The Clashing Worlds of Economics and Faith
Individual freedom is symbolized best in the institution of private property. Friedrich Hayek, a well respected social theorist, believes that individual freedom is a necessity to social organization. He rejects the belief that people created social institutions and therefore can alter them in socially beneficial ways because he believes that the cultural characteristics within the institutions are far too complex and historically rooted to be changed by central planning. The best economic policy protects property rights so that maximum freedom is retained and social organization can continue evolving.
There are clearly defined requirements for market success. The first is that property rights must be clearly defined. Second, exchange must be unrestrained. And last, people must seek their self-interest by trading wherever advantage can be found for themselves. The right of people to own property and freely exchange it is what links individual freedom and private property concepts together.
Of course, like anything else, there are also problems that come with property rights. Clearly, the application of property ownership can be controversial if it is not clearly and carefully spelled out otherwise. In cases where property rights are not clarified, sometimes both parties can lose out. Property rights cases are generally ambiguous, difficult to interpret, and even more difficult to enforce. As production factors shift to human capital, even more obscurity sets in where property rights are concerned. Human capital is often marketable based more on the speed of change t ...