What Hegel and Marx Can Teach Us About Today’s Housing Crisis
Researchers from HSE University examined how the housing crisis in European countries is affecting young people’s perceptions of home ownership, freedom, and the future. As access to home ownership becomes more difficult, young people increasingly seek opportunities for self-realisation and recognition in digital environments, including game worlds and metaverses. The article has been published in Philosophies.
Human capital—including knowledge, skills, education, health, and professional training—enables people to work more productively, develop new technologies, and contribute to economic growth. But in today’s world, another question is becoming increasingly pressing: what happens when people acquire knowledge, develop their abilities, and accumulate experience, yet are unable to establish a secure foothold in material life?
To answer this question, researchers Vladislav Zhdanov from HSE University and Ksenia Antrushina from the RANEPA Institute for Social Sciences turned to the philosophies of Hegel and Marx. The paper centres on two key concepts: Hegel’s concept of Eigentum, which translates from German as ‘property,’ and Marx’s concept of Eigenschaftslosigkeit, a state of dispossession. In the Hegelian tradition, ownership is not merely a matter of possessing an object or having the right to dispose of an asset. Rather, it is a way for individuals to express themselves in the outside world and experience freedom as part of their lived reality. From this perspective, property becomes an extension of the individual—a space where they can feel ‘at home,’ shape their everyday lives, make plans, and build relationships with society. Eigenschaftslosigkeit represents the reverse of this connection: when access to property is blocked, individuals are deprived not only of a material foundation but also of the opportunity to fully realise their qualities, efforts, and life plans in the real world.
This logic offers a broader view on the theory of human capital. While knowledge, education, and competencies remain essential, individuals also need conditions that allow these resources to translate into genuine autonomy. According to the authors, one of the key conditions is access to property, particularly housing.
Vladislav Zhdanov
'Lack of access to homeownership is not merely a matter of prices, incomes, and mortgages. It shapes young people’s perceptions of the future, freedom, and self-realisation, and therefore requires a broader conceptual framework than the one commonly used in economics,' says Vladislav Zhdanov, co-author of the article and Professor at the HSE School of Philosophy and Cultural Studies.
In their study, the authors drew on data on homeownership in Germany and the United Kingdom. In Germany, the share of households headed by people under 45 who own their homes fell from 30% in 2006 to 23% in 2023.
In the UK, the rate declined from 55% in 1997 to 34% in 2023. The authors attribute this trend to rising house prices, tighter mortgage lending, and reduced provision of social housing.
According to the authors, the housing crisis is changing the role that property plays in the lives of younger generations. For many, homeownership is no longer an expected milestone of adulthood but an increasingly inaccessible resource. In these circumstances, spaces where individuals can experience recognition, status, and a sense of achievement in other ways are gaining importance.
Thus, young people are increasingly turning to the metaverse as a space for self-realisation. The term generally refers to a range of digital environments—from online games and social media platforms to virtual worlds with their own economies—where people can create avatars, interact with others, and own digital assets.
As access to material property becomes limited, digital spaces may emerge as one of the areas where people seek a sense of achievement, recognition, and control. The authors view the metaverse as a research framework for understanding the growing importance of digital forms of self-realisation.
According to the authors, this situation represents a particular form of the Marxian concept of Eigenschaftslosigkeit, meaning the divestment of essential human attributes. Individuals are deprived of property in the physical world while acquiring simulated forms of property in digital spaces. This shift is not merely a cultural preference but a structural response to the foreclosure of Hegel’s promise that property should serve as a universal medium of freedom.
The researchers suggest that Marx’s theory of alienation can be reinterpreted in the context of today’s digital world.
'In the 19th century, Marx wrote about religion as a way of compensating for suffering and lack of freedom. Today, digital forms of ownership can play a similar role—for example, virtual property, status, objects, or spaces that individuals can acquire in a game or metaverse but not in real life,' explains Prof. Zhdanov.
This theoretical framework also offers a fresh perspective on Hegel’s concept of recognition. If property is one of the primary ways in which people experience freedom and realise their will in the world, then the inability to own material assets is not merely an economic problem; it also affects how people perceive themselves, their capabilities, and their place in society. The digital environment can offer a substitute for this experience, but the substitute remains incomplete: virtual property cannot provide the same sense of recognition and freedom as property in the real world.
'The current situation differs from the one described by Marx. In the 19th century, being deprived of property could provide a basis for collective action and political struggle. Today, people denied access to property often find themselves in a more isolated position. They may not associate their situation with that of a broader social group or see it as a reason for collective political action. Instead, young people are increasingly seeking individual outlets—for example, turning to digital spaces where they can experience a sense of ownership without changing the conditions that make real property inaccessible,' concludes Prof. Zhdanov.
The authors argue that restoring access to Eigentum may be important not only for economic efficiency but also for people’s full participation in public life. Possible solutions include improving housing affordability, reforming property markets, and developing alternative models of homeownership or housing use.
