Property: Values and institutions

Property law and property theory have become a thriving industry in the legal academy rendering some exciting conceptual and normative challenges. This book covers numerous property issues to provide a liberal theory of property. It analyzes the interactions between landowners and governments (both eminent domain and regulatory takings) and those regulating the governance of property owned by multiple individuals (such as co-ownership, marital property, and the law of common interest communities). This book puts emphasis on groups and it also attempts to look at property law from a broad institutional perspective to show that property law serves as the foundation for the organization of various types of groups and communities. The three parts analyzed in this book, property, state, and community are inter-connected. The book views property as an important legal regime intended to protect important individualistic values such as autonomy, personhood, and desert, and a shield for private individuals against the power of both the state and the community. It also views property as a major instrument in the pursuit of other worthy goals of the liberal state, such as aggregate welfare, social responsibility, and distributive justice.