If the tribesmen come to the defense of someone who has been robbed
of his belongings, that does not mean some kind of primitive police
or government but simply the collective acknowledgement of intrinsic
right to primitive property.
What difference do you see between the Sámi tribesmen enforcing his property rights, or the Finnish courts? Just because the Finnish "tribesmen" pay someone to do that task for them?
In both cases, property rights exist because there is a third party that decides who (by
their rules) is the proprietor, and has the power to ensure that he gets possession of the thing, by taking it away from anyone who has possession of it but (in
their view) is not the proprietor.
My view is simply that notion of property predates legal formulations
upheld by government, whereas you appeared to claim that it is created by them
and would not exist without them.
Yes, I do claim that "property" requires an authority that can enforce it.
I would really like to see a smart contract work without backing of police, laws, and courts. (Note that contracts are like fire extinguishers: they are useful only when things fail to happen the way they were supposed to happen.)
Crowdfunding is an example that comes to mind - you transfer an amount
of value to a recipient, and the contract stipulates that if you don't get something
by some date, you'll get your amount back just as everyone else who contributed.
Such a contract is
easily implemented algorithmically with just a few lines of code,
and everyone can instantly see that it works.
Erm, I don't see how that works, sorry. The recipient is supposed to spend that money while creating the something. At the end of the allotted period he has spent it all, but there is no something, or it is only half finished, or it does not work. What then?
Unless you mean a crowdfunded sale of something that already exists and is ready? Even so, who is going to decide whether the something was delivered and meets the terms of the contract?