Locke's labor theory of property has won attention from a staggering range of interpreters. Some analysts have hailed the labor theory of property as the greatest feat of Locke's political writings, whereas others have scorned it as egregiously misdirected and shallow. Some interpreters view the theory as the cornerstone of Locke's Two Treatises of Government, while rival interpreters discount it as largely unrelated to the Treatises' central projects. For numerous exegetes, both friendly and hostile, the labor theory functions as the core of Lockean individualism; for others, the theory serves as the underpinning of Locke's communitarianism. Many critics and supporters of Locke have found his reasoning to be solid, but some admirers and some detractors have found his reasoning to be flimsy. Praised or derided, analyzed carefully or analyzed fleetingly, construed as bearing upon a number of other topics or construed as an isolated departure, Locke's account of human productiveness has indeed been highly productive in eliciting commentary.

This latest addition to the stream of commentary diverges from all the other approaches by contending that Locke's theses are communitarian through and through because they are individualistic through and through. We shall start by looking in detail at the general and specific themes that combine to furnish the Lockean account of appropriation – themes that are often not distinguished as tidily as they should be. After discussing some ambiguous elements in Locke's account, I shall lengthily examine its principal weak spots.