Utopia

5 Pages 1316 Words

Thomas More’s
Utopia
A Look at Social and Economic Problems

Deep within every society there lies problems, significant and insignificant. Thomas More’s Utopia emphasizes the construction of the Utopian society upon the principle that “nobody owns anything, but everyone is rich”.1 With this basis, Utopian society not only succeeded, but become fruitful. Thomas More’s Utopia shows an ideal society, close to perfection in almost every way. Thomas More’s Utopia is divided into two distinct books; book one describes the ills facing many European nations and its peoples, while book two describes the Utopian way of life. Embedded within book two are the solutions to economic and social problems that are outlined in book one.
Identified in book one of Thomas More’s Utopia are many different economic tribulations, which are remedied in book two. In addition, More shows problems involving land and employment in book one, which in book two are solved in his depiction of the Utopian society. Beyond Utopia, kings, nobles, churches, and men of wealth primarily hold land. The need for more and more land is the primary motivation for most of these individuals. The land is usually used for cultivation or for grazing; Nobles sometimes bullied poorer groups to get the land they seek. This group of individuals greedily “preys on his native land like a malignant growth”. 2 People are either “cheated or bullied into giving up their property, or systematically ill-treated until they’re finally forced to sell”. 3 Unfortunately these men, whom seek land and other luxuries, “hang on to their property until they’re too old and ill to do so any longer - and even then they relinquish it with a very ill grace”. 4 In Utopian society (book two), the land is owned by the state “as there’s no such thing as private property”. 5 Thus, Utopians do not fret about meaningless excesses of land, instead trying to improve themselves t...