Embodiment and self-ownership

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

8 Scopus citations

Abstract

Many libertarians believe that self-ownership is a separate matter from ownership of extra-personal property. No-proviso libertarians hold that property ownership should be free of any fair share constraints (e.g., the Lockean Proviso), on the grounds that the inability of the very poor to control property leaves their self-ownership intact. By contrast, left-libertarians hold that while no one need compensate others for owning himself, still property owners must compensate others for owning extra-personal property. What would a self have to be for these claims to be true? I argue that both of these camps must conceive of the boundaries of the self as including one's body but no part of the extra-personal world. However, other libertarians draw those boundaries differently, so that self-ownership cannot be separated from the right to control extra-personal property after all. In that case, property ownership must be subject to a fair share constraint, but that constraint does not require appropriators to pay compensation. This view, which I call right libertarianism, differs importantly from the other types primarily in its conception of the self, which I argue is independently more plausible.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)135-167
Number of pages33
JournalSocial Philosophy and Policy
Volume27
Issue number1
DOIs
StatePublished - Jan 2010
Externally publishedYes

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Philosophy
  • General Social Sciences

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Embodiment and self-ownership'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this