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• Associate Editors
• Editorial
• Bibliographical Essay: Economics and Ideology: Aspects of the Post-ricardian Literature
• I: Political Economy
• The Classical Model of Political Economy
• Modernization, Ideology, and Economic Freedom
• Individualism Vs. Collectivism?
• The Industrial Revolution and Literacy
• Parliamentary Enclosure and Uprooted Labor
• Smith's Critique of Monopoly
• Ricardo and the “dual Development”
• Ricardo On Money
• Inflation and Political Crisis: Germany
• Inflation and Unemployment
• Government and Inflation: the Mccracken Report
• II: Concepts of Liberty
• Liberty and Its Components
• Is the Right to Freedom Vacuuous?
• Liberty, Slavery, and Utilitarianism
• Individualism, Freedom, and Society
• Liberty and Habeas Corpus
• Should Britain Have a Bill of Rights?
• Locke, Women, and Freedom
• Locke, Women, Freedom, and Individualism
• Locke, Property, and Individualism
• Children, Freedom, and Individualism
• Liberty and Mental Illness
• Sismondi and Liberty
• Mill: On Liberty
• Mill, Freedom, and Happiness
• Freedom of Speech and Moral Development
• Freedom In Kant, Hegel, and Marx
• Marx, Freedom, and Property
• Neoconservatives, Liberty, and Equality
• Freedom: the Politics of Justice and Existence
• Liberty and the American Revolution
• American Libertarians
• III: Economics and Public Policy
• How Economics Influences Political Theory
• Why Democracies Choose Deficits
• Inflation and the Welfare State
• Monetarism and the Depression
• Asian Monetary History: Gold & Silver
• Specie Money Vs. Antibullionists
• Inflation Effects On Capital
• Consumption of Public Health Services
• Factory Regulation and Vested Interests
• Poverty Programs and Government
• The Costs of Regulating Market Information
• Rent Regulation
• Engels On Economics
• IV: Social Analysis
• The Depoliticization of Society
• Is Philosophy Politically Subversive?
• Plato's Republic As a Political Dystopia
• Cicero and Modern Political Philosophy
• The Roman Jurist Gaius and Social Thought
• The Myth of Social Hierarchy
• Contract and Political Thought
• Private Vs. Public: the Domain of Freedom
• Montaigne and the Value of Tolerance
• Commerce, Utility, Character, and Republicanism
• Quintin Skinner and Western Political Thought
• Public Choice
• Editorial Board
• Contents of Vol. 33 No. 2
• Contents of Vol. 33 No. 3

Locke, Property, and Individualism

Paul Marshall

• York University

“John Locke: Between God and Mammon.” Canadian Journal of Political Science 12 (March 1979): 73–96.

Locke's individualism is clarified by exploring his attitude toward work and property. C.B. Macpherson, one of Locke's most influential recent expositors, is correct to stress that Locke favored the accumulation of property. Although a possessive individualist, Locke did not favor unlimited accumulation, however, as Macpherson asserts. Neither did he believe that the poor are irrational. Another important author on Locke, John Dunn, rightly emphasizes Locke's use of the notion of a “calling.” He interprets it in an overly theological way which ignores Locke's secularization of the idea.

Critics of Macpherson have claimed that he ignores Locke's limits to property accumulation. Locke himself withdraws most of these once money has been introduced into an economy. Furthermore, Locke believed that, although natural law was still in effect once society had been instituted, people might voluntarily surrender some of their natural rights in order to promote their prosperity. Thus Macpherson is correct to point out that Locke favored accumulation. He did not believe in unlimited accumulation and in fact condemns it in his writings on education. Macpherson's claim that Locke thought the poor were necessarily irrational is also incorrect. Macpherson tends to dismiss Lock's views on religion, regarding them as having been advanced for the purpose of keeping the poor in check. In point of fact Locke devoted extensive time to his religious works and took them seriously.

John Dunn has strongly emphasized Locke's use of “calling,” According to this idea, people had a particular vocation to pursue their economic tasts as a means of advancing their salvation. Dunn tends to ignore the development of a “calling” among the Puritans and understands it in a very strict theological Way. Many of the Puritans themselves secularized the concept of “calling,” placing emphasis on the occupation being pursued more than the mental state of the laborer following the calling. Locke changed this idea even further. He tended to stress worldly success to a great extent, and relegated religion to the realm of a “general calling.” That is to say, Locke tended to distinguish sharply between religious and secular matters. In his concern with both, he can be seen as a transitional figure.