During class we spent a large part discussing what private property meant to Marx. We also discussed what private property meant to us and I found myself disagreeing with the class in defining private property. Let me explain further, when I think of private property I think of any object, idea, belief, etc. that someone either claims to be their own or excludes others from claiming it. For instance, when Dr. J professed that she didn't belief it was human nature to conceptualize private property, but I found her example problematic. Specifically, when we discussed the idea of the chair and Dr. J exclaimed that she could come up with a bunch of ways to sit in the chair and use the chair without having to claim it as her own. What I find problematic is that although you may be never claiming it as private property, your actions are implicating that the chair is private (you are hiding it from others) and that it is a piece of property (your exclusive use of the chair).
When I brought up animals in the sense of private property I think I was too easily dismissed in my point. I will concede that it is nearly impossible to decipher if animals are truly conceptualizing the idea of private property, I do believe that behaviors can indicate this type of human-like behavior. To those of you who are say, "but Will, you are just anthropomorphizing these behaviors" I respond, aren't we doing the same thing when we are taking hypothetic beginning of man situations and their "in nature" responses to their environment and others?
Regardless of whether or not you agree on this point (and in some ways I don't fully believe it) isn't it easy to see that wolves protecting their kill a sense of private property? How about how dogs urinate in a certain areas as if to mark territory and familiarity? What about stories of dogs protecting their owners from threats? Or even cats placing their scents onto people and items by rubbing their bodies against them? Aren't these somewhat compelling in showing that animals (including us) are prone to claiming things? Marking things to be our own? Placing emotional importance and involvement in something/someone?
I think my biggest issue with the claim that private property isn't innately human is that I haven't really heard of a world or any society that lives without some form of private property. Propose to me a community whereby private property does not exist. And even if there were to be a freedom to trade, exchange, and just have equal rights over everything, would this prevent inequality in acquisition of goods. For instance, there may be personality differences that allow one person to be "satisfied" with little while another person will require more. Is it ok to have this inequality when it comes to the distribution and exchanging of goods in a communist society?
To him who looks upon the world rationally, the world looks rationally back. --G.W.F. Hegel
I think Marx's biggest bone to pick with political economists comes from the very issue that you discuss: the origin of private property. In "The Manuscript," Marx argues that wages and private property come necessarily from estranged labour. They are, as Marx suggests, simply justifications--parts of the superstructure--for the egregious state of the prole in a Capitalist framework. Once created, the system re-creates private property. Private property becomes the cause and the effect of estranged labour. All that theoretical frameworking out of the way, I'm not sure you successfully argue that private property is a thing, everywhere. Take, for example, the body. In many romantic languages, when addressing a part of the body, you do not use the possessive. Instead, you use an indefinite article. This, it seems to me, is quite strange. In English, we say: my arm, my toe, my ear, etc. In spanish, we say: the arm, the toe, the ear, etc. The most private thing in your possession--your body--is not even recognized by the possessive. I don't know exactly why this lingual idiosyncrasy exists. It is quite possible that its origins do not support my argument. I just think it is interesting to see the impact of acculturation on language, the subject, and the way in which we view the world. I am almost certain that, with some research, you could easily find societies that do not produce privately but publicly. Of course, you'd have to establish a new set of protocols for exchanging goods. Sure. But why does that seem so far-fetched? Just, for a moment, try to abstract yourself from this context. I think, with that movement, you'll find less and less solid ground for this particular assumption.
ReplyDeleteWill,
ReplyDeleteGoing back to some hypothetical state of nature is total and complete speculation. It is an almost worthless endeavor. Hobbes and Locke do not prove anything when they “assume” a state of nature. Rather, they assume exactly what they are claiming to prove: the natural state of the human being (Hegel expressed a similar sentiment in his introduction, I believe). If the state-of-nature-argument is the justification for the comparison to animals, then the comparison is not tenable.
We need to be clear about what is meant by nature as well. If you mean “a priori” when you say “by nature” then you would need to show that private property is a priori (i.e. that it is known to humans by necessity and universally). I do not think you can show this, and you do not here. Instead you approach the situation from an empirical standpoint. In essence, you are deriving an “ought” from an “is.” All it takes to overturn one experience is an experience that contradicts it. But if we take the empirical route, then by simply observing human behavior we see that humans do operate with many things that are not their private property.