Property Law in the Society of Equals

Property is often seen as fundamentally inegalitarian, leading many to believe that a world without property would be a more equal one. Property Law in the Society of Equals challenges this view, demonstrating instead that property is essential for a society of equals. Property, as the legal realization of the idea of yours and mine, creates the conditions for us to relate to each other on equal terms. This conception of property allows for an examination of many of its core doctrines, including trespass and nuisance law, the law of acquisition, possession, and transfer, the law of leases, and the law of servitudes. It also reveals the distinctive place of property within private law more generally, and how to think about novel or controversial cases of property rights. Moreover, the idea that property is fundamentally egalitarian generates a radical critique of our present systems of property. It shows that various forms of public law regulation of property - including the right to housing and public housing itself - are justified by the same principles that underlie the need for property in the first place. Property Law in the Society of Equals offers a thorough and insightful account of a fundamental legal subject matter, and a compelling call for the reform of property on more egalitarian lines. "Property Law in the Society of Equals is an account of the property law and its justificatory foundations. It begins with the common worry that property is an inegalitarian institution and shows that, contrary to the worry, property is actually an essential constituent of a society of equals. Property law is the solution to the Problem of Yours and Mine, a moral problem about the impossibility of our relating to one another on terms of equality absent an institution that allows us to have things as our own. This understanding of property not only shows why property is required for us to have equal relations, it also provides a distinctive perspective on the ways in which our current institutions of property are defective from their own internal point of view and require radical reform. The book uses this abstract account to explain contemporary property law. The book explains private law doctrines including trespass, licence, nuisance, acquisition, transfer, tenancy, the law of servitudes; it also illuminates the boundaries between property rights and personal rights and between property rights and contract rights, and explores various liminal cases of property through that lens. In addition, the book critiques property internally, showing how property's justification requires a state to provide homes to all of its subjects and showing how other parts of the public law of property, including various forms of land use regulation, should be understood as part of the law of property rather than external limitations on it"-- Cover Series Property Law in the Society of Equals Copyright Dedication Contents Acknowledgments Introduction PART I THE THEORY 1. The Problem of Yours and Mine 1.1 Setup 1.2 The Basic Commitment 1.3 A World without Yours and Mine 1.4 Using Things as Equals 1.5 The Problem of Yours and Mine 2. The Law of Yours and Mine 2.1 Relating through the Idea of Yours and Mine 2.2 Property Is the Realization of the Idea 2.3 Only Property Is the Realization of the Idea 3. The Community of Yours and Mine 3.1 Illusory Equality and Structural Subordination 3.2 Different Worries about Inequality 3.3 Toward the Ideal: Institutional Choice and Public Law PART II THE PRIVATE LAW OF PROPERTY 4. The Common Law of Property 4.1 Trespass and Licences 4.2 Boundaries and Nuisance 4.3 Acquisition and Possession 4.4 Alienation 4.5 Shared Ownership 4.6 Tenancy 4.7 Servitudes 5. Property within Private Law 5.1 Me and Mine 5.2 Bodies and Their Parts 5.3 In Rem and In Personam 5.4 The Res 5.5 Property and Market Relations 5.6 Some Considerations about Property in Information 5.7 Intangible Wrongs 5.8 In Rem Protection PART III THE PUBLIC LAW OF PROPERTY 6. Property and Regulation 6.1 From Private Law to Public Law 6.2 Thinking about Homelessness 6.3 State Provision 6.4 An Adequate Home 6.5 Housing Rights and Regulation 7. Public Property 7.1 An Idea of Everyone’s 7.2 Public Property as Public Law 7.3 Using Public (and Quasi-​Public) Property 7.4 Public or Private Conclusion Appendix: An Inescapable Feature of the Social World Index