Review
Property Outlaws is a great and deep read on how the violation of property rights -- from trespassing to sit-ins to copyright infringement -- have been critical to the evolution of "the law of ownership." --Cory Doctorow, BoingBoing
Written by two legal scholars, one an expert in real property law, the other in IP law, the book is a thoughtful rebuttal to the notion that property is absolute and trespassers are always "thieves." --Fred von Lohmann, EFF
"This book offers an excellent examination of this tension (between property and property law) and chronicles the past acts of disobedience that have led to improvements in the realm of property law as we now know it."--Marie Templo Capule, Law Library Journal
(Marie Templo Capule
Law Library Journal )
From the Back Cover
Property Outlaws offers a sparkling account of the ways in which lawbreaking can both strengthen and reshape the law. Peñalver and Katyal remind us that virtue can be found both in provocation and enforcement -- and that a society wins when neither has carte blanche.
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Jonathan Zittrain, Professor of Law, Harvard Law School, and Co-Founder, Berkman Center for Internet & SocietyA powerful thesis, gracefully articulated.
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Tim Wu, Columbia Law School We have needed this book for a long time. For the first time, two legal scholars have woven the history of civil disobedience with the development of property law in both tangible and intangible forms. This book will be essential to understanding the complex relationship between norms and laws, and the ways that media events influence both. It's written in a lively and accessible manner. My students will benefit greatly from it.
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Siva Vaidhyanathan, The University of VirginiaFrom the illegal occupation of tribal and federal lands by white squatters to the Indian occupation of Alcatraz Island, from the lunch counter sit-ins to the online posting of a major civil rights film without consent of the filmmaker, Peñalver and Katyal show how those excluded from property have shaped property law and ultimately social life by intentionally infringing on the rights of owners. A major achievement.
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Joseph William Singer, Bussey Professor of Law, Harvard Law School Eduardo Peñalver and Sonia Katyal offer a challenging and insightful account of disobedience and boundary-skirting in property law. Linking real and intellectual property law, Property Outlaws shows how such resistance can and should affect our concepts of law, as well as justice.
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Rebecca Tushnet, Georgetown Law School
