Looking to learn more here, so please be patient:
Why are these differentiated from each other by Proudhon, and why is it said that there is a right to own property but one's ownership of a toothbrush is merely a matter of fact? Could one not also say that ownership of a toothbrush is a right conferred, just as land ownership is? If not, why not?
Why is "I own this land/factory/whatever" different from "I own this toothbrush/chair/computer"?
Has to do with use. Does the capitalist, or the board of directors use the welding tools in the big factory? Do they personally use the apartments they rent out? Do they use the trucks that ship things between warehouses?
The distinction applies to use here. Things you use, such as your toothbrush, your house, your car, ect, are considered your personal property. Private property, which we seek to abolish, is the ownership of the tools you need to do your job, which results in you not having any ownership of the products you make.
No, they don't but they still make "use" of the factory nevertheless, but I don't understand why just because someone doesn't personally use something it means that they shouldn't have it, or why it means that the division between personal and private property is made along that line
the right to property ownership is descanted from the idea of land ownership as conceived by John Locke, and part of his argument was that if land and resources are left unused in nature it will spoil so it is necessary for men to lake control of the land to cultivate it for agriculture. Bourgies took that same logic and applied it to private factories, arguing that they need to manage and own the factories in order to maximize production.
But the truth is managers and property owners don't add anything to the production of goods, laborers do. So why should porky own the factory when the workers are the ones who contribute everything that makes the factory successful?
I understand this, but does that also apply to property owned by landlords that they rent out? In what way?
Maybe I'm just dumb but I can't understand why the fact that they don't do anything with it makes their ownership not legitimate, like if I had a car for 50 years without using it, it wouldn't mean that my ownership is illegitimate. I understand that it's workers using the tools and material, but ultimately it's the capitalist's materials and tools.
it just seems like an arbitrary place to draw the line to me
ownership of a luxury good isn't the same thing as owning a factory which is used to produce those goods. I think to many people here a vehicle you don't use still counts as personal property.
Land and factories play a much different role in the capitalist economy than a car does because they are used to manufacture commodities and generate surplus value, hence the distinction.
Legally yes, that's the problem. Capitalists have legal ownership of tools which is what lets them profit off other people's labor.
exactly, and that's my point, if non-use makes private property, then how come non-use of a personal item isn't also private property?
I agree, but why does the role matter to whether the right is legitimate or not? Like, what's the actual argument against private property and why doesn't it also apply to personal property?
And how can this apply to land that is rented, too? I just don't get why ownership of a toothbrush is "matter of fact" but ownership of land isn't. To me both seem to be rights, and both require justification; now you may say that private property cannot be justified, but why don't those arguments also apply to personal property?
For example one argument I heard said that property is illegitimate because it was seized violently and made into property, and because violence isn't a justification that we accept today for owning property, then that property must be unjustly owned. My response (devil's advocate) was: Does that logic also not apply to personal property?
The fact (assuming LTV) that surplus is extracted doesn't invalidate the right to private property, it just makes private property a shitty thing.
It may sound like it but I'm honestly not trying to be a sophist, just trying to understand this whole thing.
Who gets to write the laws in this world? Take a fucking guess.
I know but that wasn't my point. My point was why Proudhon differentiates private and personal property while both are the result of rights?
seems like you're looking for an if-then statement that will never actually satisfy you. extracting surplus value, via 'owning' private property, is keen to slavery (do we need to present an argument against that for you?) in that it preys on biological necessities, i.e. the need to eat food which requires capital to obtain, thus forcing individuals into labor, under someone who is profiting from their very labor, in order to survive - do you see this as a 'voluntary' and legitimate contract? if so, then you are a capitalist and further discourse will prove useless. personal property does not extract surplus value - something private property does do and which is ultimately achieved through violence either by means of actual physical force, i.e. using police to forcefully evict tenants upon the request of the landlord requiring no more justification than simply disliking the individual, or through controlling the necessities of survival
Proudhon is saying that classical ideas of property like natural law theory or Lockean theory that basically try to ground property rights metaphysically are wrong and basically contradictory to living in society. It causes strife, discord, injustice, etc. Property rights are a sort of legal fiction and imposed forcibly on people. What is actual is possession - the fact that you are using something.
The problem is that you're mixing Proudhon's theories with basically Marxist positions. Proudhon's problem is that there is an issue with just remuneration (from the early chapters of What is Prooerty). The capitalist has contributed to production, but he's using his so-called ownership rights (which Proudhon basically calls a lie) to basically pay himself for the value created by workers working together.
And so on. He goes on and on about this very subject.
Proudhon's distinction is a false one. Property is a social relation by recognition and use has nothing to do with what you can or cannot own.
If I use the lawnmower in your shed, is it mine? If I use your toilet, is it mine? If I use your pc, is it mine? No, that's a stupid criterion. You can lend me anything for my use indefinitely, it's still yours and you can demand it back whenever you please since it's yours. Why is it yours? Because society acknowledges it is yours.
What then is the case for abolishing private property, in your view?
Depends. Can you defend your claim of ownership legally? If you say that you own an iPhone, if you can't show the receipt or something similar with your credit card (or the person who bestowed it as a gift to you), then you don't own it.
For the first portion, if you don't have the deed proving ownership of the property, then you don't own it. The laws don't apply to you. In principle, all the laws are really just focused on state power to defend the laws, or might. If you show some paper saying you own the land, or the iPhone was a gift, it means fuck all if you can't defend it when the state power won't. In a blank and open system, it's all rooted in "I can enslave you and take what you lay claim to", and that's what it used to be. The remnants of that conquest is what we enjoy today. It's all no different.
All ownership is founded on violence to defend from others who say it's theirs. What's stupid is assuming that the concept of ownership is moot and attempting to abolish it. That assumes you have the might to do so, which begs the question: if you exercise might over property and do with it as you please, then it is under your ownership because the hierarchy of might is in your favor.
To add on that, the main issue with the first part is that you can't own the land because it isn't utilized in a "nice way", which, again, begs the question. So, I won't be able to purchase land and wait until the price fluctuates because I'm not living on it, so says the landless person. But the interpretation of the usage of land that is not owned by an individual/group who does not exercise might over the person who currently holds it is worthless. If they lack power, it's meaningless.
But this is wrong. Possession counts as a presumption of legal title absent proof to the contrary.
Which is why when the presumption is tested and proven to be unsubstantiated, the item is either seized by the state or returned to its rightful owner.
There is no case for abolishing private property, it is an immediate logical conclusion of the very idea of property. Why do bourgs get to claim the products of labor when they employ labor-power? Because that's the deal. It's their factory, you can't just walk in and use it as you please.
This means fuck all, though, when property is not the ultimate right and other rights trump it. Who the fuck cares if it's your factory when people are starving because you refuse to pay your workers a living wage and fired your workers for striking? Government can just claim you're overstepping your social position, take that factory, and tell you to fuck off for being a greedy bastard.
There is nothing about private property that stops us from considering it a non-absolute right when considering other rights. That current society does consider it an absolute right is telling of our dumb fucking society more than the logic of property in a rational society.
Telling me I can "own" my toothbrush, but cannot do what I want with it (trade, exchange, sell) because that's illegal is stupid. Telling me I can own my house, but cannot do what I want with it within reasonable standards is stupid. Telling me I'm free, but cannot do things like agree with people to exchange things we value differently is stupid.
Communists need to admit this completely, Marx himself hints at it strongly: you don't believe in any form of personal/private property at all. The community owns all, the community controls all, and the community decides all. The only way you have anything in this setup is simply that what you have is from such an excess that the community nor you care about what or who has it.
Basically, you got it. Property is a false concept in any form.
Realistically there would be a custom of "personal property" so that people don't step on each others' toes, and whatever allocation mechanism exists is aware of who has what particular items and isn't delivering say ten computers to the same person, and of course stealing others' stuff would have to be handled somehow. So there would be a form of "personal property", it would just take on a different character than the legal concept of property we have now.
As for exchange, absent any official market or money-form, and given a sufficient supply of goods, it would be quite futile to trade or exchange in the capitalist sense. Sure, you could set up a black market in theory and barter, but the communal production and distribution network would exchange far more stuff, and "trade" would be limited to niche areas and of little importance, or in socially prohibited goods/services (prostitution, narcotics, etc. - assuming these things are still taboo). Maybe on some small scale neighbors trade items with each other on an ad hoc basis, but there would be nothing like the massive privatized factories employing wage labor, and anyone who tried to engage in excessively capitalistic enterprises would be co-opted or shut down. More than that, people in general would not accept a capitalistic arrangement of wage-slavery given a communal alternative, so it would be hard to start making your own private factory in a field of socialism.
Managers are proles too, organization and planning is needed for any big endeavor.
Sorry do you think Proudhon, who was an anarchist and ambivalent towards markets wanted to make it illegal for you to trade and sell your possessions?