Servitised property and personality: theorising servitisation through the personality theory of property

Abstract

This Article aims to elucidate servitisation through the lens of Hegel’s personality theory, which justifies property based on its role in shaping our identity. The growing prominence of servitisation enables us to interact with and derive benefits from things not only through ownership but also through contractual access. In this light, it is submitted that the personality justification offers a helpful theoretical framework to inform a clearer conception of servitisation, which in turn sheds illuminating light on its effective legal shaping and regulation. Through the lens of personality theory, I argue that long-term servitisation is functionally equivalent to formal property in promoting the actualisation of personhood, while the short-term counterpart supports the experimentation of personality. The relational nature of Hegelian property is reinforced in servitisation. Accordingly, a functional approach to property lends itself to the proper regulation of servitisation, where contracts could be employed to set out the governance framework for servitised property. Legal regulation on servitisation should play both protective and facilitative roles in the servitised economy.

Keywords

• private law
• property theory
• personality theory of property
• servitisation
• functionalism