Property
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
|
"Property is theft!" --Proudhon "The growth of the idea of property, and the rise of monogamy, furnished motives sufficiently powerful to demand and obtain [a] change in order to bring children into the gens of their father, and into a participation in the inheritance of his estate. Monogamy assured the paternity of children; which was unknown when the gens was instituted, and the exclusion of children from the inheritance was no longer possible. "--from Lewis H. Morgan's Ancient Society. |
|
Related e |
|
Featured: |
- Something that is owned.
- An attribute or abstract quality which is characteristic of a class of objects, see property (philosophy)
Pierre Proudhon – property is theft
In his 1849 treatise What is Property?, Pierre Proudhon answers with "Property is theft!" In natural resources, he sees two types of property, de jure property (legal title) and de facto property (physical possession), and argues that the former is illegitimate. Proudhon's conclusion is that "property, to be just and possible, must necessarily have equality for its condition."
His analysis of the product of labor upon natural resources as property (usufruct) is more nuanced. He asserts that land itself cannot be property, yet it should be held by individual possessors as stewards of mankind with the product of labor being the property of the producer. Proudhon reasoned that any wealth gained without labor was stolen from those who labored to create that wealth. Even a voluntary contract to surrender the product of labor to an employer was theft, according to Proudhon, since the controller of natural resources had no moral right to charge others for the use of that which he did not labor to create and therefore did not own.
Proudhon's theory of property greatly influenced the budding socialist movement, inspiring anarchist theorists such as Mikhail Bakunin who modified Proudhon's ideas, as well as antagonizing theorists like Karl Marx.
See also
- The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State, 1884, Friedrich Engels
- Ancient Society, 1877, Lewis H. Morgan
See also
- Anarchism
- Capitalism
- Communism
- Economics
- Libertarianism
- Personal property
- Property is theft
- Socialism
- Sovereignty
- Interpersonal relationship
- Charity
- Essenes
- Gift
- Kibbutz
- Monasticism
- Confiscation
- Nationalization
- Tax
- Theft
- Wife
- Husband
- Prisoner
- Pet
