Raoul Vaneigem Quotes

Exclusive property is a theft in nature.

Law hath dominion over all things, over universal mind and matter ;, For there are reciprocities of rights, which no creature can gainsay.

Property does not exist because there are laws, but laws exist because there is property.

A man's 'original and natural right' to make all contracts that are 'intrinsically obligatory,' and to coerce the fulfillment of them, is one of the most valuable and indispensable of all human possessions.

Minorities within nation-states frayed by global capitalism are naturally more resentful of hollowed-out but still heavily centralised systems of political and economic domination.

... to teach the necessity of respect for the rights of persons and property as fundamental to every form of government...to teach the duty of government, to encourage and protect individual and group initiative and enterprise, to foster the right to work, earn, save and acquire property, and to preserve the ownership and lawful use of property when acquired.

Every man holds his property subject to the general right of the community to regulate its use to whatever degree the public welfare may require it.

The real issue…is the eternal struggle between…right and wrong; the common right of humanity set against the divine right of kings…

The right to private property is inconceivable without responsibilities to the common good.

No man has a natural right to commit aggression on the equal rights of another.

Political power, properly so called, is merely the organized power of one class for suppressing another.

All oppressing classes of every description need two social functions to safeguard their domination: the function of a hangman and the function of a priest. The hangman is to quell the protest ... the priest reconciles them to class domination, weans them away from revolutionary actions.

Certain forms of property must be reserved to the state, since they carry with them an opportunity of domination too great to be left to private individuals without injury to the community at large.

Government has no other end but the preservation of property.

The great and chief end, therefore, of men uniting into commonwealths, and putting themselves under government, is the preservation of their property

The right of private ownership of goods, including productive goods, has permanent validity. It is part of the natural order.

Every man has a right by nature to possess property as his own.

The right to private property is valid, but all private property is under a "social mortgage.

Inasmuch as great wealth is an instrument which is uniformly used to extort from others their property, it ought to be taken away from its possessor, on the same principle that a sword or a pistol may be wrested from a robber, who shall undertake to accomplish the same effect in a different manner.

Private property is a creature of society, and is subject to the calls of that society, wherever its necessities shall require it…

Huge inequality gaps in a democratic society will tend to erode the respect for and security of doctrines of private property. The large majority must either own property or have reasonable prospects of attaining property if they are to support and maintain private property laws and traditions.

I know of no mission which this Government has to perform except to protect the citizen in his life, his liberty, and his property. When it fails in these great essentials, it has failed in everything ... and whenever the Government fails ... it ought to be abolished

… since the right of possessing goods privately has been conferred not by man's law, but by nature, public authority cannot abolish it, but can only control its exercise and bring it into conformity with the common weal

Civil government, so far as it is instituted for the security of property, is in reality instituted for the defense of the rich against the poor, or of those who have some property against those who have none at all.

It is not true that equality is a law of nature. Nature has made nothing equal; her sovereign law is subordination and dependence.