2024-06-21
liberal republican
Swiss-French political thinker, 1776-1830. Largely forgotten, his thoughts were revived during 20th century as important against the totalitarian regimes. Supported individual liberty and allowed individual to turn away interference from the state or society.
Two categories of liberty by him:
Ancient liberty:
political liberty, but no private life. exercising collective, direct, popular sovereignty. Assess the governance and participate in it. Share socio-political power among citizens of same fatherland (other than citizens did had rights and freedom to participate in popular sovereignty. Much of like Athens and Room. Collective Freedom -> collective/common good.
Complete subjection of the individual liberty to the authority of the community. No individual liberty.
Community -> strong institutions, surveillance, censorship and ostracism. state laws regulated social customs and all parts of life both public and private. Individual faced a totalitarian community life.
Individual sovereign in public affairs, was a slave in all his private relation. individual had no significance in front of community (political)
No notion of individual life. (same in ancient Hindu political thoughts)
Man as machine, cog in the social organic whole, mean to achieve collective and community, common good.
Individual sacrificed their individual liberty for political liberty, share in social authority consoled them to their private enslavement.
Modern liberty:
Individual liberty -> inspired -> Isiah Berlin, Fredrich Hayek.
Civil liberties -> freedom of speech, expression, religion/conscience, press, association, to live according to one's own conception of good life.
Peaceful enjoyment and private independence. Enjoyment of security in private pleasure and guarantee of these pleasures as fundamental rights.
Not constrained by the arbitrary will of one or more individual.
Implies rule of law, constitutional government, guaranteed civil rights against the state, plus political rights -> to vote, hold political offices, political equality, political participation.
Individual independent in private life, but sovereign only in appearance in public/political domain, individual rarely able exercise his/her sovereignty (only in election day, able to exercise sovereignty).
Leaving aside governance to their representatives -> liberal representative democracy.
Negative liberty in sense of classical liberalism (his concept of modern liberty).
His famous lecture "The Liberty of The Ancients Compared with that of The Moderns", 1819. (write ups on American (1765-83) and French (1789) revolution also found in there).
French revolution not good, went for ancient liberty or republican liberty (by mistake).
Actions for common good leads to totalitarianism.
His basic arguments:
| Ancient state | Modern state |
| small, face to face political community | Large, very diverse, impersonal political community |
| states represented very heterogenous people (states different with each other) | states represent homogenous people (states same with each other in terms of people's characteristics -> diverse) |
| constant fear of war, subjugation | more peaceful and stable life |
| community life was important to ensure survival (because of above point). | for that community life is not necessary for secured individual life |
| war -> means -> secure security, independence and gain quick profit | trade/commerce -> primary means to earn profit, commerce replaces the war |
| trade and commerce were less important | |
| Institution of Slavery -> free citizens to participated in political life and perform public duties. | No slavery -> people don't have time to perform public duties. |
| Individual outsourced political duties to their representatives/delegates. if people do not give enough attention to or participate in political community, political community becomes totalitarian. | |
| Community's institutions were very strong, strong surveillance, determined each action of the members, for that people gave up their individual liberty. | |
| Duty, self-sacrifice for common or collective good- man as means to an end (end is societal common good). | rights, personal interests preferred over common good - man as end in itself. |
Individual liberty is the essence of human freedom in modern times. But political liberty is equally important for self-development, for moral development, and for human flourishment. Political liberty is an antidote against despotisms and failed democracy. Only by protecting and exercising political liberty, individual liberty can be protected and enjoyed. But individual liberty cannot be sacrificed for gaining political liberty, as happened in ancient times (modern times, individual liberty cherishes and meaning full that can't be sacrificed). There should be a judicious balance between individual and political liberty.
1724-1804, German, Enlightenment thinker, his book "What is Enlightenment?"
Rationalist (world beyond the physical world, that can be known by reason like Plato, sense and experience are not only means to achieved knowledge, but through reason. sense and experience are only means to gain knowledge are empiricist), Plato of modern times. Idealist and mixed politics with morality and ethics.
Kantian Deontology -> good means and good end.
Theology -> achieved end by hook and cook, only end is matter, means did not matter. End justify mean.
Freedom as Autonomy:
It was a response to empiricist account of philosophy of David Hume and Utilitarian concept of morality.
Books:
His Concept of Freedom:
Freedom is acting Autonomously -> rule by according to your own laws and rule, with a good (doing acts which in itself is moral, virtuous intrinsically good. Will of the action have to be good; act is end in itself) and free will (able set goal/end without external and internal constrains, without getting influence of inclination, desire, passion (of oneself and others).
Morality is reached in the means. Action as an end in itself. Obeying universal moral principle as its co-author with all others of humanity. Threating oneself and others as end, not as means to achieved something, doing acts as an end in itself (not means to attain something). Kingdom of End, doing act as moral duty, not as mean to attain something.
Moral Freedom -> freedom from inclination, desire, passion of one own self and others.
Self-government, self-development, moral perfection, attaining virtue and goodness, self-mastery, self-realization.
Pure practical reason (rationality) as source of moral principle. Prue reason -> based on ration, theoretical, abstract reasoning thinking and transnational world. Practical reason -> based on natural world, required to operate the day-to-day requirements. Mixture of both is Pure practical reason, reason derive from the transnational world and abstract reasoning, and apply them to operate in the Practical world or live in the natural world. It should be the source of Moral principle, and sources of freedom.
He linked Freedom, autonomy, virtu, and goodness. -> Acting autonomously and freely, morally is being virtuous and attaining goodness.
Two Worlds/Realms:
Phenomenal -> Natural world, empirical world of cause and effect, time and space. World follows laws, whose source is outside them, external to them. Objects acts heteronomously (not independent, act by rules and laws sources outside to them), as means to some end.
Noumenal -> Moral world, world beyond time and space. cause and effect, transcendental world. World of reason/rationality, a priori of the sense, experience, empirical world. Governed by universal moral laws/principles. Individuals are free to act according to his/her will, they are autonomously.
Freedom is acting autonomously by following the universal moral laws.
They are moral laws co-authored by each and every human being as rational moral agent by using pure practical reason.
Formulation of Categorical Imperatives:
Harmonizing principle:
That all maxims from one's lawgiving are to harmonize with a possible kingdom of ends as with kingdom of nature.
Freedom/autonomy is acting as the law made by oneself, and acting autonomously is acting freely.
Kant's freedom contains elements of both negative and positive freedom. His freedom implies freedom from both internal and external constraints. His freedom is self-government, moral development, self-mastery, self-realization -> positive freedom. Free will, good will, without inclination, desire, passion, interest, benefits -> positive freedom. Acting autonomously without being influenced by whims and fancies, desires and passions of others -> Negative Freedom.
Freedom as Autonomy
Individuality and self-development of unique character denote Autonomy and free will.
Individuality ->
Sovereignty over one's own mind and body. "Over himself, over his mind and body, the individual is sovereign".
Freedom of choice -> to develop his/her own life as the one that he/she has autonomously chosen.
"The human faculties of perception, judgment, discriminative feeling, mental activity, and even moral preference, are exercised only in making a choice."
"Central feature of the good life that it be a life chosen for oneself."
The power or capacity for critical enquiry, scrutiny of prevailing ideas and conventions, and subjecting them to the litmus test of reason. It meant self-development, self-mastery, and the expression of free will. Scrutiny of prevailing ideas and subjecting them to the litmus test of reason. Author of one's rule of conduct, not guided by will, traditions or customs of other people.
Autonomy as development of unique character ->
"A person whose desire and impulses are his own - are the expression of his own nature, as it has been developed and modified by his own culture - is said to have a character."
It denoted rich variety of "experiments of living", exposing oneself to wide range of possible forms of life, free to develop their own ways of living. Developing unique personality, character, and self-culture.
"Human nature is not a machine to built after a model, and set to do exactly the work prescribed for it, but a tree which requires to grow and develop itself on all sides, according to the tendency of the inward forces which make it a living thing."
Denote Eccentricity -> being different, unique, non-conforming. "To point at someone different as 'wild,' 'erratic,' and the like; much as if one should complain of the Niagara River for not flowing smoothly between its banks like a Dutch canal."
Moral and mental autonomy is means to personal growth discovering the nature of the good life. Help individuals develop their own talents and invent their own lifestyles. Autonomy and self-mastery were inherently desirable.
Individuality and uniqueness of character brought happiness to individual. Happiness for mill -> was the ability of individual to discover his innate powers and develop these while exercising his human abilities of autonomous thought and action.
Moral and mental autonomy would produce considerable variety of thought and behavior. A diversity of character and culture provides the engine of productive tension that drives a society/community/nation forward. From this diversity -> unique thoughts come, intellectual creativity. As long as uniqueness and creativity prevail in society, society will flourish. Same as genetic diversity protect survival of the species.
Eccentric, non-conforming, unique, and strong personality are defense against the wave of conformation and homogenization by the mass society. Individuality and liberty to develop one's own person/character is good for the individual and for the society.
1909-1997, Latvian-born British social and political theorist, philosopher, and historian of ideas,
Work:
Two Conceptions of Liberty:
Negative Liberty:
"What is the area within which the subject - a person or group of persons - is or should be left to do or be what he is able to do or be, without interference by other person?" Absence of constraints/interference external to the subject, and mostly man-made. Leaves out natural constraints and incapacities, inner constraints.
father of negative liberty -> we can say Hobbes
He divided political thinkers in to negative and positive camps:
Hobbes, Locke, Bentham, Mill, Tocqueville and Constant
Positive Liberty:
"What, or who, is the source of control that can determine someone to do, or be, this rather than that?". "By whom am I ruled?" Am I master of my will or desire? Self-mastery, self-control, self-government, self-direction, self-realization.
Plato, Zeno, Kant, Rousseau, Hegal, Marx, Gandhiji
Problem with Positive Liberty:
Negative liberty, despite its shortcomings, preferable. Better guarantee against the danger of paternalism and authoritarianism. Compatible with plurality of goals and values - individuals are free to decide their conception of good life and live that life without constraint/coercion.
Positive liberty he considered as Slippery Slope. Concept of Self is metaphysical concept. It sizes sometimes expend as much as society/community and sometimes contracted as small as intangible, ethereal hidden deep inside physical self like soul.
With that self also divided in higher - rational, authentic and virtuous - true self and lower - irrational, impulsive, lustful, empirical belief and desire. If self is divided in to two, then society can tell an individual what his/her self is - higher or lower, society can tell that you are not functioning by your higher self, you need to do this and that in order to function according to your higher self. This can lead to totalitarianism.
Following thinkers critique Isaiah Berlin.
1925-1987, American philosopher, Critic of Isaiah berlin's two concepts of liberty.
Work:
MacCallum's -> all intelligible locutions about liberty must conform to one and the same triadic scheme.
Dividing the concept of freedom divided the thinkers and thoughts into two categories.
We may understand freedom as one concept if we visualize it as a triadic relation.
Freedom always implies removal of some constraint or restriction on, interference with, or barrier to doing, not doing, becoming, or not becoming something.
x -> Agent
y -> Constraint
z -> to become or do what one is want. action or state.
x, y, z having wide range of meaning and connotations. Different kinds of freedom denote different meanings of the term variable. Such as in individual freedom x is individual and in positive freedom x can be individual or society (state is individual write large).
1930, Canadian political thinker, belongs to communitarian stream under liberal doctrine, gave opportunity vs exercise concept of freedom.
Work:
Charles Taylor -> freedom resides at least in part in collective control over the common life (according to Quinten Skinner)
Gist of his thought on freedom:
Negative freedom (absence of external constraints on all possible acts of an individual) is incomplete, insufficient definition of freedom. Negative freedom is an opportunity of doing a act, it is opportunity concept of freedom, do not guarantee you able to execute the acts.
Exercise concept of Freedom:
Freedom also involves exercise concept - exercising self-rule, self-direction, self-government, self-realization (becoming what is our essence, full potential, capacity). Freedom is being able to recognize adequately one's more important purposes and being able to overcome or at least neutralize one's motivational constraints. Freedom involves both free of external obstacles as well as internal constraints (irrational impulsive, fear, desire, passion)
Negative liberty leaves out the exercise concept of freedom and self-realization (important part of liberal doctrine), which are integral to liberal doctrine.
Pure opportunity concept of freedom is logically indefensible.
In negative liberty we rank and order, significance of freedom. Like wish, we can also rank and order our internal motivation, our life purpose. Then, we cloud rank and order what is our top priority. Subjects always evaluate/judge their fear, desire, passion in helping or hindering their basic purpose. exercising strong evaluation and discrimination of motivations are integral part of freedom.
In most cases the individual is the best judge of his/her life's basic purpose and which motivations are fetters in achieving those purpose. But in some extreme cases, one may have vary distorted basic purpose/goal/end in that case external guidance cannot be avoided.
2 step process to from negative to positive liberty:
Totalitarian danger does not allow us to reject the concept of positive liberty altogether, by deriding it as illusory, metaphysical idea.
1940, British intellectual historian. Founder of the Cambridge school of the history of political thought, Argued for "Freedom as non-dominance", and another stream under negative liberty.
Work:
Isaiah Berlin -> negative liberty is freedom from constraint and positive liberty is freedom to follow a certain form of life (decided collectively), self-masterly, achieved full potential, self-realization, self-perfection.
"Both of these interpretations are interpretation of a single concept, two profoundly divergent and irreconcilable attitudes to the ends of life." -> Isaiah Berlin.
Green and Bosanquet -> Freedom of human agents consists in their having succeeded in realizing an ideal of themselves - a condition in which someone has succeeded in becoming something.
Freedom as non-Dominance or Freedom from Subjection or 3rd Concept of Freedom or Republican concept of liberty:
Liberty was understood as absence of domination, such as ancient Greece and Rome, where people rule themselves.
He uses the Livy work -> liberty is not to be subject to the power of anyone else.
He argues that because of domination people can't be able to think above the boundary allowed by the dominator. Such as masters did allow slaves to think outside of a certain area. In domination, there might be no direct physical control but control of their thoughts and thinking, which not allow dominances to think outside.
Dependence and subjugation undermine liberty - to live at the mercy or under the absolute power of another is what it means to live in slavery.
A mere awareness of living in dependence on the goodwill of an arbitrary ruler dose serve in itself to restrict our options/choices and thereby limit our liberty.
There are many things one is not free to say or do.
One will lack the freedom to abstain from saying and doing certain things.
One may be free of external constraints but still unfree if under domination of other; conversely someone is free who is interfered with but is not dominated by a master. (first case choices are limited but not in the second case). He argues that in republican community (state) there many interferences, but for collective betterment such as Rousseau concept of general will, where you force to free or accept general will, which lead to freedom. In republic individuals are not being dominated by some sources but faced interference for their own collective good.
According to Phillip Petit -> 3rd concept of freedom, as it "fits on neither side of the now established negative-positive dichotomy". As not exactly "positive" -> it requires the absence of something (domination). Not exactly negative -> it needs something more than the absence of interference (choices, exercise general will, exercise concept of freedom of Charles taylor).
According to him, republican concept of freedom is one type of negative liberty. Which was neglected or left out by modern liberal thinkers such as Isaiah Berlin (because of fear of totalitarianism and relation of liberalism with colonial).
Deeds of greatness can be expected only from those who live in so-called free states, which provide fundamental rights of thought, expression, belief, association, and other self-regarding actions. -> same with JS Mill.
David Miller: The different traditions of speaking about liberty "appear to embody very different basic assumptions about human beings and what gives meaning to their lives"