Self-Ownership, Freedom, and Equality (Studies in Marxism and Social Theory)

Self-Ownership, Freedom, and Equality (Studies in Marxism and Social Theory)

by G . A . Cohen (Author)

Synopsis

In this book G. A. Cohen examines the libertarian principle of self-ownership, which says that each person belongs to himself and therefore owes no service or product to anyone else. This principle is used to defend capitalist inequality, which is said to reflect each person's freedom to do as as he wishes with himself. The author argues that self-ownership cannot deliver the freedom it promises to secure, thereby undermining the idea that lovers of freedom should embrace capitalism and the inequality that comes with it. He goes on to show that the standard Marxist condemnation of exploitation implies an endorsement of self-ownership, since, in the Marxist conception, the employer steals from the worker what should belong to her, because she produced it. Thereby a deeply inegalitarian notion has penetrated what is in aspiration an egalitarian theory. Purging that notion from socialist thought, he argues, enables construction of a more consistent egalitarianism.

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More Information

Format: Paperback
Pages: 288
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 15 Sep 2010

ISBN 10: 0521477514
ISBN 13: 9780521477512

Media Reviews
' ... Cohen brings formidable analytical and forensic skills, and the book is an outstanding example of the intellectual gains to be won by clear and rigorous thinking about questions that are usually blanketed by idealogical fog.' David Miller, London Review of Books
' ... his book stands out among the many studies of electorial history ...'. Anarchist Studies
...provides an extended and masterful examination of the relationships between the concepts of self-ownership, freedom, and equality. Nancy Holmstrom, The Philosophical Review
Cohen's book is crammed with intricate, interesting, and often ingenious arguments. Jan Narveson, The Journal of Ethics