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Property Rights and the Resource Curse
Because of a major flaw in the international trade system, consumers in rich countries unknowingly buy stolen goods every day. The raw materials used to make these goods are taken from the poorest people in the world, by stealth and by force.
Customary practices left over from the era of absolute state sovereignty still give property rights to whoever can exert coercive control over a population. This might-makes-right rule contradicts the movement toward citizen ownership of natural resources.
Calculations show that oil companies illicitly transport into the U.S. over 600 million barrels of oil each year. This is 12.7 percent of U.S. oil imports--more than one barrel in eight.
Wenar argues that a trust-and-tariff mechanism could be used against countries that insist on buying resources from the worst regimes. The revenues would go to repressed peoples such as the Sudanese.
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