Unpublished Paper
The Property Question.pdf
(2018)
Abstract
for presentation at the Property and Political Economy Conference at the Smith Institute,
Chapman University, April 20-21, 2018
The “property question” is the constitutional question whether a society’s basic resources are
to be publicly or privately owned; that is, whether these basic resources are to be available to
private owners, perhaps subject to tax and regulation, or whether instead they are to be
retained in joint public ownership, and managed by democratic processes. James Madison’s
approach represents a case in which prior holdings are taken for granted, and the property
question itself is kept off of the political agenda. By contrast, John Rawls approach abstracts
from any actual pattern of holdings, while putting the property question on the political
agenda, but at a particular place. This paper compares and contrasts the two approaches.
Keywords
- Rawls,
- Madison,
- Private property,
- Constitutionalsim,
- means of production
Disciplines
Publication Date
2018
Citation Information
William A. Edmundson. "The Property Question.pdf" (2018) Available at: http://works.bepress.com/william_edmundson/150/