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Essay / Classical Views on Liberalism: Locke, Rousseau, and Marx
Classical liberalism, as expressed by Locke, contains the notions of intellectual or physical freedom (i.e., the natural rights and freedoms of the man in relation to society) and economic freedom. freedom (i.e. the right to own and transmit property). Regarding the development of property rights, Locke argued from both the perspectives of Christian theology and the development of early man. Locke wrote that, in the Bible, God gave the world to the "children of men" and that all men therefore have a right to the fruits of the natural world. Locked suggested that it is intuitive that a man who consumes something from the natural world, such as the fruit of a tree or the water of a stream, becomes the owner of everything that is consumed and digested, and that the man is also the owner of his own body. and capabilities (i.e. work). Property therefore exists intuitively, and the starting point at which something becomes one's property is the moment one extracts something from the natural world; For example, when a hunter kills a deer, the carcass becomes his property. The interaction of man and the natural world, described as work or labor, thus transforms nature and creates something proprietary. Thus, combining labor and nature creates property. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why violent video games should not be banned”? Get an original essay Regarding the development of agriculture, since God gave the world to man, man has a natural right to land, and Locke held that an individual can claim as his own as much land as he can cultivate and use: "As much land as a man plows...and can use the produce thereof, so much is his property. Locke wrote that this was "in obedience to this command of God" and that, since there is much arable land on the earth, no harm is done to the rest of humanity by the appropriation of land. by one man. Since land is useless and worthless without work, the only thing that limits the amount of land an individual can claim is their ability to work on that land; we do not have this right to more land than we can cultivate. Therefore, wealth could not, in law, be accumulated. In Locke's later history, population growth and the rise of settled communities necessitated fixed boundaries and positive agreement to settle and defend property rights. The invention of money as a medium of exchange allowed for the accumulation of wealth and the expansion of personal property beyond just the amount of land and property one was able to use. With money, one would not be required, by natural law, to use up all one's spoilable harvest; instead, one could grow a surplus and sell it, and thus accumulate more property. Locke held that the value of money derived entirely from the consent of men and that this agreed method of allowing the transmission of property meant that "men accepted a disproportionate and unequal possession of the land." In other words, it is man's natural right to create inequalities, and these inequalities exist entirely because society wants them to by recognizing the value of money. In many ways, Rousseau agreed with Locke regarding the development of property rights. Both men argued from the perspective of the human condition of pre-civilized man, with Rousseau offering a pleasing view of "savage" man as self-sufficient, empathetic, and generally kind toward other men to the extent that he does not had no reason to compete or.