The emergence of a system of property rights in the West provided this kind of proof to a lender, and so property became capital that could be leveraged. A system of property rights and the legal means to enforce them are largely missing in many parts of the world where the poor live. Systems of communal ownership, government ownership, or conflicting or undocumented ownership make for what de Soto calls dead capital, because no one will loan money on something a person cannot prove he or she owns (De Soto 2000).
