的同意来允许他用特定的方式行使权力。拥有者期望他的团队去阻止其他人来干涉他的行 为，只要这些行为并不在他的权利规范禁止之内。 产权包括了自己或其他人受益或受损的权利，记住这一点很重要。通过生产更优质的产品来使竞争对手受损也许是被允许的，但是诋毁他就不行。通过诋毁一个妨碍着来获得利益可能是被允许的，但是通过降低一档价格来销售产品就是被禁止的。显然，产权详细说明人们怎样才算受益或受损，因此，谁必须向谁提供补偿以使他修正人们所采取的行动。对这个事物的重视使得产权和外在性之

29、间的关系更为密切。 外在性是一个含糊的概念。由于本论文的目的，这个概念包含外在成本、外部收益、现金上的和不是现金上的外部效 应。没有一种受损或受益的影响是在世界以外的。人们经常因为这些影响遭受痛苦或得到享受。使受损或受益的影响转换成外在性，是指对一个或更多的互相作用的人的决定的影响所带来的成本过高以至于不值得，这就是这里所说的期限。将这些影响“内在化”是指一个过程，通常是在产权当中的变化，是这些影响能够承受（更深层次的）所有人的相互影- 5 - 响。 产权的一个主要功能是通过 引导激励来实现了更大的外部性内部化。每一项与社会相互依存的成本和获利 都是潜在的外部性。要使成本和收益外部性，一个条件

30、是必要的。介于同行者（内在化）之间的权利交易的成本超过国际化的收益。一般而言，交易成本相对收益可能会更大，因为交易中自然存在的困难或因为法律上的原因。在一个法制的社会中，对自愿谈判的禁止使得交易成本无限大。因为存在外部性，资源的使用者没有将一些成本和收益列入账目，但是允许交易的内在化程度加深。举例来说，一般认为一个使用奴工的公司不会具结它所有行为的成本，因为它可以通过只支付勉强糊口的工资来拥有奴工。如果谈判允许，这就不是真实的，因为奴隶可以要求企业向他们支付在 成为自由人这一预期收益为基础的自由的补偿。这样，奴隶制度的成本可以内化于公司的计算。在欧洲封建社会中，从奴隶到自由人的转换就是这个过程

31、的一个例子。 也许外部性的其中一个重要的情况是它在征兵中的广泛使用。纳税人的得益在于不需要支付编制海陆空三军的全部成本。 他的成本的转义是额外的应付款项将需要获得人自愿为服务或那些应付款项将被提供作为支付给纳税人由应征入伍者目的是为了被免除 。要么是志愿者征募新兵，“将他买进”体制，或者是“让他以自己的方式将他卖出”体制，征募新兵的全部成本将会有纳税人承担 。 它似乎总是令人难以置信 ，这么多的经济学家 在看到烟尘是承认它是一种 外部性，当他们看到 征兵是却不这么认为。常见的烟尘的例子，是由于谈判成本可能过高（由于互相影响的同行者数量过大），而使得将烟尘的所有影响的内在化变得不值得。征兵是一种

32、由于妨碍谈判所造成的外在性。 在上述例子中，产权在将外部性内在化中所起的作用会变得明确。 一项法 律，规定了对他的自由人的权利，将须对一个企业的部分或纳税人足以支付使用 该人的劳动，如果他的服务是获得费用支付。 劳力成本在在公司或纳税人的决定下变成了内在化。换言之 ，一项法律，赋予企业或纳税人明确 的产权， 奴隶主将须 考虑到 黑奴愿意为他们的自由所支付这一款项。 这些成本， 在决议下成为内在化 ，尽管财富的分配在这两种情况 中 是不同的。 所有这些都是 在两种情况下的内在 化所 需要的是包括销售权 在内的所有权 。 它是一种对产权制度调整的禁止 ,禁止设立可以交换的，妨碍外部成本和效益内部化

33、的所有权头衔。 在零交易成本的世界中，这个过程有着两个显著的影响，这是确实的。当产权调换是被允许的有效的时，输出组合产生，这种组合与谁分配所有权是无关的（除了不同的财产分配会导致不同的需求）。举例来说， 无论纳税人 是否会 雇用军 人 ，还是 被征召入伍者是否会支付给纳税人 补偿以免除服役， 平民和军事高效组合将导致所有权转让。 纳税人只需要雇佣这些不愿意提供免税（处于 “让他以- 6 - 自己的方式将他卖出” 制度下）的军人（处于 “将他买进” 产权制度下）。处于“让他以自己的方式将他卖出” 的产权制度下的出价最高者，将会正好是在 “将他买进” 制度下的最后一个志愿者。 稍后我们将重新提及这些要点。但是现在，我们已经为帮助讨论论文中接下来的两部分奠定了足够的基础。