George Monbiot: Private Sufficiency, Public Luxury

In October 2020 George Monbiot delivered the 40th E.F. Schumacher lecture, on the topic

Private Sufficiency, Public Luxury: Land is the key to the transformation of society.

Tracing the concept of property rights to seventeenth-century Philosopher John Locke, Monbiot wonders why it is possible to own land, and why it is so near-universally accepted that it is possible and reasonable for individuals and corporations to use their unequal wealth to acquire the exclusive right to the use of vast amounts of land and other property, and deny access to all others.  He evokes the alternative lost and nearly-forgotten concept of the commons,  and suggests that we should use control over the land - 'the ground on which we stand . . . as a basis for the wider democratization of society, the wider protection of our living planet, the wider sharing of the prosperity of our living planet and its natural wealth, not just within generations but between generations'.

It's quite a long read, but well worth while.

Read the lecture transcript