The two treatises of the person: Locke and the concept of self-ownership
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The notion of the person plays a critical role in two distinct parts of Locke’s works, but it has often been supposed that the two uses of the notion were largely unrelated. This article contends, however, that there is sufficient similarity between the treatise on personal identity that can be found in chapter 27 of the second book of Locke’s Essay Concerning Human Understanding and the chapter on property in his Second Treatise of Government to conclude that a similar theory of individuality and personality is at work in the epistemic and metaphysical perspective and in the social and political perspective. In both cases, the idea of self-ownership and the notion of appropriation turn out to be decisive, and account for the relationship between a person and her conscious thoughts as well as for the relationship between a person and material goods. Such an interpretation suggests the existence of a single and consistent concept of property in Locke’s work.
Réseaux sociaux