An object-based locking mechanism is disclosed in which the requesting and granting of access to data is decoupled by the use of methods to regulate the data access. In one embodiment, a client object calls a request lock method of a server object when it desires access to data regulated by the server object. When the server object decides to grant access, it calls a lock granted method of the client object. Within the scope of the lock granted method, the client object has access to the data; when the client object returns the lock granted method, access is released. An object queue to manage data access with respect to a number of client objects for a server object is also disclosed.