The topic was raised in the panarchist chat, but I had not previously published the considerations I shared in response, so I decided to organize the topic into a separate post.

To begin with—here is what I have already written on the topic of transit through someone else’s territory. In short: in densely populated areas, owners of adjacent plots will have a market incentive to profit from transit, while in sparsely populated areas, models of reciprocal altruism are more likely to work, where allowing transit costs little, forbidding it costs a lot, and the reciprocal gratitude for granting permission may prove very valuable at the right moment.

And now, what I would like to add. In essence, an easement is a claim by one neighbor to use the property of another neighbor, recognized by the latter. As long as the agreement lasts, there are no problems. One lets another use their lawnmower, and in return, the other allows them to use a bicycle; everyone is happy. But then the bicycle is sold to a third party. Naturally, by default, it is not burdened by any easement upon sale: the new owner does not care who had the right to use their newly acquired property or on what grounds; all agreements regarding this must be built from scratch.

Now, it is roughly the same story with land. If an old neighbor used the right of passage through your plot, then when they sell the land, the new owner does not automatically acquire the right of passage. However, if the old neighbor brought the buyer to you during the sale and said, for instance, “I’m leaving, this person will be here instead of me, discuss the passage with him”—then it’s a completely different matter; you sit down and substantively discuss what and how you will concede to each other for the sake of maintaining good neighborly relations.

Of course, if the easement had already been embodied in specific physical communications passing through someone’s land, then an attempt to sever these relations would likely affect not only the interests of the new owner but also those of other neighbors, who should not lose the easement because their agreement remains in force. Nevertheless, the new owner is brought up to speed, for example, on the terms of joint maintenance of these communications.

Generally, it’s quite funny to hear that ancap is supposedly a rampage of unrestrained individualism. No, it is under the state that there is a rampage of unrestrained individualism, because a mediator is forcibly inserted between people, and any issues must be resolved not between each other, but specifically with the mediator—that is, with one state office or another. In conditions of decentralized law, as is proper in decentralized systems, network nodes agree among themselves on the rules of interaction, so individualism is individualism, but the interests of neighbors must be taken into account.

An important point: since the rules are based on tradition, by default, this tradition is dictated by the older owners. They are the ones aware of how things are done here, and new owners may adapt, they may suggest changes, but they are unlikely to be able to change the rules at their own discretion if it affects the interests of the previous owners.