Property [Paperback]

Few political ideas are as divisive and controversial for some  and yet taken for granted by others  as the ownership of private property. For its defenders, private ownership is a fundamental right that protects individual freedom and ensures wider economic benefits for the community; for its critics, by contrast, property is institutionalised theft, responsible for lamentable levels of inequality and poverty.

In this book, Robert Lamb explores philosophical arguments deployed to conceptualise, justify, and criticise private property ownership. He introduces the radical case against property advanced by anarchist and socialist writers, before analysing some of the most important and influential arguments in its favour. Lamb explains and assesses the various defences of property rights advanced by Locke, Hume, Hegel, J. S. Mill, and Nozick. He then shows how theorists such as John Rawls and his followers encourage us to rethink the very nature of ownership in a democratic society.

This engaging synthesis of historical and contemporary theories of property will be essential reading for students and scholars of political philosophy.

Contesting concepts

An historical approach to the concept of property

Structure of the book

Notes

1 The Case against Private Property

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Proudhon and the anarchist case against property

Socialism and the idea of life without private ownership

Conclusion

Notes

2 Libertarianism and the Natural Right to Property

The inviolability of property rights

Property and freedom

The concept of self-ownership

The legacy of Locke