As Bentham pointed out:
"It is to be observed, that in common speech, in the phrase 'the object of a man's property', the words 'the object of' are commonly left out; and by an ellipsis, which, violent as it is, is now become more familiar than the phrase at length, they have made that part of it which consists of the words 'a man's property' perform the office of the whole."
In other words Property is the RELATIONSHIP between the Subject Individual, and the Object,whatever that is.
I think that the emergence of the new - indefinite - Property right I call "Open Capital" transcends the conflict between the absolute/ permanent eg Freehold in Land, "Equity" finance in Corporations - and the absolute/temporary eg leasehold land and Debt finance.
I believe that it is possible to package that relationship in a new way - via an "Open" Corporate of which the UK Limited Liability Partnership ("LLP") is the first so that the rights of owenership and use may be divided more equitably.
And through the mechanism of holding "Commons" - like Land and Knowledge - in Trust (eg the US Community Land Trust) we may bring in investors in and users of these Commons through membership of such an "Open" Corporate.
Users of a Commons get to pay a "rental" to Society of course - which is the idea behind the Land Tax. "Any economic unit can emit money. The serious problem is to get it accepted" Hyman Minsky
We distinguish "Law" from "Equity" through the quite extraordinary judge-made body of "Common Law" which covers, among other things, rights of use of Land and the whole concept of "trusteeship".
And yet it is a French law concept which I think is behind the extraordinary new legal possibilities I observe.
The French distinguish "contrats de mandat" ie contracts imposed by force of law (and both existing English forms of property rights - statutory and "equitable" are of this type, backed by sanction) from consensual "contrats de societe".
The UK LLP "Open Corporate" came about following the introduction of the Jersey LLP (grounded at least in part upon French law, I think) and I believe that the innovation I observe is based upon the fact that an "Open Corporate" like this is in fact a consensual "contrat de societe".
I wish I had enough grounding in jurisprudence and even philosophy to adequately explain.
Suffice to say that I believe that the "indefinite" property right - you share the usufruct for as long as you use the land, and the capital invested in it - inherent in the structures I am developing is in fact optimal and transcends the faultlines and conflicts in existing absolute forms.
The outcome is a "continuity" - or even timelessness - which has not previously been available. "Any economic unit can emit money. The serious problem is to get it accepted" Hyman Minsky
