What Is Property? · Theme
Inequality of Wealth
How What Is Property? develops Inequality of Wealth.
Critiques how property inevitably leads to vast disparities in wealth and power, arguing that neither occupation, labor, nor talent justifies such inequality.
Where it surfaces
- § 3: Civil Law as the Foundation and Sanction of Property
Proudhon warns that property leads to disastrous exclusions, opulence, and misery, undermining equality.
- III
The chapter highlights how property based on labor still results in vast inequality and dispossession.
- Demonstration
Demonstrates how property leads to unequal exchange and waste, making production cost more than it is worth.
- Second Proposition
Property creates an unproductive class that consumes without contributing, exacerbating economic waste.
- Fourth Proposition
Shows how proprietors extract disproportionate revenue from tenants, creating perpetual inequality.
- Fifth Proposition
Wages vary widely; the lowest classes are 'stripped naked and eaten alive' by higher ones.
- Sixth Proposition
Proudhon highlights how property creates vast disparities in political power proportional to wealth.
- Seventh Proposition
The chapter highlights how property leads to luxury and poverty, with the proprietor's consumption harming society.
- Eighth Proposition
Proudhon demonstrates how property's infinite accumulation leads to extreme wealth concentration, far exceeding finite resources.
- Ninth Proposition
Proudhon demonstrates that property creates inequality of rights, where the rich can ruin the poor through competition and superior strength.
- Tenth Proposition
Proudhon asserts that property inherently demands more than labor produces, creating inequality and robbing the laborer.
- § 3
Property is identified as the definitive cause of revolutions and societal downfall due to its power of accumulation and encroachment.
- § 2 Characteristics of Communism and of Property
Contrasts property as exploitation of the weak by the strong with communism as exploitation of the strong by the weak, highlighting different forms of inequality.
- Second Memoir: A Letter to M. Blanqui
The chapter identifies three causes of social inequality: appropriation of collective wealth, unequal exchange, and profit.
