Private Property

This chapter outlines the implementation of liberal law in the liberal concept of private property. There is no single, monolithic, univocal ‘liberal concept’; instead, the most we can do is point to some major themes found in most theories of liberal property, which attempt to enshrine liberal law in the way in which things are allocated. The liberal concept begins with liberal choice, and behind this stands the state, which enforces the freedom of the holder of property to exercise choice in relation to the stuff subject to one’s property. Three main themes emerge. First, the liberal concept is historical; this is another way of describing the liberal argument that property is a matter of rights between individuals in respect of things. This is often referred to as the ‘bundle of rights’ view of property, of which three rights are considered crucial: use, exclusivity, and alienability. Second, liberal property is social—rights are not arid and abstract, but constituted by and constitutive of relationships between real people. One’s ability to use, exclude, and alienate a thing depends upon the fact that that person holds rights, backed by the state, to do that and that those rights are enforceable against others. Third, the liberal concept is spatial. Simply, in exercising the choice made possible by the bundle of rights we are shaping the space in which we live. When one chooses to build a certain structure on land said to that person’s property, that shapes physical space, which in turn affects how others may shape physical space, and which also affects the nature of the social relations which exist between that person and others, the social space.