Gift Economy of Property 2.0

Contr'un

A Tale of Three Provisos

August 21, 2012 Shawn P. Wilbur
Related: Some thoughts on Locke’s proviso Responses on Locke’s proviso “Must we say, with some who pretend to metaphysics, that property is the expression of individuality, of the personality, of the self? But possession largely suffices for that expression…” — P.-J. Proudhon, The Theory of Property “I pass death with the dying, and birth with the new-washed babe …. and am not contained between my hat and boots…” — Walt Whitman, “Song of Myself” It’s funny, in some ways at least, how Proudhon has earned a rather scandalous reputation for his work on property, while Locke remains the name to […]
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Note on slavery and the origins of property

May 9, 2012 Shawn P. Wilbur
Several people, knowing my interest in the question of property, have sent me links to a blog post by Stephen Keating, “Are Freedom and Violence Linked?,” which discusses some of what David Graeber has to say about slavery and the origins of property in his book, Debt: The First 5000 Years. There are parts of Keating’s argument to which I’m sympathetic, such as his concern that the notion of individual property rights may mask the essentially social nature of property. But his key point seems to be this: “The dirty secret is that this conception of property emerged out of […]
Contr'un

The Gift Economy of Property: From Property to Gifts

April 30, 2012 Shawn P. Wilbur
The Gift Economy of Property Thesis From the Self to Property From Property to Gifts Gifting Property    3. I’m obviously not talking about “property” in any of the very narrow senses that it has been given, including the narrower senses given to it by Proudhon. Or, rather, I am seeking a broad, underlying definition, which will allow us to relate those more limited senses of the term to one another. We’ll probably find ourselves drowning in specific definitions pretty quickly here, but for a moment or two more, let’s stay general and try to clarify just what sort of […]
Contr'un

The Gift Economy of Property: From the Self to Property

April 29, 2012 Shawn P. Wilbur
The Gift Economy of Property Thesis From the Self to Property  From Property to Gifts Gifting Property  2. Having laid out a little more clearly the philosophical moves I’m making with the “gift economy of property,” I probably need to clarify again the rationale for such a idiosyncratic approach to the question of property. Because it is explicitly a mutualist anarchist approach, and specifically a neo-Proudhonian approach, there’s a whole lot of critique of property at the foundations, a strong sense that, as desirable as the aims of property might be, the available means of founding it appear to be […]