[gchamonlive]

Here in Brazil lots of people deal land by word of mouth. The country is just too big and there isn't enough state present to make every transaction official, so people shake on it, draft an unofficial document and actually living and developing the land over a long period of time is what consistitutes ownership.

[ghaff]

It doesn't take much. A neighbor and I just had to deal with a bunch of property line confusions in the US where a property subdivision 25 years ago wasn't handled correctly. None of us really cared but it would matter in the event of an eventual sale and it cost thousands of dollars in surveyor and legal fees.

ADDED: We also had a bunch of easements and cooperative maintenance agreements that were only partially documented in the deed and mostly done via a handshake. So we got that all squared away in the expensive binder from the lawyer.

[dsego]

The public public land record in Croatia is notorious for being outdated and poorly maintained. Basically, the last time it was properly maintained was during Austria-Hungary a century ago, or at least that's the popular opinion. Right now we have the cadastre and the land registry and they do not always align. And for your example of unofficial agreements, the land my father and his brothers inherited is still in my grandfather's name, he died over 20 years ago, now my parents are aging, and there is just a verbal agreement on how the property is divided.

[lebuffon]

This is well documented in the the book "The Mystery of Capital" by Hernando de Soto. When it was published I thought it would change the world, but apparently nobody cared. :-)

In his thesis, this is the reason capitalism cannot work well in Latin America and other nations around the world. He says that registered land ownership is the foundation of capitalism. This is how one can borrow money against your land and invest it to make more capital. Very common for example with farmers in N. America to borrow against their farm, for machines, seeds and fertilizer.

(I am not an economist)

[gchamonlive]

The reason capitalism cannot work well is that it assumes endless resources and infinite growth, not because people don't like electronic transfers. Capitalism is failing in all countries and those that are not are already transitioning to some form or another or post consumerism.

[lebuffon]

Sure at the "end game" stage you are correct. But on the way to that stage it does what it does really well, meaning it makes lots more capital.

De Soto is talking about why it "cannot" get started in a place without government controlled land registry.

[wahern]

> without government controlled land registry.

De Soto describes the exact opposite situation. Latin America inherited Napoleonic property law, which only recognized property ownership when formally registered, which required quite alot of red tape. It was impossible to transfer ownership without registration. Moreover, any defect in prior registration meant the lawful owner might be the heirs of someone generations ago. Most property "owned" by the peasantry usually had defective and incurable title, having changed hands in informal private agreements, which meant banks wouldn't accept it to secure a loan. This meant only the aristocracy could leverage the financial system, because they were accustomed to following all the formalities. What piece of real property someone thought they owned, even if occupied for generations, was often in the eyes of the law owned by some aristocratic family or the state.

He contrasted that system with the American common law system, where title could be legally transfered entirely privately. Disputes are handled by courts which look to the timing and substance of transfers. Moreover, adverse possession meant that after a number of years (well within one person's lifespan) nobody could come along and claim title because of a defective transfer (even if in principle they had a better claim originally), securing title in whomever held it, even if it had been transferred without even following the much looser requirements under the common law. A bank would issue a loan so long as you could prove you held an unchallenged title for a sufficient number of years. ("Title" was whatever piece of paper handed you by the previous possessors; no government stamp or recordation required.)

Registration systems in the US are a recent occurrence, and they overlay the traditional common law rules.

A gross generalization, but Napoleonic civil law systems emphasize formal transactions centrally administered by the state, while the common law emphasizes looking to the substance of private transactions, and usually only when a dispute arises (otherwise you just presume they're valid). Broadly speaking, De Soto argued the latter tended to favor the common man, because it was much less rigid.

De Soto also pointed out that US Federal Land Grants also did a decent job at distributing land among the people, unlike Latin America where mostly only the aristocracy held land under a good title.

[wahern]

s/Napoleonic code/civil law/. Don't think Spain or Latin America directly adopted Napoleonic code stuff directly, though maybe later through reform efforts. Either way continental civil law was always big on formal state administration, recordation, and stamps.

[petit_robert]

Very interesting.

There appears to be a push to control open source software, in the guise of protecting children via age control.

With OSS, anybody can tweak the code on his device to pass the control, so the idea would be to only allow certified software. Which is expensive, and out of reach of most open source projects. Enter big, reliable companies that can afford the ticket for the certification of horrendous piles of slop.

see this recent HN post about it, I find it resonates, so to speak, with what you explain :

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48960155

[gchamonlive]

Sorry to break it to you but we are past end game since possibly the dot-com bubble.

"Cannot work well" and "cannot get started" are two different things. The whole of Latin America apart from Cuba is capitalist, for better or worse, regardless of how bad those countries keep their books.

[lebuffon]

If De Soto is correct, and I am not qualified to judge, based on your statement about land ownership in Brazil, then capitalism was not fully developed to where it could have been. Get the book. It's an interesting read.

And yes I can see that we are at the end of an era. This may be more the end of the U.S. empire than the elimination of capitalism, but for sure a new 'ism" is going to be required soon. What that is will be interesting to see. It would be nice to see someone with imagination come along instead the bipolar options we are handed today.

[singleshot_]

That’s how it works in the US too. We don’t record documents with the county recorder to make them official, we do so to provide notice to third parties who might purchase the land.