Property vs possession

[AnarchicSaint]

This seems to be a hot topic and I can't differentiate the two.


This question is for the Anarchists and this is one thing I can't seem to grasp completely. I understand being opposed to private property as it does, in a sense, limit others' freedom and property owned by the few and ran by the many is exploitative (correct me if I'm wrong)

Possessions are something you own, personally. But what about housing. How does this apply to one's home?

I guess I don't understand how owning a home and a small piece of land for yourself that you use is such a problem. Now owning a bunch of land/homes and using none does take away from some people, but that's different.

Can someone please explain the difference, overall, between property and possession? And is Anarchism generally opposed to all property? Is there an acception as long as it isn't exploitative and isn't being wasted or used for personal profit?

[o well this is ok I guess]

Generally speaking, land is most efficiently used when worked collectively. And that aside, owning land is silly as it is.

[Zav]

This seems to be a hot topic and I can't differentiate the two.


This question is for the Anarchists and this is one thing I can't seem to grasp completely. I understand being opposed to private property as it does, in a sense, limit others' freedom and property owned by the few and ran by the many is exploitative (correct me if I'm wrong)

Possessions are something you own, personally. But what about housing. How does this apply to one's home?

I guess I don't understand how owning a home and a small piece of land for yourself that you use is such a problem. Now owning a bunch of land/homes and using none does take away from some people, but that's different.

Can someone please explain the difference, overall, between property and possession? And is Anarchism generally opposed to all property? Is there an acception as long as it isn't exploitative and isn't being wasted or used for personal profit?
Welcome to RevLeft!
This is a fairly common question and also a very good one. Property (in a Leftist sense) is synonymous 'capital' and 'the means of production'. If something is used to make a profit from a commodity, say a laptop computer, then it is property. Everything from the copper and silicon mines, to the factories and machinery making circuit boards, to the shipping trucks are examples of property. Possessions are things which are owned for the purpose of survival and enjoyment of life, like houses, toothbrushes, clothing, and books. Some things can either be posessions or property depending on what is done with their products, such as a garden. A garden can be your possession, but when you sell the vegetables you grow, it becomes property.

So, if you have a house on some land, it isn't a problem if the house and land are used and are possessions instead of property. The size of these things doesn't really matter if they're used. If you live in a huge mansion by yourself, or have 500 acres of unoccupied land, they are not being used, and thus you would have no right to own them.

Anarchists are all opposed to property (unless you count ''Anarchist'' Capitalists). The famous Anarchist thinker Joseph Proudhon was the inventor of the phrase "Property is Theft". There are no exceptions I can think of, because all property is either wasteful or used for making profit (which is exploitation). I hope that answers your questions. :)

[Revolutionair]

Property -> means of production, in a capitalist society called capital.
Possession -> other products, in a capitalist society often called commodities.

[AnarchicSaint]

Welcome to RevLeft!
This is a fairly common question and also a very good one. Property (in a Leftist sense) is synonymous 'capital' and 'the means of production'. If something is used to make a profit from a commodity, say a laptop computer, then it is property. Everything from the copper and silicon mines, to the factories and machinery making circuit boards, to the shipping trucks are examples of property. Possessions are things which are owned for the purpose of survival and enjoyment of life, like houses, toothbrushes, clothing, and books. Some things can either be posessions or property depending on what is done with their products, such as a garden. A garden can be your possession, but when you sell the vegetables you grow, it becomes property.

So, if you have a house on some land, it isn't a problem if the house and land are used and are possessions instead of property. The size of these things doesn't really matter if they're used. If you live in a huge mansion by yourself, or have 500 acres of unoccupied land, they are not being used, and thus you would have no right to own them.

Anarchists are all opposed to property (unless you count ''Anarchist'' Capitalists). The famous Anarchist thinker Joseph Proudhon was the inventor of the phrase "Property is Theft". There are no exceptions I can think of, because all property is either wasteful or used for making profit (which is exploitation). I hope that answers your questions. :)


Very helpful. Thank you! So basically, property comes down to profit while possessions are.... well, possessions... that don't make profit. haha, little difficult working around these words.

[Zav]

Very helpful. Thank you! So basically, property comes down to profit while possessions are.... well, possessions... that don't make profit. haha, little difficult working around these words.
That's correct. Political terminology of any kind is difficult to understand at first, but you'll learn.:)

[CornetJoyce]

It's a distinction in Roman law upon which Proudhon relied heavily in his What is Property?
The classic work on Possession comes from Savigny, under whom the brothers Grimm and Karl Marx studied.

[Brosa Luxemburg]

The best example given about property and possession I have found would be the example given by the anarchist Alexander Berkman actually. Your watch is yours while the factory that made the watch controlled by the elite is property. The watch is possession and the factory is property and to abolish the property the factory must be given to the workers to control with their communities.

[Anarpest]

I think that the traditional difference was that land is a possession when the person who owns it also uses it frequently by themselves, but counts as 'property' in a bad sense when they hire slaves or others to work on it, or just collect rent from it without using it.
Property; means of production, in a capitalist society called capital. Possession; other products, in a capitalist society often called commodities. Aren't means of production also often commodities? Also, can't hammers or computers and so on be used as means of production and still be possessions?

[Revolution starts with U]

Property, it seems to me, is possession with an added exclusivity principle. Property is a specific legal form of possession with title. It takes possession from a reasonable thing to an idealized ethical absolute.