Property Rights and Contract Enforcement in the Post-Zombie Apocalypse

Abstract

After the Zombie Apocalypse, the ROUNZ [Rest Of Us Non-Zombie] settlements will need to redevelop institutions to allocate scarce resources within their own communities, both for internal economic growth and for providing defense against the Zombie attackers. The problem for the settlements will be how to allocate the scarce goods as well as how to allocate the risks. More likely than not, groups will initially develop systems of command and control. Some person or group will gain a monopoly over the use of force, using some combination of charisma and fear as a motivator. The important long-term outcome will be that those settlements that create and enforce private property rights and enforceable contracts, albeit within a governing system relying on a monopoly over the use of force, will be likely to emerge more dominant over the long run. The evidence from the past two centuries [pre-Zombie apocalypse] shows that time and again, no matter who wins the wars, economies based on enforceable property rights, legal entitlements, and enforceable contracts tend to become dominant.