Economics Dictionary of Arguments

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Property: Property is anything that is owned by a person or entity. It can be tangible, or intangible. Property rights give the owner the right to use, possess, and dispose of their property as they see fit. See also Rights, Duties, Contracts.
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Annotation: The above characterizations of concepts are neither definitions nor exhausting presentations of problems related to them. Instead, they are intended to give a short introduction to the contributions below. – Lexicon of Arguments.

 
Author Concept Summary/Quotes Sources

John Locke on Property - Dictionary of Arguments

Mause I 36
Property/Locke: State purpose for Locke is the protection of property.
Legitimate state power finds its limits in the property rights of citizens, whereby Locke understands "property" in a comprehensive sense as "life", "liberty" and "ownership". (1)

1.J. Locke, Zwei Abhandlungen über die Regierung, Hrsg. Walter Euchner, Frankfurt 1977 S. 253.

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Höffe I 249
Property/Locke/Höffe: Because the definition of political violence(1) cites property as the only basic good, Locke seems to represent exclusively economic liberalism, as some critics claim. By property, however, he understands, as was not uncommon in England at the time, far more than a material possession essential to the economy. For him, life and freedom are also important, and only then does possession rank. Furthermore, political power may only be used for the benefit of the common good. >Governance/Locke
, >State/Locke, >Natural State/Locke.
Höffe I 252
Property is (...) a necessary condition for human life; in working nature, humans procures for themselves the material conditions for their survival.
Prehistory/Locke: [There is one] original common property, the property of all in the earth and its fruits.
Höffe I 253
Private property: Personal property, private property, is created through agreements and contracts and is therefore already bound to a legal and state system.
Natural state: In contrast, Locke(3) claims that one acquires property already in the natural state. God gave the earth and all lower living beings to all people together. In the natural state, however, there is also a non-collective ownership, as a quasi-divine fiefdom the ownership of one's own person.
Acquisition of property: On the basis of this still pre-economic property, humans can acquire property through their activity in the usual economic understanding.
The decisive, property-creating factor is thus the labour that is both commanded by God and forced by the needs of people. >Labour/Locke.
(...) even the industrious [may] not acquire as much property as they like, because they are subject to a natural law limit, which of course cannot be justified so obviously by the prohibition of damage: One may only make oneself property to the extent that one "can use it to any advantage for one's life before it spoils"(4).
Höffe I 254
HöffeVsLocke: two questions: 1) If the pragmatic argument "useless" already applies, why does the moral criterion of dishonesty still need to be applied? 2) And what about those who are neither hard-working nor sensible: should they starve? >Labour/Locke, >Money/Locke.

1. Locke, Second treatise of Government, 1689/90
2. Ibid., Chap. V.
3. Ibid., §§ 27ff.
4. Ibid., § 31

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Explanation of symbols: Roman numerals indicate the source, arabic numerals indicate the page number. The corresponding books are indicated on the right hand side. ((s)…): Comment by the sender of the contribution. Translations: Dictionary of Arguments
The note [Concept/Author], [Author1]Vs[Author2] or [Author]Vs[term] resp. "problem:"/"solution:", "old:"/"new:" and "thesis:" is an addition from the Dictionary of Arguments. If a German edition is specified, the page numbers refer to this edition.

Loc III
J. Locke
An Essay Concerning Human Understanding

Mause I
Karsten Mause
Christian Müller
Klaus Schubert,
Politik und Wirtschaft: Ein integratives Kompendium Wiesbaden 2018

Höffe I
Otfried Höffe
Geschichte des politischen Denkens München 2016


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