Ancient Slavery, Usury and Property Regimes

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Ancient Slavery, Usury and Property Regimes

• PHIL 2011
• 2006-07

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Elaboration on ancient slavery

• In Athens
• Debated and codified
• Personal dependence
• Essential element of oikos (household)
• Manumission rare contracts offered few
  advantages
• Closed systemdid not offer passage to
  citizenship.

• Elsewhere
• Slavery included dependent communities
• E.g. Spartan Helots
• Different from personal servitude communities
  had their own identities, customs, gods, etc.
• Romans used manumission strategically to create
  patron-client networks.

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Uniform characteristics of ancient slavery

• No rights or privileges
• Could not marry
• Could not attain citizenship
• At disposal of master
• Had no kin, no family gods (had to worship those
  of masters family)
• Owner gives him/her his/her name.

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Manumisssion, to manumit

• Latin man mittere lt man , ablative singular of
  manus the power of a father or master (lit.
  hand cf. MANUS n.1 2) mittere to release,
  send (see MISSION n.) man
•     1. trans.    a. To release (a person) from
  slavery, bondage, or servitude to set free. Also
  intr. to obtain one's release from slavery, etc.
  Oxford English Dictionary online.

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Manumission Contracts

• Sophronahands over to the Pythian Apollo to be
  free the female house-born slave named
  Onasiphoron, priced at three silver minae, and
  has received the whole priceif anyone touches
  Onasiphoron in order to enslave her, then she who
  has sold her and the guarantor together are to
  ensure that the sale to the god is valid
• many of these contracts survive, inscribed
  onpublic buildings at Delphi and similar
  religious centres (Thomas Wiedemann, Greek and
  Roman Slavery, p. 46-7).

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Manumission, cont.

• But,
• Onasiphoron is to remain with Sophrona for the
  whole period of the latters life, doing whatever
  she is ordered to do without giving cause for
  complaint. If she does not do so, then Sophrona
  is to have the power to punish her in whatever
  way she wishes to. And Onasiphoron is to give
  Sophrona a child (quoted in Wiedemann, pp.
  46-7).
• The slave might have to remain with the masters
  heirs as well!

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Questions?

• Comments?

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Unnatural Acquisition usury

• Barter between persons (natural)
• Coinage enabled retail and international trade
  (starting to be unnatural)
• Banking/usury (lending money at interest) the
  most hated sort of wealth-getting..which makes
  gain out of money itself, and not from the
  natural object of it.
• Forbidden by the medieval Church
• Usury today means to exceed a certain rate of
  interest and is still a crime
• What is the usury rate in HK?

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The case of Islamic Finance

• Koran (the source of Islamic law and practice)
  forbids riba, or interest
• Like Aristotle, Koran rejects money as commodity
  also forbids gambling
• Koran sees money as store of value. Does
  Aristotle?
• HSBC, Deutsche Bank offer special investment
  vehicles for Islamic investors equity
  financing, not debt
• See Financial Times, 24 Sept. 2006, pp. W5-6.

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Unnatural Trade 1.9

• Example of unnatural use of an object
• A shoe is made for wear, not for exchange
• Hence, we may infer that retail trade is not a
  natural part of the art of getting wealth had it
  been so, men would have ceased to exchange when
  they had enough
• How would Aristotle define enough?
• How would we? Do we accept this notion?
• Cf. idea of limits to growth put forward by
  environmentalists.

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Why not stockpile money (1.9)?

• Some assume riches large quantity of coin
• Others say coin convention (recall slavery
  argument), and hence nothing
• Example of Midas how can that be wealth of
  which a man may have a great abundance and yet
  perish with hunger?
• These are riches of the spurious false kind.

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Other objections to wealth-getting (1.9)

• Object of life To lead a good life (not just ANY
  life)
• This is also the purpose of the household
• some persons are led to believe by confusion
  over means that getting wealth is the object of
  household management, and the whole idea of their
  lives is that they ought either to increase their
  money without limit, or at any rate not to lose
  it. The origin of this disposition in men is
  that they are intent upon living only, and not
  upon living well.

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Legitimate wealth-getting (1.11)

• Tillage of soil
• Animal Husbandry which animals yield best, and
  in which environments
• Treatises of Chares, Apollodorus
• Natural resources timber, mining
• Thales of Miletus, whose knowledge of meteorology
  enabled him to predict the olive harvest, hire
  presses and create a monopoly
• Thales showed the world that philosophers can
  easily be rich if they like, but that their
  ambition is of another sort!

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Todays Question

• On page 25, Aristotle calls usury, "the most
  hated sort of wealth-getting" and describes it
  as unnatural. Is this a valid and sound argument?
  His writing focuses on practical points regarding
  the state and household, and money is practically
  useful in easing transactions, as person A and
  person B may both not need what the other has at
  the same time. Would honour and desire for the
  good life be enough to ensure repayment of
  borrowed money (which may be necessary, for
  example, for a farmer during a drought), or is
  interest necessary to motivate those who borrow
  money to pay it back? Would usury then be natural
  since it arises from human nature?

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Political Philosophy and the Institution of
Property

• Plato (4th century BCE)
• Guardians should have common property so that
  they will all regard the same things as their
  own, thereby unifying the state.
• Aristotle (4th century BCE)
• Property should not be common because of
  free-riding, and other social and moral
  problems, but its fruits can be.
• John Locke (17th century CE)
• Private property is the basis of the state, and
  the reason for the state to exist.

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Property Regime Options
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Todays Question

• Plato believes that common property creates
  citizens that are more co-operative and kinder to
  their fellow citizens. The concept of common
  property has in recent history held much greater
  sway in mainlaind China than in Hong Kong. With
  this in mind, do you believe the attitudes of
  Hong Kongers and Mainlanders differ with regard
  to their relationship with close family and
  friends, and also with that of other fellow
  citizens? If so, is the cause political
  property-related?