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statement formulated here is clearly inadequate. Nevertheless, it is plausible that a properly stated
version of the principle, one that would both be justified in utilitarian terms and that would have
intuitive appeal for non-utilitarians, would entail the takings principle. One thing that a more
precise statement of the expectations principle would have to take into account is that there are
contexts in which no one would think that one has an obligation to fulfill expectations that one has
encouraged others to form. Think, for example, of business competitors who seek to bluff each
other about what their next moves will be. In some circumstances, a certain amount of deception
is morally permissible. The contexts in which this seems to be true, however, are generally those
in which a person ought to know to expect deception and to be on guard against it. Surely this
should not be the case between citizen and government, even if we are sometimes disposed to
think that it is the case, in our cynical moments. A satisfactory statement of the expectations
principle would also have to make reference to a reasonably precise account of what counts as
encouraging someone to form certain expectations. Mill never provides such an account, and
none will be found herein. Yet it does seem plausible that such an account would entail that when
a government makes it legal for citizens to own a certain kind of property, then it can be
understood to be encouraging them to expect this remain legal in the future—at least in the
absence of special reasons to think otherwise. The fact that an agent acts in some way, or refrains
from acting in some way, cannot always be construed as encouraging others to expect the same
behavior in the future. What makes the case of a government’s permitting the ownership of a
certain type of property special? First, it is important to remember that a state’s permitting
citizens to own property of a specific kind will almost always consist in more than a mere silence
on the subject. It will frequently engage in positive acts and statements expressing its approval.
Convention