Environmental Impacts of Enhanced Private Property Rights

Abstract

There has been concern in western countries over whether strong private property rights empower polluters to the detriment of other citizens. This debate is now playing out in transition economies and developing countries, where the process of moving to a market economy involves strengthening property rights. We review the conflicting arguments and test them using a new international data base. After controlling for income, education and political factors we find that cross-sectional differences in property rights regimes explain some international differences in pollution rates, but changes in property rights laws within a country do not seem to affect emissions.