Owning the earth by Andro Linklater

Barely two centuries ago, most of the world's productive land was owned either communally or by the monarchy or the Church. But that pattern was consigned to history as a result of the most creative, and destructive, cultural force in the modern era: the idea of individual land ownership. 

Through the eyes of the remarkable individuals who were integral in this change, from Chinese emperors to German peasants, Andro Linklater presents the evolution of land ownership and offers a radically new view of mankind's place on the planet.