John Locke And Karl Marx On Private Property

The action of trade is so heavily integrated into today’s modern society that it is hard to believe a time where trade did not exist. In can be found in the preliminary stages of North American culture where natives would trade with one another before the creation of currency, to a more modern level where society trades their labour to create a product or service in exchange for a wage. The discussion on private property is one covered by many different scholars throughout the years; this essay will focus primarily on the workings of John Locke and Karl Marx. Both being raised in a different time thus different upbringings has resulted in a difference in their train of thought and philosophical approaches on life. Karl Marx has been forced to endure the after math of the Industrial Revolution, where fewer people were needed to work on lands and factories/machines took over what was once human labor. John Locke; otherwise known as the father of classical liberalism, on the other hand came in a much different area although not far off from Marx, a time before the industry evolution.
By delving deeper into the philosophical understandings surrounding private property for both Karl Marx, who holds a communist approach, and John Locke, holding a more capitalist approach; an analysis of the similarities they share along with the differences will be conducted by analyzing common property, private property in regards to the government/state, and societal structure surrounding