Self-ownership, also known assovereignty of the individual orindividual sovereignty, is the concept of property in one's own person, expressed as themoral or natural right of a person to havebodily integrity and be the exclusive controller of one's own body and life. Self-ownership is a central idea in severalpolitical philosophies that emphasizeindividualism, such aslibertarianism, liberalism, andanarchism.
Americanlibertarian socialistStephen Pearl Andrews frequently discussed the sovereignty of the individual in his writings. InThe Science of Society, he says that Protestantism, democracy and socialism are "three partial announcements of one generic principle" which is "the sovereignty of the individual".[1] Andrews considered the sovereignty of the individual to be "the basis of harmonious intercourse amongst equals, precisely as the equal Sovereignty of States is the basis of harmonious intercourse between nations mutually recognizing their independence of each other."[2]
Discussion of the boundary of self with respect to ownership and responsibility has been explored by legal scholar Meir Dan-Cohen in his essays onThe Value of Ownership andResponsibility and the Boundaries of the Self.[undue weight? –discuss] The emphasis of this work illuminates the phenomenology of ownership and our common usage of personal pronouns to apply to both body and property – this serves as the folk basis for legal conceptions and debates about responsibility and ownership.[3][non-primary source needed] Another view holds that labor is alienable because it can be contracted out, thus alienating it from the self. In this view, the choice of a person tovoluntarily sell oneself into slavery is also preserved by the principle of self-ownership.[4]
For anarcho-communist political philosopherL. Susan Brown: "Liberalism and anarchism are two political philosophies that are fundamentally concerned withindividual freedom yet differ from one another in very distinct ways. Anarchism shares with liberalism a commitment to individual freedom while rejecting liberalism's competitive property relations".[5] ScholarEllen Meiksins Wood says that "there are doctrines of individualism that are opposed toLockean individualism... and non-Lockean individualism may encompasssocialism".[6]
Right-libertarian conceptions of self-ownership extend the concept to include control of private property as part of the self. According toGerald Cohen, "the libertarian principle of self-ownership says that each person enjoys, over herself and her powers, full and exclusive rights of control and use, and therefore owes no service or product to anyone else that she has not contracted to supply".[7]
PhilosopherIan Shapiro says that labor markets affirm self-ownership because if self-ownership were not recognized, then people would not be allowed to sell the use of their productive capacities to others. He says that the individual sells the use of his productive capacity for a limited time and conditions but continues to own what he earns from selling the use of that capacity and the capacity itself, thereby retaining sovereignty over himself while contributing to economic efficiency.[8] A common view withinclassical liberalism is that sovereign-minded individuals usually assert a right ofprivate property external to the body, reasoning that if a person owns themselves, they own their actions, including those that create or improve resources, therefore they own their own labour and the fruits thereof.[9]
InHuman Action,Austrian School economistLudwig von Mises argues that labor markets are the rational conclusion of self-ownership and argues that collective ownership of labor ignores differing values for the labor of individuals:
Of course, people believe that there is an essential difference between the tasks incumbent upon the comrades of the socialist commonwealth and those incumbent upon slaves or serfs. The slaves and serfs, they say, toiled for the benefit of an exploiting lord. But in a socialist system, the produce of labor goes to society of which the toiler himself is a part; here the worker works for himself, as it were. What this reasoning overlooks is that the identification of the individual comrades and the totality of all comrades with the collective entity pocketing the produce of all work is merely fictitious. Whether the ends which the community's officeholders are aiming at agreeing or disagreeing with the wishes and desires of the various comrades are of minor importance. The main thing is that the individual's contribution to the collective entity's wealth is not requited in the shape of wages determined by the market.
— Ludwig von Mises[10]
Other scholars are critical of the idea of private property, specifically withinanarchism. The anarchistOscar Wilde said:
For the recognition of private property has really harmed Individualism, and obscured it, by confusing a man with what he possesses. It has led Individualism entirely astray. It has made gain, not growth its aim. So that man thought that the important thing was to have, and did not know that the important thing is to be. The true perfection of man lies, not in what man has, but in what man is... With the abolition of private property, then, we shall have true, beautiful, healthy Individualism. Nobody will waste his life in accumulating things, and the symbols for things. One will live. To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all".
— Oscar Wilde[11]
Within anarchism, the concept ofwage slavery refers to a situation perceived as quasi-voluntaryslavery,[12] where a person'slivelihood depends on wages, especially when the dependence is total and immediate.[13][14] It is anegatively connoted term used to draw an analogy between slavery andwage labor by focusing on similarities between owning andrenting a person. The term "wage slavery" has been used to criticizeeconomic exploitation andsocial stratification, with the former seen primarily as unequal bargaining power between labor and capital (particularly when workers are paid comparatively low wages, e.g. insweatshops)[15] and the latter as a lack ofworkers' self-management, fulfilling job choices and leisure in an economy.[16][17][18] With the advent of theIndustrial Revolution, thinkers such asPierre-Joseph Proudhon andKarl Marx elaborated the comparison between wage labor and slavery in the context of a critique of societal property not intended for active personal use[19][20] whileLuddites emphasized thedehumanization brought about by machines.Emma Goldman famously denounced "wage slavery" by saying: "The only difference is that you are hired slaves instead of block slaves".[21]
Withinleft-libertarianism, scholars such asHillel Steiner,[22]Peter Vallentyne,[23]Philippe Van Parijs,[24]Michael Otsuka[25] andDavid Ellerman[26][27] root an economic egalitarianism in the classical liberal concepts of self-ownership andland appropriation, combined withgeoist orphysiocratic views regarding the ownership of land andnatural resources (e.g. those ofJohn Locke andHenry George). Left-libertarians "maintain that the world's natural resources were initially unowned or belonged equally to all, and it is illegitimate for anyone to claim exclusive private ownership of these resources to the detriment of others. Such private appropriation is legitimate only if everyone can appropriate an equal amount, or if those who appropriate more are taxed to compensate those who are thereby excluded from what was once common property". This position is articulated in contrast to the position of other libertarians who argue for a right to appropriate parts of the external world based on sufficient use, even if thishomesteading yields unequal results.[28] Some left-libertarians of the Steiner–Vallentyne type support some form of income redistribution on the grounds of a claim by each individual to be entitled to an equal share of natural resources.[29][30]
John Locke wrote in hisTwo Treatises on Government that "every man has a Property in his own Person". Libertarian philosopherRobert Nozick interprets Locke as saying that the individual "has a right to decide what would become of himself and what he would do, and as having a right to reap the benefits of what he did".[31][32]Josiah Warren was the first who wrote about the "sovereignty of the individual".[33]
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