The thesis that an analysis of property rights is essen- tial to an adequate analysis of the state is a mainstay of political philosophy. The contours of the type of gov-

tial to an adequate analysis of the state is a mainstay of political philosophy. The contours of the type of government a society has are shaped by the system regulating the property rights prevailing in that society. Views of this sort are widespread. They range from Locke to Nozick and encompass pretty much everything else in between. Defenders of this sort of view accord to property rights supreme importance. A state that does not sufficiently respect property rights is likely to be a totalitarian state, and will also be likely to fail to respect rights of other sorts. While property rights are indeed important, this traditional estimation of their importance is both too broad and also insufficiently specific. For the traditional account of the importance of property rights obscures the fact that it is just one type of property right – the right to property in land – that is of paramount importance for political affairs. The traditional account accordingly subjects this particular type of right to very little in the way of deep analysis. What distinguishes rights to landed property from rights to property of other types turns on matters both geographic and ontological. To a great extent it is precisely the geographic dimension of this special sort of property right that sets it apart from rights of other sorts. When Locke suggests that the first, original acquisition of property rights is the result of mixing one’s labor with the owned thing, he surely has in mind landed property. For it does not make much sense to talk of mixing one’s labor with a shirt or a hat. In any event, the value of applying the mixing-labor standard to hats and shirts is debatable. And similarly, when Nozick attaches so much importance to property rights that he considers them to be side-constraints to any political theory, i.e., constraints that are so basic that they are pre-theoretical and are not part of the theory itself, then it is landed property that he has in mind. Property in land is distinguished also in this. In the case of things like hats and shirts, ownership follows the age-old saw: possession is nine-tenths of the law. Your possession of a shirt constitutes a strong presumption in favor of your ownership of the shirt. The same is not true in the case of land: here possession is not a strong presumption in favor of ownership. Possessing a thing like a hat or a shirt is a rather straightforward affair: the person wearing the hat or shirt possesses the shirt or the hat. But what possession is in the case of land is not so clear; indeed it is not even clear whether land can be possessed at all. In his thorough and far-reaching study of property rights, Richard Pipes discusses the etymology of ‘possession’ and cognate terms. He tells us: