Marx and the Serious Question of Private Property

JerseyFlight

Quotes from Marx interspersed with brief commentary:

"The property in the soil is the original source of all wealth, and has become the great problem upon the solution of which depends the future of the working class."

Though this point might seem simple, it's most certainly not in our day and age. People do not think that wealth proceeds from the earth, most people believe it proceeds from innovation, pure idealism, but such idealism would have no matter to bring its form into being without the earth.

"...the advocates of private property... have tried hard to disguise the primitive fact of conquest under the cloak of "Natural Right". If conquest constituted a natural right on the part of the few, the many have only to gather sufficient strength in order to acquire the natural right of reconquering what has been taken from them."

At the time this was written it would have been exceedingly hard for humans to escape from the concept of "Natural Right," for that matter it still is. Marx makes light work of the error of the position. If conquest is equal to "Natural Right," then men merely need to overthrow the present land owners and re-establish themselves as the recipients of "Natural Right." Such a political method is known as barbarism. Tragic that men still cannot discern that conquest does not amount to justification or "Natural Right."

"In the progress of history the conquerors found it convenient to give to their original titles, derived from brute force, a sort of social standing through the instrumentality of laws imposed by themselves."

This is just as true today as it was in the past. The conqueror dictates the narrative, the language of normativity, but what he cannot see, is that this sets a boundary to the qualitative progress of society. Law then becomes a political ideology of control, as opposed to an agent of liberation. Marx was the most un-naive philosopher that ever existed.

"At last comes the philosopher and demonstrates that those laws imply and express the universal consent of mankind. If private property in land be indeed founded upon such an universal consent, it will evidently become extinct from the moment the majority of a society dissent from warranting it."

Here Marx is attacking the philosopher for creating a false metaphysics which justifies oppressive power structures. Producing a metaphysics which justifies tyranny, is the default trajectory of every thinker that remains ignorant of class distinctions. In other words, though he thinks himself to be laboring in the domain of liberty, through ignorance he is actually reinforcing the oppression of the status quo.

This is the most interesting citation:

"However, leaving aside the so-called "rights" of property, I assert that the economical development of society, the increase and concentration of people, the very circumstances that compel the capitalist farmer to apply to agriculture collective and organised labour, and to have recourse to machinery and similar contrivances, will more and more render the nationalisation of land a "Social Necessity", against which no amount of talk about the rights of property can be of any avail. The imperative wants of society will and must be satisfied, changes dictated by social necessity will work their own way, and sooner or later adapt legislation to their interests."

Marx's statement is already a fact. Social necessity has rendered the restructuring of private property absolutely imperative in order to meet the needs of society. But this is where it gets interesting, while Marx is assuredly correct, the question arises, even though serious changes are required, will necessity be enough to bring about an intelligent restructuring? The danger is that though the needs exist, a chain of power determines to defy these needs regardless of the ramifications.

* Marx, The Nationalization of the Land, Marx and Engles Collected Works Volume 23

[The second post, MARX AND THE SERIOUS QUESTION OF PRIVATE PROPERTY II, is contained on page 4 of the thread.]

ChatteringMonkey

↪JerseyFlight

I don't necessarily disagree with any of this, but I think it all misses what is I think is the most important argument for private property, which is human nature.

People want to own stuff and owning stuff motivates them to take care of it. Take away private property and a lot of that motivation goes away.

There's no further need to justify private property in metaphysics or natural rights or any of that. If human nature is indeed such that private property is a key part of what motivates people, then theories that don't take that into account are doomed to fail in practice.

You may dispute that view on human nature off course, but ultimately it is an empirical claim and the evidence seems to be in favour of it.

Pfhorrest

↪ChatteringMonkey

Surely then a situation where most people own practically nothing (because almost everything is owned by a very few) will be one in which hardly anyone is motivated to take care of anything.

ChatteringMonkey

↪Pfhorrest

Yes, and that is a bad situation too which will end up creating problems.

Maybe the conclusion of these two propositions taken together then is that the solution to a few owning everything, is not abolishing private property altogether, but retaining the idea of private property while also finding a way so that it doesn't end up in a few owning everything.

Pfhorrest

↪ChatteringMonkey

Agreed.

Frank Apisa

But this is where it gets interesting, while Marx is assuredly correct, the question arises, even though serious changes are required, will necessity be enough to bring about an intelligent restructuring? The danger is that though the needs exist, a chain of power determines to defy these needs regardless of the ramifications. — JerseyFlight

I suspect that the societal corrections will never even remotely resemble anything intelligent. There was societal restructuring that happened in France during the late 18th century...and societal restructuring that happened in Russia during the early 20th century. Neither was "intelligent"...both were torturous.

I think that is the way the restructuring or corrections have to occur.

We'll see...and probably sooner than most suspect.

Right now here in America, the wealthiest 1% owns 40% of the nations wealth. The bottom 80% (80%!!!) own only 7% of the wealth.

It is a social disaster waiting to happen.

Unfortunately, a decent percentage of the population sees this as a non-problem.

Not sure of what percentages would change those folk.

Would the top 1% owning 80% of the wealth finally make a difference to the indifferent?

I suspect not.

So the solution will probably be a variation of the French or Russian solutions mentioned above.

JerseyFlight

You may dispute that view on human nature off course, but ultimately it is an empirical claim and the evidence seems to be in favour of it. — ChatteringMonkey

No my friend, what the evidence favors is that human personality structures are conditioned by 1) attachment systems and 2) quality and stability of environment, this includes food and shelter (the vital parts of the brain must develop and mature without trauma or nutrient deficiencies). There is no such thing as "human nature," (a psychological predisposition to which all humans are subject) this is a false metaphysics.

Anyhow, this thread is not about the myth of human nature, which fascism so desperately needs to hold onto in order to justify its primitive narrative of good versus evil.

It seems you are under the impression that Marx rejected private property. Where did you derive this idea? Can you provide a citation? Marx was against the unintelligibility of capitalist formations of private property -- because they don't make any sense when you think of them in terms of the well-being and needs of the species. Everyone is in need of space in order to live, capitalism negates this fact, segregates it and begins to use it as a tyranny, coercion-leverage.

If you think you have figured out the social world because you make use of the false metaphysical concept of "human nature..." all I can tell you is that you haven't even entered the room where the adults speak, you are in much need of a critical education.

JerseyFlight

will more and more render the nationalisation of land a "Social Necessity", against which no amount of talk about the rights of property can be of any avail. — JerseyFlight

The nationalization of property does not mean the abnegation of private property. Please read more carefully before you reply next time.

A Seagull

Marx's statement is already a fact. Social necessity has rendered the restructuring of private property absolutely imperative in order to meet the needs of society. — JerseyFlight

Really? Perhaps you could compare your OP with Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations.

JerseyFlight

Perhaps you could compare your OP with Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations. — A Seagull

You are going to have to give a further exposition of your point if you want feedback. The way you cite me makes me think you have not understood my point? Provincialism is only a fragment of reality, one cannot ascertain the state of the world by looking through the lens of America. Further, the fact of needs does not imply a response, the needs do exist, you seem to be assuming that in order for social necessity to be an actual thing you must see some kind of response to it? If you want to cite Adam Smith in relation to this thread, by all means do it, a proper citation would only add to the discourse.

Pfhorrest

↪A Seagull

Smith and Marx agree more than you'd probably think.

JerseyFlight

Smith and Marx agree more than you'd probably think. — Pfhorrest

More than he knows for sure, Marx has extended commentary on Smith. The Libertarian, one-sided Adam Smith, the raving capitalist, seems to be the one that most people latch onto, because most people don't read.

JerseyFlight

It is a social disaster waiting to happen. Unfortunately, a decent percentage of the population sees this as a non-problem. — Frank Apisa

So true. All this means is that serious intellectuals have much work to do. Ignorance is the mother of tyranny.

Kornelius

I think it may help the discussion to distinguish between private property and personal property.

@ChatteringMonkey even if we accept the view of human nature you briefly alluded to, it isn't clear which type of property you mean. I think most of what you say is an argument for limited personal property but is not an argument that extends to ownership over means of production, for example.

@JerseyFlight Would it be correct to say that, on your view, Marx was a critic of ownership rights over means of production, but not over personal property (like a home, a television, etc.)?

I also really think we should bring out the criticism of the concept of 'human nature' into full focus. This is a concept that many people rely on when arguing, and it is not one that never is clearly defined. It is used to suit one's argument, usually.

JerseyFlight

Would it be correct to say that, on your view, Marx was a critic of ownership rights over means of production, but not over personal property (like a home, a television, etc.)? — Kornelius

I actually don't want to argue over Marx's orthodoxy, the world of Marxism is full of such banter. So to answer the question, at the same time moving beyond the question, the problem is that property is not intelligently distributed in light of a social awareness. No one is talking about abolishing private property, that is something close to what the Libertarian position amounts to, the intelligent suggestion is to make sure all humans have property. That property must be socialized is inevitable, but this will not make it realized. The inescapable needs of human life dictate that an advanced species would never neglect these needs, or leave them to the chaos of a system such as capitalism. An advanced species would know the needs HAVE to be met for one specific reason: individual quality is inescapably linked to social quality. (It's the difference between one Einstein every two thousand years, or the common cultivation of Einstein). A species cannot advance without species consciousness. So far as I know Marx was the first philosopher to ever comprehend this specifically.

I will clarify that I am not a Marxist. I do not believe in Marxist revolution, what I see in Marx is (astoundingly!) one of the greatest thinkers that ever lived.

JerseyFlight

I also really think we should bring out the criticism of the concept of 'human nature' into full focus. This is a concept that many people rely on when arguing, and it is not one that ever been clearly defined. — Kornelius

You are correct, but it seems to me this needs to be the topic of another thread. Also, we are not guessing here. The Human-Nature-Metaphysicians have no ground to stand on apart from isolated and distorted historical images (these images prey on fear). Their position is exceedingly primitive, it has been entirely refuted by recent discoveries in psychology and neurobiology. There is no way around it without suppressing and ignoring concrete facts of being. They are desperate because much hinges on their cynical, negative metaphysics. Through this error they essentially justify barbarism. Every intellectual that uses words to make progress, as opposed to physical violence, must stand against this.

ChatteringMonkey

No my friend, what the evidence favors is that human personality structures are conditioned by 1) attachment systems and 2) quality and stability of environment, this includes food and shelter (the vital parts of the brain must develop and mature without trauma or nutrient deficiencies). There is no such thing as "human nature," (a psychological predisposition to which all humans are subject) this is a false metaphysics.

Anyhow, this thread is not about the myth of human nature, which fascism so desperately needs to hold onto in order to justify its primitive narrative of good versus evil.

It seems you are under the impression that Marx rejected private property. Where did you derive this idea? Can you provide a citation? Marx was against the unintelligibility of capitalist formations of private property -- because they don't make any sense when you think of them in terms of the well-being and needs of the species. Everyone is in need of space in order to live, capitalism negates this fact, segregates it and begins to use it as a tyranny, coercion-leverage.

If you think you have figured out the social world because you make use of the false metaphysical concept of "human nature..." all I can tell you is that you haven't even entered the room where the adults speak, you are in much need of a critical education. — JerseyFlight

I don't get it, why do you post quotes that directly and without qualification attack the idea of private property if not to reject the idea of private property. What's you point then?

There's nothing metaphysical about humans having certain tendencies, it's an empirical claim, as I said. If you have spend for instance any time observing infants, that can hardly be said to be indoctrinated by culture already, you'd know that there is strong tendency to appropriate things for themselves. This is for the most part not something that culture imposes on us, it is in our genes.

Thinking in terms of well-being and what we need as a species, won't work if it doesn't align with what we want. Two different things. You need to work with what people want, otherwise it won't work, this is a very simple point.

And I'll say this once, if you continue the discussion in the same pompous vein, I'm done with it.

JerseyFlight

And I'll say this once, if you continue the discussion in the same pompous vein, I'm done with it. — ChatteringMonkey

No need for this here:

you'd know that there is strong tendency to appropriate things for themselves. — ChatteringMonkey

What separates humans from other primates is that we look to the adults to obtain information about ourselves and our environment. What a human is and will be depends upon his environment, and here we use the term in the broadest possible sense, both physical and psychological. What you are claiming is not empirical, it is a fiction, humans become what they are as their brain develops and passes through concrete experience structures (see Allan Schore, Affect Regulation and the Origin of the Self). You are asserting that humans come preset, this is a superstition left over from religion. "Human Nature" does not exist, human brains exist, and they are exceedingly sensitive, what your brain experiences and how it develops determines who you are and what you become. If you abuse a child, neglect him, he will grow up to abuse others, he will be selfish, there will be many problems. Humans are not born predisposed to the negative. This is a religious assertion, not a scientific fact.

ChatteringMonkey

ChatteringMonkey even if we accept the view of human nature you briefly alluded to, it isn't clear which type of property you mean. I think most of what you say is an argument for limited personal property but is not an argument that extends to ownership over means of production, for example. — Kornelius

It does to some extend, people are motivated to care for things they consider 'theirs'. What they consider theirs is a fluid concept to some extend, in the sense you can get them to care for things that are not actually their property, like a 'nation' or a 'sports team', but there needs to be some identification for them to care. And so, the argument does extend to the means of production insofar as someone needs to be motivated to put those means to good use.

JerseyFlight

Thinking in terms of well-being and what we need as a species, won't work if it doesn't align with what we want. — ChatteringMonkey

This proves that you can't even enter the room to talk with the adults, and this is why: it is the most basic knowledge of sociology and social psychology that human wants can be artificially generated. This is what consumer culture is all about, generating artificial needs. One thing people should not do is listen to any advice you have on how to approach the problems of the world, because you have clearly manifest that you don't even comprehend the most basic parts of the system. I'm not trying to be mean, this is a problem if you want to converse with any kind of authority. If I was you I would return to education, specifically psychology and sociology. (If you want to learn how to think powerfully read Hegel and Marx, if you want to learn how to calculate and shift symbols across the page, devote your life to analytical philosophy).

ChatteringMonkey

What separates humans from other primates is that we look to the adults to obtain information about ourselves and our environment. What a human is and will be depends upon his environment, and here we use the term in the broadest possible sense, both physical and psychological. What you are claiming is not empirical, it is a fiction, humans become what they are as their brain develops and passes through concrete experience structures (see Allan Schore, Affect Regulation and the Origin of the Self). You are asserting that humans come preset, this is a superstition left over from religion. "Human Nature" does not exist, human brains exist, and they are exceedingly sensitive, what your brain experiences and how it develops determines who you are and what you become. If you abuse a child, neglect him, he will grow up to abuse others, he will be selfish, there will be many problems. Humans are not born predisposed to the negative. This is a religious assertion, not a scientific fact. — JerseyFlight

This proves that you can't even enter the room to talk with the adults, and this is why: it is the most basic knowledge of sociology and social psychology that human wants can be artificially generated. This is what consumer culture is all about, generating artificial needs. One thing people should not do is listen to any advice you have on how to approach the problems of the world, because you have clearly manifest that you don't even comprehend the most basic parts of the system. I'm not trying to be mean, this is a problem if you want to converse with any kind of authority. If I was you I would return to education, specifically psychology and sociology. — JerseyFlight

I disagree, culture plays a part of course, I never said otherwise, but it seems hard to deny there are some basic tendencies that are hard to unlearn. Artificially created humans wants typically are created because they promise people social success, status etc... The specific iteration of objects we attach those desires to may differ, but the underlying desires that make people want those things are usually pretty similar.... in short will to power.

JerseyFlight

will to power. — ChatteringMonkey

Once again, more of the dark ages brought into the present. Will power as you speak of it does not exist, your will is determined by your motivation and motivation is caused by a plurality of psychological and physical factors. You cannot tell a brain lacking grey matter to simply try harder! This is my last exchange with you. You need to educate yourself and stop trying to see what will stick. I wish you all the best. :)

Pfhorrest

will to power — ChatteringMonkey

Will power — JerseyFlight

Different things.

ChatteringMonkey

Once again, more of the dark ages brought into the present. Will power as you speak of it does not exist, your will is determined by your motivation and motivation is caused by a plurality of psychological and physical factors. You cannot tell a brain lacking grey matter to simply try harder! This is my last exchange with you. You need to educate yourself and stop trying to see what will stick. I wish you all the best. :) — JerseyFlight

You just can't help yourself, can you? It's certainly clear what motivates you :-).

NOS4A2

We can review past situations where the nationalization of property has occurred, for instance in Mao’s land reforms, and find that these types of “intelligent restructuring” often led to mass murder, famine, cannibalism and economic disaster.

State or mob confiscation of land is barbarism of the highest order, no matter which cadre of intellectuals think the know how to do it best.

JerseyFlight

We can review past situations where the nationalization of property has occurred, for instance in Mao’s land reforms, and find that these types of “intelligent restructuring” often led to mass murder, famine, cannibalism and economic disaster. — NOS4A2

Can you tell me what this has to do with Marx? Of course we should all stand against this kind of Right Wing totalitarianism, fascism is dangerous no matter what name it uses. Marx knew that qualitative democracy was the only real solution to political tyranny. Not sure where you locate democracy in Mao, Stalin or Hitler?

State or mob confiscation of land is barbarism of the highest order, no matter which cadre of intellectuals think the know how to do it best. — NOS4A2

Marx already addressed this argument above. What you don't comprehend is that the criteria ("confiscation") actually puts you in a bind.

My people are Native, our land was confiscated from us, this game doesn't lead where you think (see Marx above).

NOS4A2

↪JerseyFlight

Can you tell me what this has to do with Marx? Of course we should all stand against this kind of Right Wing totalitarianism, fascism is dangerous no matter what name it uses. Marx knew that qualitative democracy was the only real solution to political tyranny. Not sure where you locate democracy in Mao, Stalin or Hitler?

I was more so speaking about Marx’s idea of the nationalization of land. Mao saw such a necessity, nationalized the land—a euphemism for the confiscation of property by force—and did so with the most ruthless efficiency. As it turns out, the nationalization of land does not make living on other people's labor a thing of the past. As it turns out, the nationalization of land never made the class distinctions disappear, and state brutality, starvation and murder became the order of the day.

JerseyFlight

I was more so speaking about Marx’s idea of the nationalization of land. Mao saw such a necessity, nationalized the land—a euphemism for the confiscation of property by force—and did so with the most ruthless efficiency. As it turns out, the nationalization of land does not make living on other people's labor a thing of the past. As it turns out, the nationalization of land never made the class distinctions disappear, and state brutality, starvation and murder became the order of the day. — NOS4A2

With all due respect you're way out of your depths here. What you have brought are a bunch of false assumptions. When Marx speaks of nationalizing land, he is not speaking of putting it in the hands of a dictator, but in the democratic hands of the workers, not in the hands of a political party, but in the hands of the workers. You are falsely equating Right Wing dictatorships with Marxism, they are not the same.

As it turns out, the nationalization of land never made the class distinctions disappear, and state brutality, starvation and murder became the order of the day. — NOS4A2

Unto whom was the land nationalized in the examples you cite? Were these democratic nationalizations? Further, you said, "state brutality," but in Marx's theory the state power was to be nothing more or nothing less than a democratic union of workers. The historical examples you are citing persecuted and exploited the workers, they did not empower them. What is more tragic, you don't comprehend that the tyranny you are referencing is Right Wing tyranny, fascism. It's what you get when individuals are put into power without a check on that power, it's what you get when individuals in power are allowed to execute any order they want and the people obey out of fear (see Arendt); it's what you get when you subvert democracy.

Either provide citations from Marx's work to back up your sweeping claims or humbly move on from this thread.

Jamal

People, please stop posting here about moderator actions. We have a feedback category.

By the way, it's our normal practice to delete any response to a deleted post.

Carry on with the Marx :cool:

David Mo

The nationalization of property does not mean the abnegation of private property. — JerseyFlight

Indeed.What Marx defends is the socialization of the collective means of production, not referring to the private property of use goods. That is, factories, not handkerchiefs.
If there is a natural right to individual property -I doubt it very much- this right would be preserved by personal property. That is why the so-called socialist states had no problem signing Article 17 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which states that "Everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others".

All states in the world have some limitations on the use of property. The perfect neoliberal state does not exist, thank God. Therefore, we can only discuss whether Marx's proposal of socialist limitations on private property was excessive or not. Natural rights have little to do here.

I don't know if it was excessive or not, but the alternative seems to me to be socialism or barbarism. Or worse, socialism or extinction. That's where we're going, I'm afraid.

whollyrolling

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Marx and the Serious Question of Private Property

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