Shadow Property and the Hidden Empire of Ego

This book explores the nature of liberal property in the twenty-first century. It contains three parts. The first examines how we have arrived at the liberal concept of property—what many scholars call the 'bundle of rights' metaphor of property. This part argues that the liberal conception embodied in the bundle of rights metaphor is really a way of masking or hiding what property really is: an exercise of ego about the way goods and resources are used. Or, put another way, it enshrines the ability to suit personal preferences about the way things are used, rather than what might better serve the common good. The second part provides an important modern critique of the bundle of rights metaphor—that, in addition to being a collection of rights, property is also about social relations that exist between people. Through these social relations, which are contained in law, any decision that a person makes about how to use a good or resource necessarily carries implications for others. While those effects can be both positive and negative, we are much more familiar with the latter, including most of the global challenges we face today—climate change, extreme weather, global hunger, and global poverty. Taking those global challenges as its focus, the final part of the book suggests possible futures of property in which it is reconceived in ways that reduce the potential for negative impacts on others.