Conditions for the Legitimate Appropriation of Resources in Locke's Theory. Effects of the Introduction of Money on Them and on the Distribution of Property

The present work has two main objectives: on the one hand, to develop the requirements derived from the conditions that Locke provides to justify private property of resources and to present the effects that they have on the distribution of private property. Particularly, I will focus on the two conditions that ensure that private appropriation does not harm the situation of others: the sufficiency condition, which guarantees that people do not lose the opportunity to appropriate some resource, and the spoilation condition, which ensures that goods, once they are appropriated, do not be wasted in the hands of their owners. With regard to the distribution of property, it will be shown that the Lockean conditions avoid major disputes over the existing distribution of resources, because they prevent the accumulation of their property in few hands and guarantee that all people have the opportunity to appropriate some resource, so that they will not have reasons to complain about other people's appropriations. On the other hand, to show the effects of the introduction of money on these conditions and on the distribution of property that results from them, which is widely unequal, to explain Locke's strategy to justify this distribution, which is linked to the consent given by people to the introduction of money, and why it can be criticized, since it affects the liberty of some people who lose the opportunity to appropriate some resource.