This article is a highly academic treatment of the evolution of forms of ownership over the past 10,000 years to its highly concentrated form of capitalism that we see in existence today. Boyd only refers rather obliquely to the violence that has been used by various group down through this period to acquire ownership over land and resources. Such violence by warlords, colonialists, etc, served to provide the foundation of the accumulation of wealth that made possible the acceleration of capitalist concentration of ownership witnessed in the 20th century and continues today.
Still, he offers a critique of capitalism by showing how its resulting concentration of wealth and power is not legitimate according to any democratic standard. By presenting this broad historical perspective, he reminds people that the current reality, and those benefiting from it, strive to obscure alternative methods of organizing an economy.
The history of alternative ownership and business models and the power struggles that lead to the current reality have been mostly forgotten, as they do not fit the current ruling discourse. Instead, the current ahistorical ideology takes the status quo as a starting point. The modern vanguard of cultural and ideological imperialism is that of neoclassical economics, and its emissaries such as the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, which treat private property with a near-religious reverence.
