Institutional Critique as Property Defense

Sor Juana's writings—particularly her *Respuesta*—constitute a sophisticated critique of institutional power: the church's monopoly on theological interpretation, male scholars' gatekeeping of intellectual authority, and society's theft of women's potential. She demonstrated that defending property and freedom requires not only individual assertion but collective critique of the systems that concentrate power. Institutions that control knowledge, education, and voice effectively own people's capacity to understand and defend their own interests. Libertarian justice is incomplete without the practice of institutional criticism—naming how power operates, documenting how systems extract value and liberty, and refusing to accept official narratives uncritically. This concept frames critique not as destructive but as protective: questioning authority is how people learn to recognize theft, exploitation, and coercion. Sor Juana's intellectual courage modeled this for later thinkers and activists. Applying this to modern contexts means supporting people's right to investigate institutions, publish critical scholarship, and organize around shared recognition of systemic injustice—all essential to building truly free societies.