scholarly journals Liberty, Equality, and the Boundaries of Ownership: Thomas Paine's Theory of Property Rights

2010 ◽  
Vol 72 (3) ◽  
pp. 483-511 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Lamb

AbstractThomas Paine is customarily regarded as a pamphleteer, rhetorician, and polemicist rather than a significant political theorist. This article takes the philosophical content of Paine's thought seriously and argues that his account of property rights constitutes a distinct contribution to theoretical debates on the subject. Drawing on Paine's Agrarian Justice and other writings, this article shows that his theory of property defends a libertarian concern with private ownership that contains within its logic an egalitarian commitment to the redistribution of resources. Paine's justification of property is distinct from that of various other important figures in the history of ideas (including Grotius, Pufendorf, and Locke) and represents his simultaneous commitment to foundational liberal values of individual freedom and moral equality.

2014 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 59-101 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daphna Hacker

Abstract This article suggests enacting an accession tax instead of the estate duty – which was repealed in Israel in 1981. This suggestion evolves from historical and normative explorations of the tension between perceptions of familial intergenerational property rights and justifications for the “death tax,” as termed by its opponents, i.e., estate and inheritance tax. First, the Article explores this tension as expressed in the history of the Israeli Estate Duty Law. This chronological survey reveals a move from the State’s taken-for-granted interest in revenue justifying the Law’s enactment in 1949; moving on to the “needy widow” and “poor orphan” in whose name the tax was attacked during the years 1959–1964, continuing to the abolition of the tax in 1981 in the name of efficiency and the right of the testator to transfer his wealth to his family, and finally cumulating with the targeting of tycoon dynasties that characterizes the recent calls for reintroducing the tax. Next, based on the rich literature on the subject, the Article maps the arguments for and against intergenerational wealth transfer taxation, placing the Israeli case in larger philosophical, political, and pragmatic contexts. Lastly, it associates the ideas of accession tax and “social inheritance” with inspirational sources for rethinking a realistic wealth transfer taxation to bridge the gap between notions of intergenerational familial rights and intergenerational social justice.


2021 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
pp. 9-47
Author(s):  
Maria Neklyudova

In his Bibliotheca historica, Diodorus Siculus described a peculiar Egyptian custom of judging all the dead (including the pharaohs) before their burial. The Greek historian saw it as a guarantee of Egypt’s prosperity, since the fear of being deprived of the right to burial served as a moral imperative. This story of an Egyptian custom fascinated the early modern authors, from lawyers to novelists, who often retold it in their own manner. Their interpretations varied depending on the political context: from the traditional “lesson to sovereigns” to a reassessment of the role of the subject and the duties of the orator. This article traces several intellectual trajectories that show the use and misuse of this Egyptian custom from Montaigne to Bossuet and then to Rousseau—and finally its adaptation by Pushkin and Vyazemsky, who most likely became acquainted with it through the mediation of French literature. The article was written in the framework (and with the generous support) of the RANEPA (ШАГИ РАНХиГС) state assignment research program. KEYWORDS: 16th to 19th-Century European and Russian Literature, Diodorus Siculus (1st century BC), Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712—1778), Alexander Pushkin (1799—1837), Prince Pyotr Vyazemsky (1792—1878), Egyptian Сourt, Locus communis, Political Rhetoric, Literary Criticism, Pantheonization, History of Ideas.


ELT Journal ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 74 (1) ◽  
pp. 20-28 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert J Lowe ◽  
Richard Smith

Abstract The concept of English as a lingua franca (ELF) is the subject of much theoretical discussion and debate within ELT. However, little has been written concerning the history of ideas preceding it. This article discusses the concept of ‘neutral English’ proposed in 1967 by the writer L. A. Hill. After summarizing Hill’s life and work, the article explores his idea for neutral English, noting its apparent similarities to modern ELF theory as well as the historical and contextual factors that distinguish it. Using Hill’s work and stated motivations as a lens through which to view modern theory, the article highlights the possibility that apparently radical ideas can be co-opted to ‘centre’ interests in modern global ELT. Finally, it is proposed that more work into the history of conceptualizations of international English use would shed further light on the academic and political forces which intersect with this area of research.


2021 ◽  
Vol 43 (2) ◽  
pp. 57-72
Author(s):  
Anna Citkowska-Kimla

The aim of the article is to develop a research tool for a historian of ideas in the form of an autobiography. It is about framing when a personal document meets the criteria of being a tool for a historian of political thought. The conclusions included the thought that the memories must be meta-considerations on the subject of written autobiography or an analysis of the problem of auto-biography within the framework of the created philosophy or history vision. Examples representing this narrative type were left by, among others, Johann Gottfried Herder, Johann Wolfgang Goethe, Thomas Carlyle, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Friedrich Nietzsche, Benedetto Croce, Robin G. Collingwood, and in Poland Stanisław Brzozowski. The volume of Richard Pipes’ memoirs, Memoirs of a Non-belonger, which is the foundation for the analysis, has also become part of the trend. The most important thinkers who have studied the issue of autobiography in depth include Wilhelm Dilthey and Georg Misch. The conclusions of the analysis are as follows: autobiography has a philosophical and epistemological meaning in the field of knowledge about human nature. In this sense, autobiography becomes part of anthropology, while anthropology is the foundation for the history of ideas, including political thought.


2016 ◽  
Vol 21 ◽  
pp. 89-101
Author(s):  
Karina Alanís Flores

In this paper we use the discourse analysis as theoretical framework to discuss the renowned Octavio Paz’s essay, The labyrinth of solitude. Although there are many studies that have been made about this theme which are mainly based on the history of ideas and the philosophy of the culture, in this case we propose a different perspective which focuses on the linguistic features that are used to construct the subject of enunciation in the literary essay. We consider Émile Benveniste’s concepts of his theory of enunciative operations in order to reveal the different positions that the author takes in the text, as well as how he constructs his reader.


2020 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 155-166
Author(s):  
Wolfgang Seibel

Abstract This article addresses a classic problem of public administration, which is the quest for institutional integrity in the presence of bureaucratic autonomy. It does so in combination with a history of ideas account of the subject with a case study of derailed autonomy at the expense of institutional integrity It does so in combination with a history of ideas account of the subject with a case study of derailed autonomy at the expense of institutional integrity with particularly serious consequences in the form of human casualties. Referring to literature on public values and moral hazard under the condition of bureaucratic discretion, the article argues that harmonizing bureaucratic autonomy and institutional integrity requires commitment to public values that prioritize the protection of basic individual rights over temptations of pragmatic decision making. It is, therefore, a plea for linking traditional lines of thoughts on public administration with a more fine-grained assessment of the ambivalence of governmental agencies as both guardians of, and a menace to, rule-of-law-based protection of civic values.


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandra Wirth

The political scientist and historian Peter Graf Kielmannsegg has dedicated his academic career to analysing the liberal constitutional state, its roots and the manifold challenges it poses. By examining his writings in both a biographical and contemporary context, this study is the first to address an exceptional representative of the third generation of political scientists. Based on the question ‘What is his academic work rooted in and what reception has it received?’, this biography of Kielmannsegg’s work from the beginning of his career in the 1960s to the present provides an overview of the subject areas it covers, including its trends and changes of direction, and of his understanding of an appropriate form of political science. Kielmannsegg’s advocatory thinking revolves around a representative form of democracy and its fascinating identity and stability. Basing his approach on the history of ideas and aligning it with democratic theory, he addresses current debates and, as the ‘thinking teacher of democracy’, explains complex interrelationships.


Author(s):  
Menachem Kellner

This is a book on history of ideas which traces the development of creed formation in Judaism from its inception with Moses Maimonides (1138–1204) to the beginning of the sixteenth century when systematic attention to the problem disappeared from the agenda of Jewish intellectuals. The dogmatic systems of Maimonides, Duran, Crescas, Albo, Bibago, Abravanel, and a dozen lesser-known figures are described, analysed, and compared. Relevant texts are presented in English translation. For the most part these are texts which have never been critically edited and translated before. Among the theses defended in the book are the following: that systematic attention to dogma qua dogma was a new feature in Jewish theology introduced by Maimonides (for reasons examined at length in the book); that the subject languished for the two centuries after Maimonides’ death until it was revived in fifteenth-century Spain in response to Christian attacks on Judaism; that the differing systems of dogma offered by medieval Jewish thinkers reflect not different conceptions of what Judaism is, but different conceptions of what a principle of Judaism is; and that the very project of creed formation reflects an essentially Greek as opposed to a biblical/rabbinic view of the nature of religious faith and that this accounts for much of the resistance which Maimonides’ innovation aroused.


2021 ◽  
Vol 100 (3) ◽  
pp. 322-377
Author(s):  
Giovanni Maria Martini

Abstract Although the science of the occult properties of the Qurʾān (ʿilm ḫawāṣṣ al-Qurʾān) has been regarded by Muslim intellectuals as an independent discipline within the classification of the sciences and has generated an independent literary genre over the centuries, it has never been the subject of a specific survey within Islamic Studies. Often wrongly considered simply as a component of related disciplines, the most important texts belonging to this genre remain understudied and are not critically edited. Many reasons suggest that the study of the genesis of this concept, of the homonymous discipline and of its literary corpus represent an important desideratum for the history of magic and of the occult sciences in Islam. Based on philological examination of numerous primary sources, this article aims to situate the science of the occult properties of the Qurʾān and its literature within the History of ideas in the Muslim world.


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