Why talk about liberty?

If I ask a stranger what is liberty, I can guarantee he’d tell me it's freedom. If I ask him to describe it, he may enlist all the fundamental rights related to freedom beginning his list with ‘the freedom of speech and expression.

Freedom at the outset seems to be a term too easy to discuss but the entire politics revolves around this power dynamic where a concept like liberty has gathered so many diverse opinions, especially on how much freedom should an individual get and under what conditions. Well, I will be more than happy to share the views of scholars in detail but this preliminary article will tackle only broad streams of liberty.

Live and Let Live: Nature of Liberty

Freedom as a quality of human beings- We human beings have considered ourselves to be the best creation on earth. Human beings a superior to all other living creatures. Taming animals and nature to serve our needs and make life easy.

But, let us put the arrogance aside, and consider the fact that the human brain is the most developed. While all species live according to nature in the same way they have been living for generations, we human beings are gifted with rationality. We are empowered with imagination to invent and innovate. Thus, our ability to gain knowledge of science is the source of our freedom.

Freedom as the condition of Human Beings- Man is a rational creature and therefore needs freedom to exercise his mental faculties. Imagine you love painting and then you are forbidden to paint for the rest of your life. How would you feel? You need the freedom to be the person you want and do the things you want.

If you were to fall sick, you’d feel restricted to carry on with your routine life. You would not be able to do anything strenuous. You would want freedom from sickness.

Thus, liberty means ‘freedom from restraints' about freedom from both internal as well as external constraints so that man can live and achieve the best possible version of himself.

Liberty and Authority: Wider Freedom versus Tighter Authority

Man is a social animal. He prefers to be a part of society. As much as he needs society for security and emotional needs, a society many times may put restrictions on the individual. Women all over the world have been subject to oppression since olden days. They were forbidden to get an education and have a career. The state comes into the equation of the individual and society as a regulative agent. It exerts authority to do positive actions like empowering women and oppressed classes.

Now, the question arises of how much authority is to rest with State. The majority of our Fundamental Rights are undermined during emergencies. State in the name of public order imposes laws and takes actions. It arrests and punishes the offenders.

Thinkers like Hobbes believe in absolute authority, but absolute authority crushes individual liberty. On the other hand, we give all the liberty an individual can imagine, there’s a risk of such lawlessness and anarchy that liberty will degenerate into license.

Limited Liberty is Actual Liberty-

“ Liberty to one is liberty to none and absolute liberty to all is no liberty at all.”

Ernest Barker says that liberty within the state implies ‘relative’ and ‘regulated’ liberty. It is relative because citizen is given similar rights and freedom. If you have the right to give your opinion so is the other. It is regulated because absolute liberty is no liberty. If every individual gets the liberty to do anything, everyone’s liberty will be violated. For example, in the case of absolute liberty, murder can be justified as a killer’s right to harm someone he doesn’t like but then the victim’s right to life ends right there.

Positive liberty and Negative Liberty

In 1941 President Roosevelt met Prime Minister Winston Churchill to discuss the principles that would design the postwar world.

Realizing the importance of freedom, the ‘Atlantic Charter' stated four freedoms:-

1. Freedom of Speech
2. Freedom of worship
3. Freedom from fear
4. Freedom from want

It is interesting to note that the aforementioned freedoms could be categorized into two types based on the aim of public policy.

Negative Liberty- The first category of liberty comprises freedom of speech, freedom of worship, and likewise. To enable such freedoms to the individual, the state should keep away. They imply that the state is not to interfere with an individual’s free speech, worship, and his private life. Such, liberty is negative liberty because it signifies the negative role of the State.

Positive Liberty- The second type of freedom includes freedom from fear and want. Freedom from exploitation and freedom to adequate means of life also falls into this type. To make sure that individuals experience such freedom, the state plays a positive role by making laws and implementing them. All welfare schemes are aimed at removing impediments from an individual’s life so that he can live freely. Such liberty is called positive liberty.

Various Streams of Liberty:-

Libertarian View

Berlin believes that negative liberty is the only responsibility of the state. Negative liberty within the state can be termed as political liberty ( to take part in the formation of the government, to protest, to have freedom of speech, etc.) The state should leave positive liberty with the individual in the name of ‘self-mastery’. He says if the individual is poor enough to not able to buy a loaf of bread then it should be understood that the state has not stopped him from buying a loaf of bread. He is guaranteed liberty within the state. For the incompetencies and disabilities, the state isn’t responsible. He famously comments that there’s nothing that the state can do if one cannot swim like a whale or fly like an eagle.

By doing welfare works, the state is doing injustice to the meritorious and deserving thus state should abandon them.

Hayek – He says freedom is when an individual isn’t subject to coercion and the arbitrary will of others. He is controversial because he doesn’t believe that the cake of freedom is for everyone. He doesn’t believe in equal freedom for all. He’d rather prefer some individuals with all freedom and others with no freedom at all. He justifies it by saying that all individual is different and those who contribute more should get more freedom.

Friedman - He defines freedom as the ‘absence of coercion of a man by his fellow men’. He too believes in sacrificing equality to enable freedom for the few. He doesn’t believe in the welfare projects of government and thinks that competitive capitalism is necessary for freedom. He reduces the state to do only those functions which aren’t handled by the market. Like, protection of property and maintaining peace.

Criticism of Libertarianism

What libertarians get wrong is that it’s not just some physical or mental constraints, but social constraints that curb freedom. Disabilities may be inalterable, but social disabilities can be removed by positive actions from the state. Also, the libertarian view is very biased toward protecting the freedom of the rich and fortunate.

Marxist View

Marx rejects the atomistic view of the individual. He doesn’t believe that being left alone is the surest way to happiness. He also criticizes the capital system in liberal democracies. For Marx real freedom can come only when the capitalist mode of production is destroyed and replaced with the socialist model.

Alienation

Marx in his ‘Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts’ described the process of alienation that takes place at four levels in a capitalist system. Alienation is defined as “ a state of mind in which the person is isolated from the significant aspect of his social life and creative aspects of his own personality.”

The four levels of alienation experienced by a worker in capitalism are as follows:-

Alienation from the product of labor as capitalist and not the worker decides what is to be produced and how much. He isn’t allowed to add his creativity and imagination to his product as it is decided by the capitalist. Once the capitalist pays him his wage, he loses the right over the product he has created.

Alienation from the process of labor as his work becomes routine and monotonous devoid of his individual creativity.

Alienation from others as the economic system is highly competitive and it creates class conflict too.

Alienation from self is the worst. Man loses himself and is burdened by the realm of necessities.

Thus, the alienated labor isn’t free. He lives in a realm of necessity where if he doesn’t work, his material needs will be unfulfilled and there’s no scope for him in taking a leap from the kingdom of necessity to faith without uniting with other labor to stand against capitalism. In a socialist world, each person will get according to his need and according to the work he does, unlike capitalism where all wealth is concentrated in the hands of a few.

Herbert Marcuse and One - Dimensional Man-

Marcuse talks about alienation in highly advanced industrial countries. He says that capitalism in these countries not only monopolizes on goods and services but also uses mass media to its advantage in order to create meaningless desires. The downtrodden class forgets its actual problems and is dissatisfied with the trivial needs. The citizens are slaves to them. They can only become free when they realize this.

Freedom as Emancipation

Emancipation means freedom from social, legal, and political restrictions. These restrictions are mostly unnecessary and hold the person back from development. In many colonies, the colonizers laid restrictions on the natives. In South Africa, the natives were discriminated based on the color of their skin. They were denied access to higher positions and banned from using various public utilities.

In the contemporary world, we talk about the emancipation of women in the name of empowerment. The real motive behind

Freedom as Development

Libertarian view has been criticized for safeguarding and strengthening the position of the rich and strong. If such people are given the lassiez faire they want, the disadvantaged section may never be able to compete against them and get into a better place. The competition is very unfair for the unfortunate.

The idea of ‘freedom as development’ recognizes the talents of the disadvantaged section of society and believes in improving their quality of life without the mercy of the bourgeoisie. This is very crucial to preserve their dignity and increasing their self-esteem.

Macpherson and Creative Freedom

In his book ‘Democracy- Essays in Retrieval', Macpherson highlights two basic principles of liberal democracies---

Maximization of Utilities

Maximization of Power

The first principle recognizes the man as the consumer that is to be satisfied through welfare schemes. human capacities. Macpherson talks of two power—developmental power and extractive power. ‘Extractive power’ denotes ‘power over someone’, that is, the ability to get others to do what you want them to, ‘development power’ is the ability to do and create. Developmental power is the way to creative freedom. Man is a doer and creator. If he is unable to use his mental faculties to reach his goals, he isn’t free. This creative freedom and developmental power can be obstructed by a lack of means and hindrances from others. He too prefers a socialist model where market forces and their capitalist relations cannot bind the individual.

Amartya Sen and Capability Approach

Freedom will come with development when a person is able to improve the quality of his life using his skills and resources. Amartya says that material resources aren’t enough unless the person has the capability to create something valuable from his resources. Thus, both intention and skill are more important than just resources. Having a bicycle is different from being able to ride a bicycle.

From the moral point of view, it is recognized that each person is capable of improving his life and contributing to the welfare of society. Each person is different in terms of his capabilities. Even, disabled people are redefined as ‘differently abled’ to bring out their residual talents.

The capability approach has been recognized by United Nations Development Program. Certain ‘capability indicators' have been accepted. The only limitation of these indicators is cultural bias. What is more commercial or useful could be varied based on the culture. Other restrictions on the capabilities of individuals can be posed by political tyranny (dictatorship or oppression by state machinery i.e legislature, executive, and judiciary); social deprivation (a particular section of the society is deprived of respectable status), and cultural authoritarianism (a dominant section of society imposing its culture as superior to other sections).

Conclusion

Thus, liberty is a condition for the full personal development of the person. It is not just about being left alone to do whatever you want but to be able enough to create a life of your choice. It is to be able to be creative. It comes with awareness and knowledge. It is more than emancipation.

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