ABSTRACT
In Chapter 2 I outlined aspects of the cultural symbolism of property which operate in the various social spheres of the contemporary liberal West: spheres such as law, politics, identity-formation, and sexual identity. As I explained, property and its associated concepts of propriety and the proper are immensely powerful normative symbols for a way of life. In contrast, this and the next chapter present more conventional dimensions of the property-concept, that is, its history and theory. These three issues – meanings, history, and theory – can be seen as three sides of a triangular cultural matrix of property: each in a sense has its own sphere and its own logic, but each element is constitutive of and dependent upon the others. For instance, it is possible to isolate property as a symbol or metaphor for a variety of human interactions. But as I hope to show in this chapter, it is ultimately impossible to disentangle this symbolism from historical developments such as feudalism, colonialism, the abolition of slavery and the married women’s property enactments. In the next chapter, which outlines the more abstract side of property, it will also become evident that history and symbolism co-exist with some rather momentous theoretical interventions such as Locke’s ‘labour’ justification of property which both
named and strengthened the logic of colonial expansion (Locke 1988: 285-6).
