Locke Vs. Locke Essays -- Empiricists, Empiricism

For many political theorists and thinkers, the ideas of labor and retention are aboriginal to the evolution of governments or states, and henceforth, very important aspects of human life. For some writers, the development of property is a direct result of labor, and government is set up to turn back the property rights of those who own property. Some view property and labor vestigially or infixedly connected aspects of human life, while others see it as but a social convention. Each thinker also has different opinions about how property is acquired, as well as what the limits to property science are. While maven writer may provide the about fair account of property, another may provide a more feasible account of property acquisition and its limits. This essay will attempt to compare and contrast the beliefs of John Locke and Karl Marx on the ideas of labor and property with their connections to the aspects of the human condition, as well as determine who holds the most feas ible or fair account of property.To begin, Locke believes that property is not a "thing", rather, it is a relationship between an individual and an item. Property is a natural condition in John Locke& angstrom8217s state of nature, meaning it was present since the beginning. "Thus labor, in the beginning, gave a right of property, wherever anyone was pleased to make use of it upon what was common, which remained a long while the far greater part, and is yet more than mankind makes use of." (Locke, 27). In order for property rights to exist, they must be recognise by other individuals through the act of alloy physical labor with nature. The most fundamental and natural forms of the property of man are "The labor of his body, and the bet of his hands&8230" (Locke, 19.) These fundamental properties, according to Locke, cannot be stripped from any man "&8230nor could without injury take from him." (Locke, 21). By mixing nature with this fundamen tal form of property, or labor, man can appropriate property to himself. "His labor hath taken it out of the hands of nature, where it was common, and belonged equally to all her children, and hath hereby appropriated it to himself" (Locke, 20). Here, Locke explains that by mixing one&8217s physical labor with, for example, an apple from a tree, one removes the apple from the common cache ... ...er, which are understood as goods or property. To Marx, property is not a natural or fundamental aspect of human existence. In a capitalist economy, property comes about through authoritative social relations between the capitalist and laborer. It is a social convention to Marx, and is not natural at all, in fact one of Marx&8217s main movements into communism abolishes all property rights. One reason Marx would like to move from our current governments into communism is because of the alienation of labor. Alienation of labor alienates the physical laborer from the object he creates. The capitalist owns the product that the laborer produces through the division of labor, and no individual worker will ever own what he creates in this system. Marx does not really delve on the evolution of property rights or property relations, he is more concerned with economic factors of production and markets. In Marx&8217s base superstructure model of a political economy, the forces of production (labor, technology) form the base of the political system. After the forces of production, come the relations of production, which are class inequality, property rights and the division of labor.