Abstract

This paper evaluates Mill’s arguments favoring a society with an economy dominated by “a principle of individual property” over alternatives dominated by the common ownership of the conditions of life and wealth. Mill’s strategy for addressing the problem of property consists in conducting a comparison of competing systems of ownership (capitalism, socialism or communism) on the criterion of which best distributes wealth to the individual. Mill applies this criterion in the evaluation of these systems in light of three considerations: (1) their feasibility in a highly developed society, (2) their efficiency and likelihood of continuing improvement in comparison to competing systems, and (3) their consistency with and conduciveness to individual liberty. This paper investigates Mill’s arguments regarding the application of these and related considerations to the arguments of socialist and communist theorists with whose views he was familiar and, in varying degrees, sympathetic. As argued here, the arguments Mill employs are not, on his own terms and especially with respect to liberty, adequate to justify his general contention that given the inadequate moral and intellectual development of citizens, it is better to gamble on a private property economy than a socialist alternative.