The Acquisitive Society · Question
How does The Acquisitive Society develop the theme of Property and Privilege?
Answer
The Acquisitive Society by R. H. Tawney develops Property and Privilege across the chapters the companion marks for this theme.
The text examines how property rights, especially passive ownership (e.g., rentiers, shareholders, landowners), create unearned income and privilege, functioning as a form of private taxation without corresponding social function.
The chapter critiques absolute property rights as the foundation of social organization, arguing they privilege owners without requiring service or function.
Discusses the absolute rights of property and the resistance to imposing social obligations on property tenure, including examples like factory legislation and taxation.
Discusses how property and inherited wealth create unequal opportunities, allowing some to draw dividends without performing any function, and notes that privilege returns in a new guise after the gospel of 1789.
Evidence in the book
- Rights and Functions
The chapter critiques absolute property rights as the foundation of social organization, arguing they privilege owners without requiring service or function.
- The Acquisitive Society
Discusses the absolute rights of property and the resistance to imposing social obligations on property tenure, including examples like factory legislation and taxation.
- The Nemesis of Industrialism
Discusses how property and inherited wealth create unequal opportunities, allowing some to draw dividends without performing any function, and notes that privilege returns in a new guise after the gospel of 1789.
- Property and Creative Work
The chapter distinguishes between property used for service or use (legitimate) and property for acquisition or power (illegitimate), arguing that functionless property is a parasite on creative energy.
- The Functional Society
The chapter distinguishes between property used for work and property that is merely parasitic, advocating for the abolition of the latter.
- Industry as a Profession
Critique of passive property ownership that confers authority without function, and the need to alter proprietary rights to serve the end of industry.
