Private Land Ownership: Tax or Socialize?

ABSTRACT This study compares the land reform concepts of Henry George and Silvio Gesell, both of whom rejected private appropriation of land rent as unjust. While George proposed to “hollow out” private land ownership through a comprehensive land value tax, Gesell aimed at full socialization of land combined with lease auctions and compensation of former owners through interest‐bearing government bonds, embedded within his “free money” system. Gesell's approach represents a radical systemic reform requiring public ownership and involving high administrative costs, whereas George's model is incremental and tax‐based but faces unresolved valuation and constitutional problems. The article highlights practical obstacles to both approaches, such as administrative complexity, auction distortions, and the integration of property taxation into multi‐level fiscal systems. It also discusses the further development of the approaches, including conceptual tenders and self‐assessment of land values. Ultimately, it concludes that a forward‐looking land regime should combine elements of both thinkers—Gesell's socialization principles for high‐value urban land and George's land value taxation for peripheral areas—while re‐examining the doctrinal foundations of property law to achieve a just, sustainable, and institutionally coherent land order.