7

Principles of Liberty and Freedom

Introduction

A major concern of political theory has been to resolve the sphere and scope of actions of the authority and the individual. This issue has drawn attention to the principles that define or determine the limit and scope of their relationship. Principles of rights and liberty primarily deal with state-individual relationship and define how much political obligation is required from the individual and how much responsibility the State carries. However, there also needed are principles that determine and define the limit and scope of liberty and rights amongst the individuals themselves. To deal with such issues the principles of equality and justice come into the picture. The issue involved is how and in which way the State would like to define the relationship between itself and the individual, on the one hand, and between the individuals themselves, on the other. Would it like to engage each individual equally by providing equal rights and liberties, or would it like to engage different groups of individuals differently on the basis of positive discrimination for certain capacity differences, cultural differences and other inequalities? How giving primacy to one principle alone, e.g. liberty, hampers the other principles, such as equality and justice, or how emphasis on the principle of justice distorts the principle of equality. What relationship these principles have with each other and how far are they significant for organizing a political society? In the following four chapters we will look at the principles and conditions that define the relationship of the State and the individual on the one hand, and amongst individual themselves, on the other.

Meaning and Sphere of Liberty and Freedom

In this chapter we will discuss the principle of liberty. The word ‘liberty’ has come from the Latin word libertas or liber meaning ‘free’. As a principle of political theory, it signifies the sphere of freedom to the individual against the authority of the State or any such authority delegated. In this sense, it means ‘absence of restraint’ or ‘being left alone’. As such, liberty implies such a sphere of an individual's activity, which is not interfered by any authority. However, in a second sense, liberty is used to signify not only absence of restraint and being left alone to act as one chooses but also the presence of certain socio-economic and other enabling conditions, which make enjoyment of liberty meaningful. In the second sense, it relates to some kind of personal development, self-realization or fulfilment. Thus, there have been two streams of arguments as to whether this sphere of liberty should be interfered or un-interfered from the authority. If it is absence of restraint then the individual's sphere of activity should remain un-interfered with. But if it is taken as provision of enabling conditions, then it implies interference so that those provisions can be made. While in the first sense, it is referred to as ‘negative liberty’, in the second sense it is called ‘positive liberty’. Given the fact that liberty has been treated as a distinguished principle emerging from liberalism, the streams of negative liberty and positive liberty have been a debate within the liberal framework. Adam Smith and David Ricardo (Laissez-faire advocates), John Locke (social contractualist), F. A. Hayek, Isaiah Berlin, Milton Friedman and Robert Nozick (neo-liberals), and others such as Tom Paine, Herbert Spencer, etc., are identified as advocates of negative liberty. J. S. Mill (utilitarian), T. H. Green (idealist), L. T. Hobhouse, R. H. Tawney, J. A. Hobson, H. J. Laski, R. M. MacIver, Ernest Barker and C. B. Macpherson have advocated positive liberty. Amartya Sen (developmental economist and a Nobel laureate) has advocated a broader concept of freedom as expansion of human capacity.

In liberal framework, the two terms, liberty and freedom, are often treated synonymously. This is because they signify that principle of political theory, which poses the individual's sphere of action in relation to the authority of the state and advocates absence of any interference in individual's sphere of action or seeks some enabling conditions for self-realization or fulfilment but that too in individual terms. However, within the liberal framework also, liberty or freedom has not always been posed only against the constituted authority of the state. Thinkers such as Alex de Tocqueville and John Stuart Mill expressed that liberty or freedom also means non-interference from the force of the majority in society. Mill was particular about protecting individual liberty against what he termed as ‘the tyranny of the majority’.¹

Tocqueville's assumption is that desire for equality in liberal democracy, which destroys liberty when carried to its extreme, is the root cause of majority tyranny.² Apprehension of these writers emerges in the context of liberal democracy that espouses the majority rule as operational principle of governance. In liberal framework, negative liberty or freedom is absence of interference by the constituted authority of the state and its organs as well as the collective force of the majority in society.

While the term liberty is generally associated with liberalism, the term freedom is applied universally. Liberal thinkers use the term freedom in the sense of liberty. Idealists and those who support the organic view of state-individual relationship (Rousseau and Hegel) present freedom as realization of an individual's personality as part of a great idea. For Rousseau, General Will is the ultimate source of freedom. Each individual is to realize one's freedom as part of the General Will, nothing above, nothing beyond. Failing this, ‘one will be forced to be free’. For Hegel, the modern state is the realization of the Spirit, which is synonymous with freedom. As such, freedom of an individual lies in obedience to the State.³ Marxists have used the term ‘freedom’ to signify absence of exploitative economic structure and also in terms of ‘recognition of needs’. Neo-Hegelians such as Herbert Marcuse and others have used the term to present ‘freedom’ as an attribute of consciousness of an individual as opposed to ‘false consciousness’ and ‘alienation’. In fact, Karl Marx, Herbert Marcuse, C. Wright Mills, André Gorz, Robert Blauner and others have used the term ‘alienation’ to define the relationship of an individual and various material, working and technological conditions that have hampered realization of freedom by distorting the needs of human beings.

A Brief History of Liberty and Freedom

Liberty and freedom as principles of organizing political and civic and political societies have always been a concern of political thinkers and statesmen. Greeks put liberty and freedom at the core of civic life. They were concerned with the collective life and active participation of the individual in the affairs of the polis. Pericles, a great orator and advocate of Greek democracy, treated freedom in terms of participation in political activity. Similarly, Aristotle considered participation in public office as the basis of citizenship. Pericles favoured freedom of discussion and maintained that ‘the great impediment to action is, in our opinion, not discussion, but the want of that knowledge which is gained by discussion preparatory to action.’ Another statesman, Euripides, also proclaimed this virtue of Greeks when he said, ‘This is true liberty, when free-born men, having to advise the public, may speak free.’⁴ What both Pericles and Euripides declare is that free discussion and active participation in public life is a civic virtue for Greeks. Freedom of discussion and speech becomes fundamental to participation in public life. Thus, we can say that for Greeks, a citizen's freedom means freedom to understand, to discuss and contribute by active participation in the public life of polis. Sabine calls this as the ‘ideal of civic freedom’ and says ‘… the supreme value for the individual lies just in his ability and his freedom to contribute … in the common enterprise of civil life.’⁵ This way of conceiving relationship between the individual and the polis by the Greeks does not project any anti-thesis between the individual and the authority. However, Aristotle's defence of slavery was to exclude a part of human beings from this civic freedom.

Marcus Cicero (106–43 BC), an eminent political thinker at the beginning of the Roman Empire, wrote De Republica (The Commonwealth) in which he advocated the republic and not monarchy as the form of government for the Roman Empire. He suggested a composite state balancing aristocratic, monarchical and democratic elements, along the lines of Aristotle's mixed constitution.⁶ Particularly, Cicero discussed two types of offices—Consuls and Tribunes, which possessed executive, judicial and indirect legislative powers. Consuls represent the supreme executive power of the State and reflect the interest of the nobility or patricians and manifested the monarchical elements. To check this, Tribunes were elected by common people or plebeians and manifested democratic elements. The significance of Cicero's discussion of consuls and tribunes lies in the fact that he felt that tribunes represented the people's freedom and countered the interest of the noble classes in the empire. For Cicero, replacement of monarchy, which was the initial form of government that Rome possessed, by republic was premised on the granting of liberty to the people—plebeians. As such, Rome as republic was identified with existence of liberty to the people to elect and get represented. Cicero felt that preservation of liberty or what can be said republican liberty should be premised on ‘triple division of powers’,⁷ power of the Senate (aristocratic elements), power of the Consuls (monarchical elements) and power of the Tribunes (democratic elements).

While the Greeks were concerned with civic freedom and cherished active participation in public life as the core of liberty, in the Roman Empire, participation of the plebeians was considered as the core of republican government. This shows that liberty was conceived in terms of democratic participation in the affairs of the polis, state or the republic. Another element found in Cicero and Roman concept of law in general, is the idea of subjection to law or supremacy of law over personal power of emperors as compatible with freedom. Cicero's famous statement: ‘We are servants of law in order that we may be free’,⁸ signifies this.

This Greek and Roman concern for civic freedom and republican liberty of the people got replaced with ‘idea of salvation and freedom of soul’ after the emergence of Christianity. Concern for liberty and freedom of human beings vis-à-vis political authority, civic life and political obligation was replaced by the doctrine of Christian obedience. It required obedience to constituted civic authorities as well as to the Church. As such, it was in fact a doctrine of dual obedience, one to temporal power in the State and the other to the religious power in the Church. This is exemplified in the dictum, ‘render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's, and unto God the things that are God's.’⁹ The idea of individual or human freedom conceived in political and civic sense is absent in medieval Europe. Conflict between the State and the Church in medieval Europe was exemplified by the struggle for supremacy between the imperialists (supporters of state's or king's power) and the papalists (supporters of church's power). The Church claimed supremacy as the custodian of ecclesiastical or religious–spiritual authority. This not only required priority of individual and human being's submission to it over the temporal authority, it also restricted the freedom of conscience. The Church's absolutism insofar as the question of restricting individual ‘freedom to search and judge’ for himself within the Christian belief was however sought to be countered by conciliar theory. William of Occam sought to curb papal absolutism and advocated Christian freedom against the Pope in the sense that he gave priority to Scriptures against the decretals of the popes. He wanted overall supremacy of the Church but based on ‘constitutionalized form of church government by means of a General Council representing the sound body of Christian scholarship and belief.’ William wanted to include clergy, laymen and even women in the council to make a religious affair representative. William and conciliar theory sought to give individual freedom to search and freedom to judge within the fold of Christian belief.

Another problem, during the state-church controversy, relates to the persecution of religious minorities belonging to other sects of Christianity. In the state-church controversy, the kings and emperors resorted to the divine rights of kings theory to legitimize their power as if it had also been drawn from the God. This implied that a king following a particular sect, say Catholic, invokes his authority as drawn from the God and requires political as well religious obedience from the people. A group of people of other sects, say Protestants, would have a problem submitting to him in political as well as religious matters. This contradiction often resulted in persecution and killings of people of other sects.

In short, we can say that medieval Europe was not conducive for liberty and freedom including religious freedom. Feudal socio-economic relations and multiple power centres that resulted in a chain of economic and political obligations further aggravated this. As Fernand Braudel says that ‘it is no accident that the Middle Ages spoke much more of libertates (liberties) than of libertas (liberty). In the plural, the word meant very much the same as privilegia (privileges) …’¹⁰ Liberty in such a situation meant privileges to one group or class against the interests of the other. The nobility, the vassal, the clergy, and the emerging bourgeoisie had their respective privileges. In fact, political power and affairs of the state were not a matter of civic freedom or republican liberty as the Greeks and Romans envisaged, but merely a matter of privileges. These privileged classes even ‘bought the offices of state’, as Braudel points out. On the other hand, the concept of individual liberty as the freedom of an individual or everyone's freedom by virtue of being a person, as we understand today, was even inconceivable. It was left to Renaissance and Reformation to install individual liberty and human freedom including the freedom of conscience as the intellectual concern of political and philosophical thought in Europe.

Three revolutions, namely, Renaissance, Reformation and Enlightenment promised Europe the end of the ‘medieval darkness’ and put human reason and greatness of human being as an individual at the centre of social, religious and political landscape. Renaissance humanism if we term it so, was also a call for what Descartes summed up in the seventeenth century: I think, therefore I am. It gave way to liberties of a few privileged classes to revolts of many. The revolts manifested in political, economic and religious fields. It is reported by Braudel that there were various peasants’ uprisings in France (Jacquerie in 1358, Paris in 1633, in Rouen, north-western France in 1634–9, in Lyon, eastern-central France in 1623, 1629, 1633 and 1642), in Germany (in 1524–25).¹¹ The conditions of peasants in Europe could be understood when we look at the plight in Bohemia where they were allowed to work on their own land only one day in a week, in Slovenia where they could work only ten days in a year. The feudal system and its system of bond-service had no place for liberty for all.

Politically, the English Revolution (1688) and the French Revolution (1789) were revolts against the decadent feudal system and degenerating nobility. Practically, these were revolts to place the emerging bourgeoisie at the seat of political and economic power in Europe. The 1789 French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen which declared that ‘Men are born, and always continue, free and equal in respect of their rights’ though landmark in the history of freedom and liberty, only promised the equality of liberty of the emerging capitalists and the landed bourgeoisie. The peasants at land and the working class of the emerging industrial economy were still to fight for their liberty. Emergence of liberalism and capitalism as political and economic frameworks advocated individual liberty as the fundamental principle and invariably as part of ‘natural rights’. Politically, it symbolized freedom of political participation in liberal democracy and economically it required contract based on ‘free’ labour as the basis of capitalist-industrial economy. However, this liberty was also circumscribed, politically by restricting the freedom of political participation to the propertied classes and also by exclusion of women (England granted voting rights to women only during the First World War) and economically by defining freedom and liberty in terms of ‘protection of property’. Laski opines that freedom which liberalism sought ‘had no title to universality, since its practice was limited to men who had property to defend.’¹² Thus, liberalism and capitalism advocated and practised liberty as freedom of private property un-interfered by the State.

With emergence of socialist thought in Europe and particularly Marxian thought, realization of liberty as a universal principle came to be recognized. Liberalism, starting with negative view of liberty however, sought to address the socio-economic conditions without which enjoyment of liberty was meaningless and class-biased. As a result, positive view of liberty became an integral part of liberal thought. It is also argued that liberalism in its initial phase favoured negative liberty, i.e., liberty as non-interference by the state, primarily because the authority of the State was not completely in the hands of the bourgeoisie. Non-interference would mean circumscribing the interference of the elements of nobility and the landed interests and when bourgeoisie became sure of their hold on the authority of the State, interference of the State could be accepted in the form of positive liberty. In the latter half of nineteenth and in twentieth century, socialist thought introduced principles of equality and justice as the defining elements for universal enjoyment of liberty and freedom.

Liberty and Freedom Defined

The terms liberty and freedom have been defined and interpreted differently by writers and thinkers using different perspectives. To appreciate the meaning, nature, scope, relationship of liberty with authority and liberty and equality, etc. we should look at how they have been defined. From the brief survey of how liberty and freedom have been treated in different periods in Europe, we come across various meanings of liberty and freedom. These includes, civic freedom as Greeks meant, republican liberty as Cicero advocated, freedom to search and judge within the Christian fold as advocated by William of Occam and the conciliar theory, freedom as privileges to select classes and groups as feudal Europe espoused, negative and positive liberty as liberalism adopts, civil liberty, liberty enjoyed in common with the whole community, as Rousseau and Bentham says, equal liberty as the socialist thought advocates.

Euripides, the Greek statesman, proclaimed liberty in the sense of free speech and participation in public affairs when he said, ‘This is true liberty, when free-born men, having to advise the public, may speak free.’ What Cicero meant by liberty was extension of opportunity of participation in the public affairs of Rome to the plebeians. He advocated a mixed constitution, which could give a share to aristocratic, monarchical and democratic elements in the public affairs. When Rome became republic from its earlier form of monarchy, to assert its viability and necessity, Cicero in his book, The Laws said, ‘it is clear that either the monarchy ought never to have been abolished, or else that real liberty, not pretence of it, had to be given to the common people.’ What Cicero calls ‘real liberty’ is the presence of Tribunes as elected representatives of the plebeians. Though in a different context, Machiavelli known for his suggestion for a strong monarchical rule in his book, The Prince, showed respect for republicanism in his later book, The Discourses in the sixteenth century. He was of the opinion that once founded, a state could be made permanent by admitting a share of people in government and suggested business of the state to be run in accordance with law.¹³ It seems Machiavelli was reflecting Cicero's concern of republican liberty.

Hobbes defines liberty as ‘… absence of external impediments, which impediments may take off part of man's power to do what he would do.’ Hobbes's idea was that human beings, by nature, are oriented for self-preservation. In fact, the social contract is meant to come out of the state of nature and institute a sovereign to provide conditions in which the prime concern of security of life is maintained. For this, all impediments are to be removed by the sovereign. It is then the duty of all subjects to abide by the law the sovereign sets for them. ‘For the use of laws is not to bind the people from all voluntary actions; but to direct and keep them in such a motion, as not to hurt themselves by their own impetuous desires, rashness or indiscretion; as hedges are set, not to stop travellers, but to keep then in their way.’¹⁴ As such, Hobbes grants liberty and freedom to individual in all aspects and seeks interference of law to remove external impediments. He gives freedom in all those matters in which law is silent. Leviathan gives freedom to transact business and contract, to pursue private religion, belief and conscience and to disobey when the sovereign violates the very basis of life, as the end of obedience is protection. Though Hobbes had individualism as the end of the sovereign in the sense of protection and preservation of individual life, he granted only limited liberty and did advocate interference by the Leviathan. This was because Hobbes says, ‘I ground the civil rights of sovereign and both the duty and liberty of subjects upon the known natural inclination of mankind.’ He identifies natural inclination with instinct of self-preservation and security. In consonance with this objective, for Hobbes, ‘a free man is he that … is not hindered to do what he has the will to do.’

Locke's understanding of freedom and liberty arises from the nature of social contract. Liberty is part of natural rights of ‘life, liberty and property’. Individual retains rights to liberty as part of these rights and the ‘life, liberty and estate’ of one person can be limited only to the extent to enforce similar rights of another person. For this, Locke advocates enforcement of these rights through law. He says, ‘end of law is not to abolish or restrain but to preserve and enlarge freedom.’ As the State is only a trust to protect these rights through law, he advocates constitutional government based on rule of law. For Locke, limited government based on rule of law and separation of powers (legislative, executive and judicial and federative) provides framework of political liberty for individual as well as protection of rights of life and property.

Somewhat like Locke, Baron de Montesquieu in his The Spirit of Laws, equates presence of liberty with separation of power. He says, ‘when the legislative and executive powers are united in the same person, or in the same body of magistrates, there can be no liberty … again there is no liberty, if the judicial power be not separated from the legislative and the executive.’ This was separation of powers as a means of checks and balances to ensure political liberty and as a protection against the tyranny of ruler. Both Locke and Montesquieu feel that constitutional government with checks and balances could be a guarantee of political liberty.

While Locke advocated economic liberty in the form of natural right of property and its inviolability by the state, Adam Smith provided a clear exposition of the theory of laissez faire, individual to be left alone. For him, liberty amounts to:

Everyman, as long as he does not violate the laws of justice, is left perfectly free to pursue his own interest in his own way, and to bring both his industry and capital into competition with those of any other man or order of men. The sovereign is completely discharged from … the duty of superintending the industry of the private people, and of directing it toward the employments most suitable to the interests of the society.¹⁵

This is a clear enunciation of liberty as non-interference by the State in the affairs of the individual, particularly in the field of economic activity. Smith calls this as natural liberty.

Hayek and Friedman, both supporters of neo-liberalism and the negative view of liberty, define liberty in terms of absence of coercion of one person by another. Hayek says ‘a man possesses liberty or freedom when he is not subject to coercion by the arbitrary will of another.’ By defining liberty or freedom in terms of absence of coercion by arbitrary will of another, Hayek admits coercion by non-arbitrary will of another. This means there can be coercion that is not arbitrary. However, whether this admits positive liberty implicitly or not is a matter of debate. Friedman also defines freedom in the same way as Hayek does. According to Friedman, freedom means ‘absence of coercion of a man by his fellow men’.

Rousseau was an advocate of civil society and civil liberty. For him, liberty implies obeying the General Will. He defines liberty as ‘obedience to law which one gives to oneself’ and also that ‘it is to law alone that man owe justice and liberty’. ‘Law’ to which Rousseau refers is law made by the General Will. Rousseau feels that in the state of nature only impulsive freedom is possible, civil liberty is required for liberty to be meaningful. Civil liberty of each individual is guaranteed because ‘each one, in giving himself up to all, gives himself up to no one’.

Hegel's conception of freedom is based on his thesis of development of Spirit as embodied in the development of state. World history according to Hegel is development of the Spirit, and the State is the march of God on earth. Since the Spirit or it is independent for its progress, its progress is also progress of freedom. As such, ‘the history of the world is none other than the progress of the consciousness of Freedom.’ Individual's freedom is inseparable from the freedom embodied in the state. Hence, individual freedom lies in obedience to the state. For Hegel, individual liberty is in submission to the laws of the State. The State is ‘that form of reality in which the individual has and enjoys his freedom provided he recognizes, believes in and wills what is common to the whole’.¹⁶ Laski severely criticized Hegel's conception of freedom as ‘dialectical fraud’, which equated slavery and freedom.

Bentham's Utilitarian doctrine gives primacy to maximization of pleasure as an end and maximization of liberty as an end. He opposes the concept of liberty as natural rights, which he decries as ‘simple nonsense’. He differentiates between Natural Liberty, which is liberty to do what I will and Civil Liberty as liberty to do whatever I will so long as it is consistent with the interests of the community to which I belong¹⁷. Since the utilitarian principle of happiness is the only ultimate criterion that liberty must admit, it is the concept of civil liberty that Bentham gives primacy. A law is good or bad not because it increases or decreases liberty but because it increases or decreases happiness. For Bentham then, liberty is subject to utility and at times there may be a conflict between the two.

John Stuart Mill's On Liberty is considered as a significant defence of individual liberty of actions. Mill declares that the subject of his concern is’… Civil or Social Liberty: the nature and limits of the power which can be legitimately exercised by society over individual.’¹⁸ Mill was, in fact, apprehensive of the majority's overwhelming oppression of the individual having a view contrary to theirs. He, therefore, advocated liberty of the individual against the ‘tyranny of majority’. This was also significant because liberal democracy has espoused the principle of majority as the operational means. Mill defines liberty in two ways. Firstly, it is in the sense of being left to oneself as ‘over himself, his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign’. He says, ‘all restraints qua restraints is an evil’. Thus, for Mill, liberty is non-interference in an individual's liberty of action except to protect the similar liberty of other individual(s). As such, he differentiates between ‘self-regarding’ and ‘other-regarding’ actions. ‘Other-regarding’ actions are those actions of individuals that have a bearing on the liberty of other individuals. Mill admits interference in this sphere of individual actions. A second definition of liberty he gives is that ‘liberty consists in doing what one desires’. This means liberty may not be being left alone or to oneself. For example, one would be justified in preventing a man crossing a bridge that one knows to be unsafe. ‘Liberty consists in doing what one desires, and he does not desire to fall into the river,’ says Mill. This definition of liberty provides enough scope for interference and amounts to admitting Rousseau's position that one can be forced to be free, as Wayper says.¹⁹ However, we can say that Mill's concern for introducing criteria of moral and self-development of individual personality into the principle of Utility that can be seen in both the definitions. He seeks to protect the sphere of ‘self-regarding’ actions and also gives primacy to the individual's desires.

Thomas Hill Green's idea of freedom is also Hegelian. For both, an individual is most free when he identifies himself with the Divine Spirit. However, Green defines freedom in a positive sense as ‘a positive power or capacity of doing something or enjoying something worth doing or enjoying and that too, something we do or enjoy in common with others.’ He also defines freedom as ‘the liberation of all powers of men for the social good.’ This is possible only when everyone does what is in the interest of all and in the realization of the human personality. Freedom is not absence of restrictions but availability of those conditions that help one realize positive power or capacity. Green advocates concept of freedom as positive power.

H. J. Laski defines liberty in the positive sense when he says, ‘By liberty I mean the eager maintenance of that atmosphere in which men have the opportunity to be their best selves.’ Thus, instead of absence of restriction, Laski advocates presence of certain conditions as in terms of rights, which are essential for development of an individual personality. However, with the emergence of fascist and corporatist state in Germany and Italy, Laski is reported to have revised his view of liberty as absence of interference from authority. Laski also supported Lord Acton's conception of liberty as ‘the assurance that every man shall be protected in doing what he believes his duty against the influence of authority and majority, customs and opinion.’

Macpherson defines liberty in developmental sense as ‘positive liberty is liberty to act as a full human being. A man's positive liberty is virtually the same as what I have called a man's power in the developmental sense.’

From the above descriptions, it becomes clear that the notion of liberty and freedom has changed over a period of time. Of particular interest is the shift from the notion of liberty as absence of restraints to individual action to the notion that liberty and freedom is more a matter of moral and self-development of the individual. In the second sense, liberty becomes a derivative value serving the ultimate purpose of moral and capacity development of individual personality. Further, it has also focused on different aspects of liberty such as natural liberty and laissez faire notion (Smith, Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau), political liberty (Locke, Montesquieu, Blackstone, Barker), civic liberty (Greeks and Romans), Civil and Social Liberty (Mill, Blackstone, Barker), economic liberty (laissez-faire and neo-liberals, Laski, Barker), religious liberty (renaissance and reformation), etc. We also find that liberty requires certain conditions to be present to be effective. We may also explore the relationship of liberty and authority and also liberty and licence.

Conditions for Realization of Liberty and Freedom

Realization of liberty and freedom as an integral part of human, moral and self-development require either un-interfered action as an agent or provision of enabling conditions. It is also dependent on fulfillment of certain other institutional and constitutional requirements.

• In the liberal sense, political liberty is premised on the presence of a limited government with checks and balances because liberty is treated in terms of struggle between liberty and authority and minimum interference of authority in individual's actions. This can be achieved in two ways: (i) by provision of certain rights and liberties as granted to people or citizens in which the authority's interference, except in special circumstances, could be treated as infringement, and (ii) establishment of constitutional checks, e.g. in the form of checks and balances. Locke and Montesquieu supported a limited government with checks and balances. The Indian Constitution provides a set of Fundamental Rights to individuals and groups and has separation of powers between legislature, executive and judiciary as a means of checks and balances.
• Both Mill and Tocqueville felt that ensuring individual liberty or liberty of those having ideas opposed to the majority requires limiting the nature and sphere of power that society can legitimately exercise over them. Limit on tyranny of majority is necessary for ensuring civil or social liberty. The Indian Constitution gives a wide variety of freedoms including that of speech.
• To ensure the enjoyment of liberty, certain enabling conditions should be available. For example, I have freedom or liberty to get employed or choose my profession, as I desire. But will it be possible if there is no provision to get education? Similarly, I have been given freedom to eat whatever I can, but I have no money to buy. These are questions that relate to socio-economic conditions that are required to make liberty meaningful. As Anatole France suggests, the freedom of a rich man and a destitute to buy bread is not the same. Enjoyment of liberty must be premised on its conditions of enjoyment and mere its provision.
• According to Laski, freedom requires absence of special privileges. This was the case during feudal Europe when privileges existed instead of liberty. Liberty then requires equality also. Secondly, Laski suggests that liberty also requires presence of rights. Thirdly, he feels that a responsible government that acts in an unbiased manner is required for liberty to be enjoyed.
• At times, provision of enabling conditions also require a differential provision of these conditions for those who are socially, historically and naturally depressed. Enjoyment of liberty is meaningful when some are positively discriminated.

Types of Liberty and Freedom

As hinted earlier, liberty or freedom has been understood in a variety of ways. Some common understanding and interpretation may be discussed in the following manner.

Natural Liberty

We can understand natural liberty in terms of liberty naturally available to the people. It implies unrestricted and unfettered liberty to do what one wills in a stage of natural condition. This can be possible only when we conceive a stage in which either there is a situation of licentious liberty as Hobbes thought it existed in his state of nature, or a situation of idyllic liberty as Rousseau portrayed in his state of nature. We can also think of Daniel Defoe's portrayal of Robinson Crusoe's position, which can be equated with natural liberty. However, liberty conceived in such a way may not be socially relevant which requires some type of regulation. In fact, all the three contractualists—Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau—talk of natural liberty being available in the state of nature. However, transition to civil society or the commonwealth requires surrender of natural liberty. For Rousseau, natural liberty is based on impulse, which requires to be replaced by civil liberty within the fold of General Will. Adam Smith, while laying the doctrine of laissez faire, insists that everyone should be left perfectly free to pursue his own interest in his own way. He is primarily seeking a free sphere for business and industry as a means of ‘wealth of nations’. Smith calls this as a system of natural liberty or system of perfect liberty. The origin and working of commercial capitalism is based on natural liberty for Smith.²⁰

Civil or Social Liberty

In his book, On Liberty, J. S. Mill declares that the subject of his book is not ‘Liberty of the Will’, … but Civil, or Social Liberty: the nature and limits of the power which can be legitimately exercised by society over the individual.’ In the sense of safeguarding the liberty of individual or the minority to action, opinion, speech and thought against what Mill calls, ‘the tyranny of majority’, is the scope of Civil or Social Liberty for Mill. Sir Ernest Barker holds that civil liberty denotes liberty of a person in the capacity of an individual and includes personal liberty such as security, health, movement, expression of thought, belief and religion, contract, etc. For Barker, civil liberty includes: (i) physical freedom, (ii) intellectual freedom, and (iii) contractual freedom. Blackstone includes personal security of reputation and acquisition, enjoyment and disposal of personal property also in personal liberty. As such, following Mill, Blackstone and Barker, civil and social liberty will include liberty of action, belief, contract, opinion, speech, thought and also liberty to life, safety, health, movement, trade, business, property, reputation, etc. The Indian Constitution also provides a wide range of civil liberties which includes liberty to business, profession and trade, movement and residence in India, religious liberty, freedom of speech, press, political affiliation and trade union activities, etc. as part of fundamental rights. Civil or social liberty can be treated as rights or conditions that authority and society recognize and protect in the public and private spheres of individuals. Following from Mill's differentiation between the ‘self-regarding’ and ‘other-regarding’ actions, we can also distinguish between private and public spheres of individual's life. Civil liberty is also understood in terms of liberty that comes from following the established law or liberty as established by law. Rousseau used civil liberty to denote this aspect.

Economic Liberty

Economic liberty could be treated as a part of civil liberty in the sense of liberty of business, employment and work, profession, property and trade. However, it is generally associated with the individual in the capacity of a worker or producer using physical or mental work. Thus, economic liberty could mean different things for different people and will depend on the perspective one is looking from. For example, for an unemployed youth, economic liberty would mean liberty or chance to have employment; for a trader or businessman it will mean liberty to trade and do business within a sphere of fair competition; for an industrialist and capitalist it will mean liberty to produce and earn profit; for consumers it will mean availability of necessary items in the market at reasonable and fair prices which means a non-monopolistic and regulated market; for a worker it will mean security of work or gainful employment. Article 19 in Part III of the Constitution of India relating to fundamental rights, mentions the right ‘to practise any profession, or to carry out any occupation, trade or business’ which are in the nature of economic liberty. Some of the provisions contained in the Directive Principles of State Policy in Part IV, such as right to work, living wages and even participation of workers in management of industries are also in the nature of economic liberty. The Constitution of India also provides right to property as constitutionally protected liberty, though no more a fundamental right. There are differences even within the fold of pluralists writers. Barker, for example, in his book Principles of Social and Political Theory in which he explores the relationship between justice, equality, liberty and rights, does not treat economic liberty as liberty in the capacity of a worker. He includes it as part of civil liberty as contained in the liberty of contract. Laski, on the other hand, advocates industrial democracy as part of economic liberty. Neo-liberals such as Milton Friedman insist that economic freedom in terms of free competitive capitalism is a precondition for maintenance of political freedom. On the other hand, Marxian supporters seek economic liberty in the abolition of private property and capitalist economic structure. Dilemma of economic liberty may be captured in Rousseau's words, ‘one should not be so strong to be able to buy the “other” person and the “other” should not be so weak to be sold.’

Political Liberty

While thinkers have related civil liberty in the capacity of an individual person, economic liberty in the capacity of a worker, they associate political liberty in the capacity of a citizen. When the Greeks and the Romans speak of liberty or freedom of participation by citizens in public affairs of Greece and Rome respectively, they speak of political liberty. While Greeks meant civic freedom, in Rome, Cicero called it republican liberty. In contemporary times, this implies freedom of participation in political and public affairs, provision of participation for all in the sense of universal suffrage, existence of conditions to enable expression of freedom of participation such as free and fair elections, presence of healthy public opinion which requires education, freedom of thought and expression and discussion. Locke and Montesquieu talked about separation of different powers—legislative, executive and judicial, which is meant to provide checks and balances against each other. Locke talked about limited government also, which means the government as an agent of people. Blackstone feels that political liberty is a negative liberty, which is used to curb the government. Locke, Montesquieu and Blackstone would like to limit or curb government with checks and balances as guarantee of political liberty. Barker, however, feels that political liberty is not merely a means to curb the government but is the liberty of constituting and controlling the government by choice and election and discussion and sharing. In this sense, it is a positive right enabling political participation and self-development by discussion and sharing of opinion, etc.

Negative and Positive Liberty

Liberal thinkers support both the negative and positive views of liberty. In the negative view, liberty is treated as the absence of restraint in the sphere of individual actions. This is to counter interference of authority/state in the individual's area of activity. One school of liberal thinkers supports the negative view of liberty and would be happy if interference from the state or external forces is either absent or minimal. In the positive view, liberty or freedom is taken as enabling conditions in terms of socio-economic requirements necessary for enjoyment of liberty. It is also related to self-development or moral and self-realization. The other school of liberal thinkers supports the positive view of liberty and seeks interference by the State or authority for making provision and providing enabling conditions. Macpherson likes to call developmental or creative freedom to designate positive liberty. While the negative view of liberty is generally associated with laissez-faire and minimalist state advocated by Smith, Locke, Hayek, Friedman, Berlin and Nozick, the positive view of liberty is identified with the welfare state supported by Mill, Green, Laski, Barker, Tawney, Hobhouse, Macpherson, Rawls, Chapman, Galbraith, Amartya Sen, etc.

National Freedom or National Liberation

In the context of colonial subjugation, nationalist struggles in Asia and Africa and also Latin America against the foreign domination has been termed as national freedom or liberation movements. In India also, we generally refer to the struggle for independence as India's national freedom movement. With the emergence of nationalist consciousness and awareness for political independence, many ‘third world’ countries witnessed radical national freedom or liberation movements against colonial occupation. It was based on struggle, not only for political independence, but also against cultural, economic, psychological and moral domination of colonial powers. In India, at the end of nineteenth and beginning of twentieth century, Dadabhai Naoroji in his Poverty and un-British Rule in India and R. C. Dutt in his The Economic History of India portrayed the economic consequences of colonial domination. In his The Wretched of the Earth written in the light of the Algerian liberation struggle, Fanon developed a powerful critique of the psychological impact of colonialism.’²¹ Kwame Nkrumah in his Neo-Colonialism: The Highest Stage of Imperialism depicted how continuance of colonial linkage even after the end of political domination results in economic and other forms of colonial relations between the liberated nation and erstwhile colonial master. There have been ‘national liberation’ movements demanding independence from either the constituted nation-state after the end of colonialism such as in case of India, Sri Lanka, etc. or against perceived or unjustified occupation by a country such as Palestine Liberation against Israel or The Tibetan Liberation against China.

Liberty, Liberation, Freedom, Licence, Anarchy and Authority

Liberty, both in its positive and negative sense, is identified within the liberal framework and is related to the individual as the agent to be either left without interference or to be provided with enabling conditions to realize liberty in the sense of self-realization or development. Liberation, however, does not imply such a meaning. Liberation is used to describe a generally radical political goal or a movement that seeks to alter the prevailing relationship of power, dominance and perceived or existing inequality. For example, anti-colonial movements in countries under subjugation were generally identified as liberation movements. Similarly, many a movement within a nation-state that identifies itself as a separate nation such as Liberation Tigers of Tamil Elam (Sri Lanka), or one that resents political domination of others such as Palestine Liberation Organization (Israel, Palestine) also take liberation as goal. Liberation movements have generally been radical in their approach and embraced collective goals. One of such an effort emerged in the form of women's liberation or feminist movements, which sought to alter primarily not only the political but also other forms of power relations that prevail between male and female in society. This resulted in the demand for equal political, civil and economic rights and also for the sexual liberation of women. The core of feminist liberation philosophy is that ‘gender’ is a political construct based on stereotypical masculine-feminine behaviour and social roles.²² This becomes a political construct justifying unequal share of power, privileges, roles and status for male and females. Feminist movements hold that patriarchy justifies inequality by assigning to females such identity as passive, shy, submissive, weak or feeble. Feminist movements have focused on the oppression women have to bear due to the incidence of multiple inequalities including mental, moral, psychological and sexual repression. As part of countering gender myth, feminist movements have advocated sexual freedom also.

Liberty is generally associated with the liberal conception of individual freedom. Liberation, though aims at freedom and liberty, and focuses on collective interest or goal. It seeks to fight against power inequality, e.g. women liberation movements focusing on gender inequality as a political construct. Freedom also stands for liberty but is not restricted to the liberal framework only for its use. Freedom as a generic term is used across various perspectives. Liberal and Marxian theorists alike use the term freedom though with different meanings. Liberation as a goal and movement implies freedom in the sense of an ideal or a normative and ethical goal. Freedom is associated with ‘free will’ as opposed to an entirely determined action.

When we look at the scope of liberty from the viewpoint of it being arranged or adjusted to the claims of different individuals, two extreme positions may emerge. One of them claims complete liberty even to the extent of absence of all restraints as if it is the market of individual liberty with survival of the fittest as the goal. This way of conceiving liberty amounts to liberty as licence. It is almost agreed that liberty as licence is not the approved goal of political society. Thrasymachus's insistence on force principle, might is right, in Plato's Republic, Manu and Kautilaya's mention of matsyanyaya, big fish eating the smaller one, Hobbes and to some extent, Locke's description of state of nature, etc. can be treated as examples of licentious liberty. Though liberal theorists such as Adam Smith, John Locke, Herbert Spencer, Isaiah Berlin, Milton Friedman, Robert Nozick and others advocate the minimalist approach of intervention in an individual's liberty, this however does not mean they are exponent of licentious liberty. The governing principle of liberty should not be licence. Liberty is doing or enjoying what an individual is entitled to do or enjoy without harming similar liberty of others. When one goes beyond one's required or given liberty and rights, which instead of helping the individual harms others, licentious liberty starts. As such, going beyond one's own liberty and abusing the rights of others, leads to licentious liberty. For example, I have liberty to drive on the road, but not as per the speed I like obstructing and threatening others on the road; I have a right to trade and do business, but not to do trade in human slaves harming their rights to have a dignified life. This requires liberty that does not degenerate into licence.

This means that liberty should be regulated and adjusted with other principles such as equality, justice and rights of others. There have been various attempts and propositions to differentiate between the spheres of liberty and licence on the one hand and justify grounds of liberty on the other. Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau differentiated between liberty available in the state of nature and those, which are part of the civil society. Thus, a distinction between natural and civil liberty is made. These contractualists treat natural liberty as liberty, which is more or less licentious due to unregulated selfishness (Hobbes), unregulated legislation, execution and interpretation of law (Locke) and idyllic savagery (Rousseau). Counter to this, the scope of liberty is defined as either provided by the Leviathan (Hobbes) or the institution of government as trust while people retain certain natural rights (Locke) or submission to the General Will (Rousseau). However, in all the cases there is transition from licentious liberty to civil liberty. In contractualists’ view, liberty is civil liberty; Hobbes and Rousseau make it clear by asking the individual to seek their liberty in submission to the Leviathan and the General Will, respectively. And for Locke ‘end of law is not to abolish or restrain but to preserve and enlarge freedom. As such, freedom and liberty is grounded in the civil liberty, liberty as regulated by law or a properly instituted authority.

While contractualists seek to ground liberty in the political sense, J. S. Mill is concerned with the sphere of individual liberty in the context of society expressed in the form of majority. On what ground interference by society or majority of that society in the actions and sphere of liberty of the individual or the minority is allowed? Mill's solution lies in the differentiation between ‘self-regarding’ and ‘other-regarding’ actions of the individual. Mill is of the view that an individual needs liberty for complete self-development. As such, self-regarding sphere of actions should not be interfered by society. One is sovereign over his body and mind and should not be hindered by external interference in self-development.

However, Mill's differentiation between ‘self-regarding’ and ‘other regarding’ actions allows scope for interference. To protect similar liberty of the other individual, society or majority of it should interfere and regulate the liberty in such a manner that self-regarding sphere of all is coordinated. Further, liberty also does not mean liberty to the extent of harming oneself. Mill will agree that an individual who knows that crossing a damaged bridge is harmful for others is correct in interfering with the action of others and not allowing them to cross. So far as freedom to cross the bridge would result in falling in the river and harm to life, interference is not against liberty. Thus, liberty if taken to the extent of harming either oneself or others, may become licentious.

Some political theorists such R. H. Tawney, L. T. Hobhouse, H. J. Laski and Sir E. Barker have maintained that there should not be unregulated liberty. They opine that liberty of one has to be qualified by the liberty of all. In short, there should be equality of liberty. Tawney cautions against emphasis on liberty alone when he says, ‘the freedom of the pike is death to the minnows’. For Hobhouse, unchartered freedom of one should become servitude of all hence equality of freedom requires equal restraint upon all. Given the fact that each individual would enjoy similar liberty concurrently in society, it requires relative and regulated liberty. Barker in his book, Principles of Social and Political Theory has suggested necessity of ‘relative and regulated liberty’. He feels that while making distinction between ‘self-regarding’ and ‘other-regarding’ actions of individuals, Mill excludes the former from the regulated and relative sphere. According to Barker, this way of distinguishing actions of individual is meaningless. He calls Mill ‘a prophet of empty liberty’. Barker says that Mill should have separated the sphere of society and the State rather than that of the individual. This would provide the area in which the State interferes and the area in which society interferes. This view of Barker is in line with his pluralist position. Sabine has also pointed out that Mill's proposition of liberty based on ‘self-regarding’ actions of individual would have been more convincing provided ‘there was a body of natural rights which intrinsically belonged to individuals and of which they ought never to be deprived’.²³

Anarchists have advocated an extreme position in favour of liberty. For them, liberty means absence of any authority—State, property, administration, court, etc. Though in different degrees, Proudhon, Kropotkin, Bakunin and other anarchists advocate absence of any authority—religious, political, economic, as hindrance to liberty. However, an anarchic political stage should not be confused with a stage of licentious liberty. Licentious liberty or minimal interference stands for absence of restraints so that the individual realizes his or her liberty in a competitive manner. For Smith, Ricardo, Malthus, Spencer, Nozick, liberty means liberty to compete and survive, as one is the fittest. For advocates of anarchic position, absence of authority in any form is not licence to do what one wants. An anarchic position is a political state of human effort where each individual realizes his or her self-development as per their fullest capacity not in competition, but in cooperation. An anarchic position on liberty implies comprehensive liberty—from state and political authority, religious yoke and economic domination.

Thus, we find that liberty and freedom have been advocated for individuals, groups, nations, communities, gender, etc. Various bases of this have been advocated which include natural liberty of individuals, ‘self-regarding’ actions of individuals, gender equality, national liberation, freedom for self-development, liberty as absence of any authority, etc. On the other hand, bases of regulated liberty have also been advocated. These include ‘regulated and relative liberty’, ‘equality of liberty for all’, liberty as provided by civil law, liberty of one not to harm the liberty of others, etc. In recent times, Rawls's conception of distributive justice has suggested compatibility of liberty of one with that of the other as a principle of justice. It seems unregulated liberty will be liberty of few. But over-regulation will amount to absence of liberty. We require coordination and adjustment amongst liberty of each for any meaningful enjoyment of liberty by all. This requires interference and authority. But at the same time, excessive authority may lead to the very absence of liberty. A balance between liberty and authority is required.

Relationship between liberty and authority is to be understood in terms of the perspective that one adopts such as laissez-faire individualism and the negative view of liberty or pluralist-liberal position, positive-liberal position, Marxian position, Anarchist view, etc.

Negative and Positive Liberty

Within the liberal fold, liberty of individual has been understood and explained in two ways. In the first sense, liberty is described as that sphere or area of individual actions that is not restrained or interfered by others. In the second sense, it is associated with effective conditions or power of self-realization or moral freedom. While in the first, liberty amounts to absence of external obstruction in the actions of individual, in the second, liberty is equated with inner freedom and self-mastery. It follows that while negative liberty seeks placing limits on external interference, positive liberty insists on provision of those conditions that help self-realization or self-mastery. Limits on external interference on individual actions can be in the form of restrictions and checks on authority as in the form of separation of powers, checks and balances, constitutional governments, rule of law, provisions of rights, etc. or limits on majoritarian tyranny as Mill and Tocqueville suggested. Conditions that help self-realization and self-mastery require socio-economic and other enabling provisions.

Lets us understand the two dimensions of liberty with the help of a simple example. Suppose there are two individuals, one having money and capacity to buy things available in the market and another having no money or capacity to buy. Given the fact that every individual in a society has the liberty to buy a packet of bread, liberty implies one being not interfered with while buying bread. In the negative sense, liberty is available for both of them. That is, both the individuals should not be restrained from buying bread. But do both individuals have an equal chance to buy? Can negative liberty of not being restrained translate into actual enjoyment of that liberty? While one having capacity to buy bread enjoys liberty, the other cannot translate that liberty into actual action. This implies that negative liberty, though is an important condition, is not a sufficient condition for liberty. Positive liberty requires conditions that help translate negative liberty in actual action. It is perfectly acceptable that mere absence of conditions that help enjoy liberty cannot be taken to argue that there is no liberty. But on the other hand, mere availability of equality of liberty to buy also does not help in any way to translate liberty in action. In this sense, negative liberty is premised on the availability of certain a priori privileges. My liberty to buy is based on the fact that I have the power to buy. However, many liberal theorists are of the view that negative liberty is not only primary but sufficient condition of liberty and argue that admission of the equality principle of enjoyment of liberty leads to the very curtailment of liberty.

Before discussing the views of various theorists, we may summarize the main points on the negative and positive dimensions of liberty in Table 7.1.

 

Table 7.1 Negative and Positive Liberty

Aspects	Negative Liberty	Positive Liberty
Liberty Defined	Liberty is understood in terms of absence of external restraint on individual actions including obstacles put by law Liberty is concerned with area or sphere of control by others—smaller the area of control on individual actions, larger is liberty Liberty—absence of restraints and coercion	Liberty is understood in terms of self-realization and necessary conditions that help in self-realization Liberty is concerned with its sources and ability to act—sources and material resources that help enjoy liberty by giving ability to enjoy Liberty—self-realization/moral development
Conditions of Liberty	Sphere or area of individual actions not to be interfered Non-interference from authority of the State, majority in society, etc. Economic liberty is primary component of liberty	Provisions for enabling conditions to be made Provisions for education, employment, basic human necessities, gender equality, working conditions, etc.
Sufficiency of Liberty	Negative liberty is primary and a sufficient condition of liberty	Negative liberty is only one condition of liberty, sufficiency requires enabling conditions
Relationship with Equality and Justice	Principle of equality and justice, inimical to liberty	Principles of equality and justice necessary for enjoyment of liberty
Role of the State	Minimalist—limited state with only basic functions like law and order, protection, security, defence etc. No planned or command economy—it leads to paternalism and hence restricts liberty by interference	Welfarist state Provides conditions that help realize liberty
Main Advocates	Physiocrates Laissez-faire theorists (Adam Smith, David Ricardo) Social Contractualists (Thomas Hobbes and Locke) Utilitarian (J. S. Mill), Neo-liberals (F. A. Hayek, Isaiah Berlin, Milton Friedman, Robert Nozick) Herbert Spencer, Benjamin Constant, Thomas Paine, Henry Sidgwick, Thomas Jefferson, Alex Tocqueville, etc.	J. S. Mill, T. H. Green, R. H. Tawney, L. T. Hobhouse, Ernest Barker, H. J. Laski, C. B. Macpherson, Amartya Sen, etc.

Negative Liberty

Liberal theorists have developed different grounds to support negative liberty. On the basis of natural liberty and natural rights of individuals, Physiocrates (Francois Quesnay and Mirabeau), early laissez-faire economists (Smith, Ricardo and Malthus) and contractualists (Hobbes and Locke) proposed individual liberty and argued for either complete non-interference or limited interference by authority in individual liberty. This basis of argument was both for economic liberty as well as political liberty of individual. J. S. Mill and Alex Tocqueville developed the ground for liberty of the individual and minority against the tyranny of majority. Mill's argument was to protect the civil and social sphere of individual liberty in terms of free expression, thought, belief and actions. Tocqueville also argued against the majority suppressing the minority and the individual's actions in democracy. Benjamin Constant advocated liberty of religion, opinion, expression and property and argued that these must be guaranteed against arbitrary invasion. Herbert Spencer, a sociologist, argued for individual liberty in a negative sense on the basis of organic analogy of the Darwinian principle of survival of the fittest principle. Jefferson, Paine, Sidgwick and others have also argued for non-interference in individual liberty as the ground for liberty. Contemporary political theorists, neo-liberals (Hayek, Berlin, Friedman and Nozick), have combined the concept of natural and inviolable liberty of the individual with criticism of state interference in the name of individual welfare and good to argue for negative liberty. We may briefly discuss the views and arguments in defence of negative liberty proposed by these theorists.

Physiocrats refer to a school of economic thought in France led by François Quesnay and Mirabeau in the eighteenth century. They advocated liberty of production and non-interference of the State in the activity of individual. Their main argument was that the individual left to oneself in a natural condition was the best producer and labour in land was the primary source of production. This was premised on an understanding of goodness of nature and that labour can produce only when performed on land and in the bosom of nature.²⁴ Physiocrats advocated policy of laissez-faire in agricultural activity of individual.

Laissez-faire economists, Smith, Ricardo and Malthus, influenced by Physiocrats, however refined the non-interference argument and applied the argument of labour as productive element to commercial and industrial activity. Adam Smith views self-interest as the moving force in individual for doing and acting in society. However, this basic instinct to do business to our best advantage needs a self-regulated mechanism, if it has to emerge in the form of a market leading to general prosperity. This regulator, Smith identifies as ‘competition’—the conflict of the self-interested actors in the marketplace. In short, Smith deducing from the nature of the individual as self-interested and having natural propensity to trade and do business, concludes that it will result in competition in a situation of similarly self-interested individuals. Thus, Smith's view of individual is that of a rational calculator, an economic man, in competition with similar individuals. For Smith, the economic man in a situation of competition must not be interfered with if natural liberty is to be protected. Freedom of an economic man and liberty for commerce and industry is the basis of natural liberty for Smith. Smith's argument is that the economic man, in a situation of an invisible hand of competition, is the best producer and contributor to the wealth of nations, if left without interference from the State or external authority.

David Ricardo developed his theory of rent to show that rent earned by landlord on land and protected by state interference was against the interest of free trade. This was apparent in his fight against the Corn Laws, which protected British grains that were costly. He advocated non-interference of the State in individual activity and enterprise as interference at that point of time was against the rising capitalist class and protected the landlords.

Thomas Malthus developed his theory of overpopulation and natural causes of correcting them. He argued that while subsistence would increase arithmetically, population increased exponentially, creating a gap between subsistence and population. It is natural that some or the other section of population would always be in misery. He also argued that it would be unnatural to correct this imbalance by external interference or charity. As such, there should not be interference from the State or authority that disturbs the natural course of action. Malthus added a new ground to the laissez faire position.

These three theorists provided arguments in defence of non-interference in individual liberty and sphere of economic enterprise from the point of view of capitalist and commercial activities. However, it is apparent that their objective, directly or indirectly, was to provide theoretical support to the emerging capitalist and commercial classes against the landed and agricultural gentry. We can say that the emerging capitalist and commercial class in Europe influenced the laissez fair argument of individual liberty.

On the political ground, Hobbes and Locke developed their arguments to propose and defend the sphere of individual liberty. Thomas Hobbes argued that the individual in the commonwealth is subject to laws as the very purpose of escape from the state of nature is to institute the Leviathan as the supreme lawgiver and protector. The Leviathan provides conditions and grounds for liberty. However, he is of the view that notwithstanding predominance of laws, the individual is free to the extent law does not prohibit a particular action. Wayper identifies this as liberty ‘which men enjoys in the silence of the laws’.²⁵ In this way, Hobbes admits liberty ‘to buy and sell and otherwise contract with one another; to choose their own abode, their own diet, their own trade of life, and institute their children as they themselves think fit.’ This means, liberty of the individual amounts to what laws do not interfere with. We can say that in this sense law is seen as the main obstacle to liberty, in the absence of which the individual enjoys liberty.

John Locke's concept of inalienable natural rights of ‘life, liberty and estate’ provide individual, exclusive and indefeasible realm, which the State cannot violate or negate. These rights include individual civil and political rights of life, liberty and property. Right to life requires other rights and things, which are necessary to preserve it. The very idea of inalienable natural rights which the individual carries from the state of nature provides Locke an important ground to limit government. Government is limited to the extent these rights should not be violated. Thus, natural rights provide a realm for individual liberty, which is not interfered by external authority. For Locke, individual liberty is based on non-violation of exclusive realm of natural rights and this requires a limited government. However, Locke though proposed a limited government and rule of law as means of putting limit on arbitrary law, he felt that law instead of restricting liberty may defend or enlarge it. He says the end of law is not to abolish or restrain but to preserve and enlarge freedom. In this way, the role of law is to protect the liberty of one from interference or encroachments by others.

J. S. Mill is considered as an important liberal thinker who provides significant arguments to defend the sphere of liberty of individual. He is concerned with protecting the rights of one individual to act, at least, in the matters of those actions, which do not concern other individuals or society, ‘self-regarding actions’. Mill's defence of individual liberty is directed against the tyranny of the majority. Mill's primary concern is not the struggle between Liberty and Authority, but what he calls ‘Civil, or Social Liberty: the nature and limits of the power which can be legitimately exercised by society over the individual.’²⁶ Mill's discussions in his On Liberty are meant to deal with this aspect. He is aware that tyranny of the majority is exercised either ‘by the hands of political functionaries or society executing its own mandates’.²⁷ Thus, society can be oppressive, interfering and coercive of individual liberty, either directly or through the political functionaries. Mill wants protection ‘against the tyranny of the magistrate’ as well as ‘against the tyranny of the prevailing opinion and feeling’. For Mill, protection against political despotism was as important as against tyranny of the majority. Having realized that society and its majority have become the primary source of curtailing individual liberty in contemporary times, Mill was concerned with separating a sphere of individual liberty that remains un-interfered with. This requires separating: (i) sphere of individual actions that can be protected against the invasion of the majority and its dictates (ii) the sphere in which society can legitimately interfere. With this objective, he differentiates between ‘self-regarding’ and ‘other-regarding’ actions of individuals. By differentiating two spheres of individual actions, Mill's aim is to protect the sphere of ‘self-regarding actions’ from any external interference.

His differentiation between ‘self-regarding’ and ‘other-regarding’ actions are based on two maxims that Mill talks about in ‘Chapter V: Application’²⁸ of his book, On Liberty. First that ‘the individual is not accountable to society for his actions, in so far as these concern the interests of no person but himself’. Thus in ‘self-regarding action’ there is no accountability admitted except as Mill says, advice, instructions, persuasion, and avoidance by others. However, in ‘other-regarding’ actions, those actions that are prejudicial to the interests of others, the individual is accountable. In this sphere of actions, the individual is subject to social or legal punishments as deemed necessary by society for its protection.

Mill's argument is that ‘in all things which regard the external relations of the individual, he is de jure amenable to those whose interests are concerned, and if need be, to society as their protector.’ This is the sphere of ‘other-regarding’ actions where the individual's actions have bearing on other individuals and to this extent the actions of each individual have to be interfered with. Having accepted the sphere of individual actions, which is open to interference, Mill proposes a second sphere of individual action. This is ‘self-regarding’ action, which ‘is a sphere of action in which society … has only indirect interest’. This he considers as ‘the appropriate region of human liberty’. ‘Self-regarding’ actions should not be interfered by others and there should be no impediments from fellow beings. In ‘self-regarding’ actions, he includes; (i) inward domain of consciousness, i.e., liberty of conscience, liberty of thought and feeling and also freedom of opinion and sentiment (due to the reason that expressing and publishing opinion concerns others also, the latter are linked to other-regarding actions also); (ii) liberty of taste and pursuits, framing plan of life to suit one's own character and doing what one likes without harming others; (iii) liberty of combination among individuals, which means freedom to unite for any purpose not involving harm to others.²⁹ He also advocates liberty of free trade and production.

Mill is clear in proposing negative liberty in terms of non-interference by fellow beings and society in ‘self-regarding’ actions of individual. He expresses his proposal clearly when he says, ‘the only part of the conduct of any one, for which he is amenable to society, is that which concerns others. In the part which merely concerns himself, his independence is, of right, absolute. Over himself, over his body and mind, the individual is sovereign.’³⁰ In short, Mill's argument is that the individual's liberty consists in being not interfered with or absence of impediments in ‘self-regarding’ actions. He presents a very strong ground for defence of negative liberty.

However, it would not be difficult to identify weaknesses in his arguments. By admitting interference in ‘other regarding actions’, Mill leaves enough space for interference. Mill admits that one person would be justified in preventing another person from crossing a bridge that he/she knows is damaged, though the person feels that his/her liberty lies in crossing the river. In admitting such a ground of interference amounts to agreeing with Rousseau's position that one would be forced to be free. However, Mill's position in this regard is that liberty consists in doing what one desires and the person intending to cross the bridge certainly does not desire his/her own harm. However, Barker has criticized Mill's distinction between ‘self-regarding’ and ‘other-regarding’ actions and has called him prophet of empty liberty. For Barker, Mill's case could have been more valid, had he argued by separating individual actions in the realms of the State and the society. Barker's suggestions, however, is influenced by his own liberal-pluralist perspective which seeks to give primacy to society over the State.

It has also been held against Mill that it would not be possible to really differentiate between what is ‘self-regarding’ and what is ‘other-regarding’ in the strict sense of the term. While discussing the realm of ‘self-regarding and other-regarding actions’ in ‘Chapter V: Applications’ of his book Mill accepts that while free trade is ‘self-regarding’, restriction to control adulteration, sanitary precautions, protection of work people employed in dangerous occupations, sale of poison etc. do require intervention. Similarly, drunkenness that threatens others and offences against decency require intervention.

Sabine has suggested that Mill's defence of ‘self-regarding’ actions, as the realm of individual liberty should have logically followed natural rights arguments. The argument that the realm or sphere of ‘self-regarding’ actions should be protected could be stronger had Mill grounded this realm on natural rights of the ndividual. However, Mill as an utilitarian could not admit the natural rights arguments. One of the significant contributions of Mill is that he combines his defence of negative liberty with the positive or welfare state. He also supported positive state as the agency for providing conditions for development and self-realization of personality. As such Mill has contributed to both negative liberty as well as positive liberty.

Herbert Spencer, a sociologist, applies the principles of organic evolution to society in terms of struggle for existence and survival of the fittest. He argues against state-interference and objected to state-financed education, or to governmental protection of citizens against fraudulent finances. At one time, he argued that even the management of war should be a private, not a state, concern.³¹ Spencer supported a minimalist state or a watchman state. He suggested that state interference in intricate industrial situations would be inimical for liberty and enterprise. Like Adman Smith, Spencer also held economic relations must be left to the automatic self-adjustment of supply and demand. He also opposed the government attempting equality principle as forced.

Thinkers like Thomas Paine who celebrated the Rights of Man also contributed to the principle of non-interference as the basis of individual liberty. He denounced the State as a ‘necessary evil’ and supported the concept of the natural rights of man. However, Paine did not support the social contract theory and rejected it as a ‘clog on the wheel of progress’. His support to the natural rights is grounded on teleological basis. This means, rights are inherent in the very existence of man as its purpose or teleos is human life. Paine argued for a limited state with limited functions. He says, ‘while society in any state is a blessing, government, even in the best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one.’³² It seems Thomas Paine would never accept an interfering state. In Europe, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, emergence of trade, commerce and industrial activity required individual freedom from the interference of governments and state authorities. It may be mentioned that Europe was not yet a fully established democracy with all its constitutional limitations. In fact, the English Revolution (1688) and the French Revolution (1789) and if we may include, the American Revolution (1776), are all symbols of struggle of the industrial and bourgeois class over the receding feudal domination. Demand for non-interference by the State was to protect the sphere of rising industrial and capitalist individual. It is apparent that landlords were trying to hold their ground while emerging commercial and industrial bourgeoisie wanted to establish their position. This required freedom to do business, enterprise, industry, commerce and trade with less or no interference from a political set-up or state authorities that were in nature either absolutist or dominated by the landed gentry. Two main aspects of demand for negative liberty have been: (i) absence of restraint or coercion in economic activity of individuals including freedom to contract and (ii) limited political set-up that does not regulate all aspects of human life by law. Henry Sidgwick, a nineteenth-century advocate of negative liberty suggests that a freely negotiated contract is expression of individual choice notwithstanding the terms being onerous to him. This means that liberty to enter into free contract is an important part of negative liberty.

Liberty in a negative sense as being absence of restraint or coercion has been an important principle of liberalism. This has contributed in establishing theoretical and operation bases of individualist–capitalist system and limited political order. It is based on the maxim that everyone knows one's interest best. In economic terms, every individual becomes the master of his own labour, resources and material capacity that can be exchanged in a freely negotiated situation. This becomes the basis of freedom of contract. Workers are free to contract for selling labour in exchange of wages and capitalists are free to contract for purchase of labour. The State should not interfere to regulate the economic sphere and disturb a self-regulated market. In political terms, it means the State should not have extensive powers of law making for regulating the wide range of individual life. Neither should state interfere for redistribution of resources allocated in society based on freely contracted market. Since the assumption is that market is self-regulated and provides conditions of liberty, external interference by distorting this will hamper liberty. In the twentieth century, neo-liberals have argued for negative liberty. But before we take the neo-liberal position on liberty, we may discuss the concept of positive liberty.

Positive Liberty

We have seen previously the context in which the liberal theorists argued for negative liberty. Renaissance philosophy had argued and fought for installing the individual as the centre of all human activity. Classical liberal philosophy suitably trimmed this and spread understanding of human psychology as basically self-interested or self-centred. Many may call it triumph of bourgeoisie psychology. The tenor of negative liberalism seeks to ensure the realm of this self-interested individual in the political and economic field.

But by the dawn of the nineteenth century, two significant factors could be identified that led to the realization that mere negative liberty could not provide a holistic realm of liberty for individuals, at least, not to those who are the owners of labour and the authority of the State could be useful for regulating certain aspects such as contract and providing support to the industrial economy. Firstly, the conflict of interests between the landed or the aristocratic class and the rising capitalist class was already won in favour of the latter. This removed the perceived fear of state authority harming the interests of the rising class. Secondly, the growing problem of inequality and economic hardship in terms of working conditions, poor sanitation, health and habitation and other attendant problems were staring in the eyes of the labour class. Growing miserable conditions of the workers led to the realization that substantive liberty—liberty with equality and enabling conditions for self and moral development, were required. Liberty had to shift its ground from the ‘sphere of individual actions not interfered’, i.e., ‘freedom from’ outside authority, to ‘freedom to’ moral and self-development and self-realization. This avatar of liberty is called positive liberty. In Table 7.1, we have differentiated between negative and positive liberty. We may discuss the views of Mill, Green, Barker, Tawney, Hobhouse, Laski, and Macpherson on positive liberty. In recent times, Amartya Sen has argued for expansion of freedom in terms of capabilities.

When liberty is understood in a negative sense, it means what is not limited or interfered from outside. Liberty of an individual is premised on being unobstructed. To this extent, intention to bring equality and social justice will amount to obstructing someone's liberty. Those who understand liberty in a negative sense generally hold the view that liberty and equality, or for that matter, social justice, are incompatible. On the other hand, liberty in its positive sense means some kind of self-development and moral development of the personality. Liberty can be positive only when it is premised not merely on absence of obstructions but on presence of capability and ability to act or enjoy. It means the effective ability to act and self-realize. This requires enabling conditions. While negative liberty deals with the condition of liberty, whether interfered/obstructed or not, positive liberty deals with the sources of liberty like moral, material and educational capabilities to enjoy the condition of liberty. Positive liberty is generally associated with welfare measures and distributive justice.

J. S. Mill is a thinker who started with the conception of negative liberty but subsequently supported positive liberty and advocated the idea of a positive state. His idea of liberty if seen in the perspective of his revision of utilitarianism, insists on moral development, self-realization and self-mastery of the individual. Mill revised Bentham's utilitarian principle, which held quantitative pleasure as the end of individual efforts. He argued that instead of quantitative pleasure, qualitatively higher pleasure is the end to be sought. His views of individual liberty and freedom of thought, opinion and action is related to a qualitative aspect of individual personality. For Mill, they are necessary for making choices.

In fact, Mill terms ‘individuality as one of the elements of well-being’ and Chapter III in his book On Liberty is captioned as such. Individuality as a unique and special character of each individual comes when each has freedom to think, express and make choices. This leads to self-development. The idea behind such a premise is what Mill attributes to Wilhelm von Humboldt, the German philosopher who said, ‘the end of man, or that which is prescribed by the eternal or immutable dictates of reasons, and not suggested by vague and transient desires, is the highest and most harmonious development of his powers to a complete and consistent whole’. By invoking such a premise of Humboldt approvingly, Mill associates moral purpose with liberty of individual action. Every individual must direct his efforts to seek the individuality of power and development.³³ This, in turn, requires ‘freedom and variety of situations’. Mill insists that freedom and variety of situations are important because they are the basis of making choices. And in making choices, only the ‘human faculties of perception, judgment, discriminative feeling, mental activity and even moral preference, are exercised’. For example, a person who does something because it is the custom, makes no choice. Making a choice implies mental and moral improvement.³⁴ This is where Mill has weaved liberty and self-development together. For self-development and improving mental and moral faculties, liberty is essential.

Mill, starting with the definition of liberty as ‘being left to oneself’ shifts to define it as ‘doing what one desires’.³⁵ The first, being left to oneself or not interfered, gives a meaning of negative liberty. The second, doing what one desires, requires making choices by applying moral and mental faculties, gives a positive sense of liberty. Macpherson in his book, The Life and Times of Liberal Democracy, calls the model of democracy based on Mill's idea as Developmental Democracy, which seeks personal self-development of individual.³⁶ For Mill, development of powers and capabilities of moral, mental and personal realization is the end of individual actions. Macpherson feels that L. T. Hobhouse, A. D. Lindsay, Ernest Barker, Woodrow Wilson and R. M. MacIver also followed Mill's vision of developmental democracy.

Mill's idea of positive liberty in terms of self-development requires availability of conditions that facilitate this or remove obstacles in its realization. Mill is known for denying private property in land. In fact, he termed rent from land as ‘unearned income’. Probably on the same line as Ricardo has done while opposing the Corn Laws in England. Mill also advocates state supported compulsory education. He also supports the right to inheritance to be limited, factory legislation in case of children, limited working hours, and also right of the State to intervene in economic affairs.³⁷ Thus, liberty is essential for making choices and mental and moral development, which in turn, is required for self-development. Self-development implies positive liberty, liberty in terms of effective decision-making, self-mastery and inner freedom. Positive liberty requires a positive state. This is how Mill becomes the advocate of positive liberty that another British philosopher, Green sought to explain further.

T. H. Green, an idealist, presents a positive conception of freedom and relates it with the moral and self-development of individuals. He defined freedom as ‘positive power or capacity of doing or enjoying something worth doing or enjoying’. What does this positive power or capacity refer to? Is it effective power and ability to act, do or enjoy what one should? For Green, liberty is not absence of restraint as beauty is not absence of ugliness. It is freedom to do something worth doing or enjoying—freedom to pursue an objective which is worth pursuing. And the ‘worth’ is to be measured by the contribution it makes to the development of man. It is this objective that makes Green deviate from Hegel's idealist position on the State. Green treats the state not an end in itself but a means to development of man's moral nature and fulfilment of moral capacity without which man would not be man. If freedom is the right of a man to make the best of himself, the State must then remove obstacles in this endeavour. For Green, the State actually is a remover of obstacles.

Green's idea is that the State must interfere to remove obstacles and provide chances for fulfilment of moral capacity of individuals. Removal of ignorance and poverty from the untaught and unfed, as symbols of mental and physical malnutrition is essential. The State should remove these obstacles along with gin-shops and should also provide against contracts that result due to helplessness of one of the parties. Green's idea of positive liberty and the State as a remover of obstacles for self-realization of the individual, supports welfarism, positive state and social justice. Green tries to establish a relationship between human consciousness, liberty, rights and authority. He says, human consciousness needs liberty, liberty needs rights and rights need the State.

Ernest Barker, R. H. Tawney and L. T. Hobhouse are also considered as advocates of positive liberty. They argued for liberty of each to be adjusted in such a manner that it provides an equal chance to all not only in terms of the condition of it being legally available but also in socioeconomic terms. They feel that liberty cannot be left un-interfered with or unregulated. Whether equal opportunity to liberty is enough condition of liberty or does it require relevant ability to enjoy that opportunity to liberty. Barker, Tawney, Hobhouse and later Laski and Macpherson feel that for liberty to be a means for moral and self-development of an individual, not only should it be adjusted to the equal liberty of others but should be understood in terms of sources, socioeconomic conditions. Amartya Sen has also talked in terms of the individual's capability expansion as freedom.

Ernest Barker in his book Principles of Social and Political Theory opines that the State must treat every individual as a moral person and free agent, capable of developing his own capacity in his own way. He relates liberty as a means of development of personality. To have liberty in such a way that one enjoys concurrently with others, adjustment of liberty of one with the others is required. Enjoyment of liberty by all requires adjustments and adjustment of liberty of one with others requires regulation. Liberty is also relative because there should be specific liberty for each personality realizing specific capacities. According to Barker, liberty is always relative and regulated. His views on relative liberty arise from his premise that liberty is a derivative value, a value derived from the higher value of development of moral personality of individuals. We have mentioned earlier that Mill insisted on individuality as a unique and special character of each individual. Barker also suggests that there is need for definite liberty of a defined personality to realize specific capacities.

Barker formulates two basic principles to account for regulated and relative liberty. Firstly, the greatest common possible measure of liberty can be determined and defined by the need of each to enjoy similar and equal liberty with others. Thus, liberty of each adjusted to others, hence regulated. Secondly, there is a need of all to enjoy the specific liberty of realizing specific capacities, liberty of each relative to others as per requirements. Barker is critical of Mill's differentiation of ‘self-regarding’ and ‘other-regarding’ actions and the exclusion of ‘self-regarding’ actions from the scope of regulated and relative liberty. Barker calls Mill a ‘prophet of empty liberty’, liberty that is not grounded in social situations. Further, he feels that Mill should have separated individual actions in the sphere of society and the State rather than that of the individual itself (‘self-regarding’ and ‘other-regarding’).

For Barker, liberty needs to be balanced both internally and externally. He has talked about three types of specific liberties—civil, political and economic. Civil liberty implies liberty in the capacity of an individual as a person. This includes physical freedom from injury, threat to life, health and movement of the body, intellectual freedom such as expression of thought and belief, and exercise of choices in the field of contractual actions. Political liberty implies liberty in the capacity of a citizen. This involves liberty of constituting and controlling government. Economic liberty implies liberty in the capacity of a worker and Barker would like to treat this as part of contractual actions. When Barker says, liberty needs to be balanced internally, what he suggests is that civil, political and economic liberty should condition each other. Liberty should also be balanced externally means it must also be conditioned by other principles—principles of equality and justice.

R. H. Tawney and L. T. Hobhouse also advocate balancing liberty with equality. Tawney in his book Equality maintains that equality is necessary to make liberty substantive. For him, liberty should imply not only civil and political rights, but also security for the economically weak. L. T. Hobhouse in his book Elements of Social Justice argues that a freedom to be enjoyed by all must be put some restriction upon all other freedom of one. Hobhouse treats system of rights as system of harmonized liberties. It means maximum degree of freedom to each, compatible with the same degree of freedom to others.

Harold Joseph Laski relates freedom with the development of personality. He treats freedom as an opportunity essential for development of personality. His definition of liberty matches with Green's understanding of liberty and freedom. For Green, liberty is positive power or the capacity of doing or enjoying something worth doing or enjoying, and for Laski it is ‘the positive and equal opportunity of self-realization’.³⁸ His further explanation of liberty as eager maintenance of that atmosphere in which men have the opportunity to be their best selves also supports his concern for positive liberty. It is clear that an enabling and facilitating atmosphere, in the shape of rights, is required for men achieving their best selves. Laski mentions three kinds of liberty—private, political and economic, which are helpful in development of the human personality. For Laski, three conditions, namely absence of privileges, presence of a set of rights and a responsible government are required for realization of liberty.

Laski is known to have shifted his position on liberty. Broadly, he supports positive liberty as an essential factor for development of personality and his views are close to that of Green. However, at one point of time he even regretted having supported the conception of positive liberty. In the preface to the second edition of the A Grammar of Politics (1929), he declared, ‘In 1925, I thought that liberty could most usefully be regarded as more than a negative thing. I am now convinced that this was a mistake and that the old view of it as an absence of restraint can alone safeguard the personality of the citizen.’³⁹ It seems Laski now supports negative liberty. Assuming that he does, as is apparent when he says ‘…the old view of it as an absence of restraint …’, it could be possible that Laski was apprehensive of the growing corporatist and fascist states that may legitimize interference in the name of providing conditions of liberty. Nevertheless, his conception of liberty in terms of absence of restraint may also be interpreted in terms of positive liberty. Laski in Liberty in the Modern State, says, ‘I mean by liberty the absence of restraint upon the existence of those social conditions which, in modern civilizations, are the necessary guarantees of individual happiness.’ He explains his conception of liberty as absence of restraints but in terms of social conditions. This is no different from his earlier definition of liberty as the positive and equal opportunity of self-realization. Positive and equal opportunity cannot be available unless social conditions are conducive.

C. B. Macpherson has supported the case for liberty in a positive sense. But instead of accepting the division between positive and negative liberty, he calls it developmental liberty or creative freedom. According to him, positive liberty is the same thing as developmental liberty. This is liberty to act as a full human being and achieve the fullest development and enjoyment of one's faculties. Fullest development may be understood in terms of development of human capacities—moral, intellectual, aesthetic as well as material productive capacities. This is what Mill argued for when he introduced the qualitative principle and revised Bentham's utilitarian principle based on quantitative principle.

Macpherson makes a distinction between developmental and extractive power. While extractive power relates to the use of other's potentialities for serving one's own ends, developmental power requires development of one's own capacities and its application to one's self-appointed goals. While extractive power is based on treating the individual as consumer, developmental power views the individual as an agent and creative being.

Macpherson accepts the liberal premise of individual liberty and the central ethical principle of liberalism, ‘the freedom of the individual to realize his or her human capacities’.⁴⁰ But he says, this central ethical principle should not be confined for its realization to the capitalist market society. His idea is that men are not merely consumers of material things but ‘exerters and enjoyers of the exertion and development of their own capacities’. While as a consumer one consumes by oneself, for one's own satisfaction or to show superiority to others; as an exerter or enjoyer of one's capacities, one acts in conjunction with others.⁴¹ Macpherson's emphasis on developmental and creative freedom focuses on development and realization of inner faculties and capacities of human beings. He opposes the position of early liberalism of the individual as a possessive individual, proprietor of own labour, capacity and power unconcerned with society. He advocates that human beings should change their consciousness of themselves as consumers and appropriators to exerters and enjoyers of their own capacities. For this, reduction in social and economic inequality and availability of means of life and labour are required. He argued for equal liberty and participatory democracy. He is considered as a radical liberal as he rejects the early liberal position and advocates non-market-based participatory democracy.

Let us try to understand what Macpherson says as consumer and exerter. in contemporary times, the market projects many products as if they are meant to define your existence. You are what you wear, what you drink, what you eat! This is true in the field of fast food, men and women dressing, fashion and personal care industry. Though they are meant as a provocation for consumption, they are projected as if you are not yourself unless you do what they say. Whichever way they are projected, they are meant to catch you as consumers. To the consumer, market seeks to project a somewhat distorted picture. Socrates is not Socrates because he drank hemlock but because he drank soft drink, Cleopatra was not beautiful and empowered because she was beautiful and queen of Egypt but because she seduced Caesar and had courage to die of snake bite, Einstein was not Einstein because he was a scientist but because he had a designer hair and moustache, Arthur Miller was not Arthur Miller because he wrote Death of a Salesman but because he married Marilyn Monroe, Mr Harry is not Mr Harry because this is his name but because he wears Harry collections and neither Karl Marx nor Herbert Spencer were Marx and Spencer as they did not wear from Marks and Spencer and so on so forth. A person is a person not because he or she merely wears, drinks or eats but how he or she actually realizes one's inner faculties. in short, a person who drinks cold drinks to meet thirst is a consumer but the one who drank hemlock is an exerter, a woman who grows her hair long to advertise for shampoo is a consumer but the one who grows it to enjoy herself as a beautiful lady is an exerter.

Amartya Sen argues for ‘expansion of basic human capabilities’ in terms of education, health, employment, etc. as they are important for overall development not only in individual terms but also in economic terms. He has focused on how ‘variations in social opportunities not only lead to diverse achievements in the quality of life but also influence economic performance…, ’⁴² This means that human beings if not provided with basic opportunities like education, health, minimum livelihood, housing, gender equality etc. will neither neither be able to enjoy ‘capability’ nor contribute effectively in the economic development. Capability means ‘the range of options a person has in deciding what kind of life to lead’.⁴³ Let us assume a person ‘A’ who is educated, skilled and has employability has employed another person ‘B’ who is uneducated, unskilled and poor. It is apparent that has more choices over B in choosing how to live. Further, capability in the sense of choice to decide how one wants to live gets restricted due to poverty, illiteracy, gender, social and economic inequalities. This is what Sen would call ‘capability deprivation’. In a situation of capability deprivation, people will also not be able to participate effectively in the economic process. As such, he argues for expansion of capabilities as freedom. Sen's conception of capability expansion as freedom adds to positive freedom of human beings.

Liberalism: Classical and Modern, Neo-liberalism and Libertarianism

Before we proceed to discuss the contemporary liberal thinkers and their views on liberty, it may be suitable to explain the relationship between classical and modern liberalism and libertarianism. Liberalism as an ideology emerged after the breakdown of the feudal economic, political and social set-up. Liberalism is associated with commitment to individual liberty and freedom, especially in the economic and political field, limited authority based on consent, self-regulating market, etc. Liberalism treats the individual as rational and capable of deciding his or her own good. It does not support wide range intervention by the State in the name of good of the individual. This position is identified with classical liberalism. Classical liberalism supports individual liberty, laissez-faire policy, minimal state, self-regulating market and consent-based authority. Locke, Smith, Ricardo, Bentham, Mill and Spencer are considered as classical liberals.

However, by the end of the nineteenth century, operation of capitalism has generated undesirable consequences in the form of injustice, poor condition of workers and has left the mass of people unattended by the market. A sympathetic form of liberal ideology emerged which supported welfare and betterment of people. This form of liberalism is identified as ‘social or welfare liberalism’.⁴⁴ This is called modern liberalism. It argues for protecting people from the vagaries of the market and its evils. While classical liberal ideology focused on negative liberty, liberty as absence of external constraints upon the individual, modern liberalism focuses on positive liberty, liberty in terms of self-realization and personal development. While negative liberty assumes the individual as a rational being capable of willing and achieving if only not interfered with, positive liberty seeks individuality and self-realization of individual by requiring removal of constraints that hamper such realization. Thus, while the first aims to pre-empt constraints on liberty, hence a minimal state, the second seeks to remove constraints in way of individuality, hence a welfare and positive state. While negative liberty finds ideal of equality inimical to itself, positive liberty argues for equality as an important ally of positive liberty. Key writers and thinkers who support modern liberalism and positive liberty include Mill (qualitative aspect of utilitarianism and developmental view of individual personality), Green, Tawney, Hobhouse, Barker, Rawls and others.

By the second half of the twentieth century, many writers and thinkers started asserting the view of negative liberty, market individualism, economic freedom and minimal state as the basis of liberal philosophy. As opposed to the modern liberalism and its view of positive liberty, liberalism reasserted itself in the form of neo-liberalism. It asserted tenets of liberal ideology in an updated version and argued for a minimal state as nightwatchman, negative liberty in terms of laissez-faire ideology and economic freedom as the basis of other forms of freedom. It opposes any form of planning, central direction for resource allocation in society and intervention in the name of justice and equality. Hayek, Berlin, Friedman and Nozick are some of the prominent neo-liberals.

Libertarianism as an ideology is associated with classical liberalism as well as neo-liberalism. Libertarian ideology argues for increasing the realm of individual liberty and economic freedom based on laissez-faire doctrine. Individual liberty, in the negative sense and minimal state or authority along with complete freedom to economic activity, is the basis of libertarian ideology. Smith, Spencer, Hayek, Friedman and Nozick are considered as prominent libertarians.

Neo-liberal Views on Liberty

Debate on negative and positive aspects of liberty has focused on sphere and condition versus sources of liberty. Whether condition of non-interference and non-restraint in the sphere of individual actions are enough conditions of liberty or does it require sources for actually enjoying liberty. In short, whether liberty means being left alone and un-interfered by the authority of law and the State or does it require enabling conditions like education, employment, health etc., to realize the available liberty and achieve self-development. This debate has been discussed previously. However, regarding negative liberty, in the contemporary period some neo-liberal thinkers have taken up the debate and argued in favour of liberty as being free from others intervention. Hayek, Berlin, Friedman and Nozick have argued for negative liberty and negative state or minimalist state.

Friedrich A. Hayek is a prominent neo-liberal who advocates negative liberty and thin state. In his books, The Road to Serfdom (1948), The Constitution of Liberty (1960) and Law, Legislation and Liberty (1979), he has supported a free liberal order based on capitalist economy, which he considers as the only guarantee of individual liberty.

Hayek distinguishes individual liberty or freedom from three other forms of liberty namely, political freedom, inner freedom and freedom as power. He defines individual freedom as ‘freedom from subjection of coercion of arbitrary will of others’. This is a negative concept of freedom and liberty and is characterized by absence of coercion. Hayek rejects the positive or developmental view of liberty as he considers it inimical to individual liberty. This is because he apprehends that any form of intervention of the State in the name of securing sources of liberty, as the conception of positive liberty does, may lead to collectivist justification of state interference. On this ground, Hayek opposes planned economy and distributive justice. He feels that the conception of distributive justice imposes some other's conception of merit and requires allocation of resources through central intervention. Further, there is equality of opportunity but since individuals differ in their talent and skill, it results in inequality which should not be tampered with.

For Hayek, equality and liberty are incompatible. In the name of equality or justice, there should not be enactment of rules that specify how people should use the means at their disposal. Interference with people's own capacity to determine their objective becomes coercive and hence incompatible with individual liberty.

For him, political freedom means participation in the choice of government, process of legislation, control of government, etc. This does not necessarily ensure individual freedom. An undemocratic political system may be more permissive of individual freedom than a democratic set-up. Political freedom then does not automatically translate into individual freedom. In fact, though for different reasons, Mill and Tocqueville had also suggested that democratic order is not a guarantee of individual freedom, and majority itself can become a reason for restricting or hampering individual liberty. Inner freedom stands for the extent to which one is being guided by a considered will or choice and not by momentary impulses or inducements. This arises not due to the absence of coercion but due to moral strength or control on impulsive behaviour. As such, it is also different from individual freedom. Freedom as power is related to choices available to a person to make decisions or satisfy wishes. A person may have the power to do what is prohibited or may not be able to do what others are not prohibiting. Freedom as power is also different from individual freedom.

Hayek's opposition in allowing liberty understood in terms of power arises from his apprehension of intervention. He feels that if liberty or freedom understood as power is given primacy, there would be legislative intervention from the State in the name of enlarging choices or extending the range of choices of individuals. This, in fact, would be inimical to individual liberty as Hayek defines. He argues that since people are different in their capacities and skills, they should not be treated equally, treating them equally would result in inequality in actual position. He says, desire for making people more alike in their condition becomes a basis for discriminatory coercion. Hayek's defence of individual liberty is aimed at preserving the original liberal and laissez-faire meaning of liberty as the individual not being interfered. He opposes the positive conception of liberty as it relates to sources of liberty, which requires a positive state and a state that may plan and control economy and attempts distributive justice. He contends that it is better if some should be free than none and many should have full freedom than all have a limited freedom.

Hayek's conception of individual liberty as differentiated from any other conception such as liberty as power, political freedom or inner or moral freedom, is aimed at installing the original laissez-faire view of individual liberty. It seeks the absence of external restraint and freedom from coercion from the state. He opposes planned for the reason that it imposes certain external view of merit and is coercive to individual liberty. He also opposes mixed economy because it is neither planned nor market and hence cannot allocate resources rationally. For Hayek, then only free-market economy can become the basis of liberal order and individual liberty. His is a negation of bases of the welfare state and distributive justice, planned and mixed economy and support for liberal–capitalist order and minimal state. This theme appears in the writing of others such Berlin, Friedman and Nozick.

Sir Isaiah Berlin, a neo-liberal, advocates negative conception of liberty. However, he is known for making a distinction between negative and positive liberty in such a way that it amounts to conceiving both types of liberty as the same thing.

Generally, negative conception of liberty was identified with the laissez-faire economists like Adam Smith, David Ricardo, Robert Malthus and limited government liberal theorists such as John Locke, J. S. Mill, Herbert Spencer, Benjamin Constant, Alex de Tocqueville and others. They understood and advocated liberty as ‘sphere of individual actions unobstructed by others‘. Negative liberty was understood to be applicable both to the economic activity as well as the political field. In economic aspects, it was freedom to do business, commerce and economic activity including contract without interference. In the political aspect, it meant a limited government and provision of political rights not being interfered. Critiques of negative freedom were developed by thinkers such as J. S. Mill, T. H. Green, L. T. Hobhouse, R. H. Tawney and later on by Barker and Laski. In its positive aspects, liberty was understood as related to self-realization and development of the individual personality. This, in turn, required opportunities and sources such as socio-economic conditions that help in such development and realization. In this debate, while negative liberty was based on the sphere of individual actions not interfered by others, positive liberty advocated sources that were essential for enjoyment of liberty. Negative liberty advocated individual as sovereign (what Macpherson calls possessive individual), having full right and sovereignty over his capacities, labour, and talent. Positive liberty advocated conception of individual as developer or one who seeks self-realization (what Macpherson calls developmental freedom) and has ability to act. These are the two ways of conceiving liberty or freedom within the liberal tradition.

Berlin looks at liberty in a new way and in his seminal essay, ‘Two Concept of Liberty’ (1958), he portrays that in its negative and positive sense, liberty means the same thing. He extended the same arguments in his ‘Four Essays on Liberty’ (1969). He uses the term freedom or liberty interchangeably. According to Berlin, liberty in the negative sense is involved in the answer to the question ‘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 persons?’ Liberty in the positive sense is involved in the question ‘what, or who, is the source of control or interference, that can determine someone to do, or be, one thing rather than another?’ Accordingly, he defines liberty in both the negative and positive sense.

Liberty in the negative sense is defined as ‘an area within which a man can act unobstructed by others’.⁴⁵ Liberty is an area of unobstructed or unimpeded action of individual. One lacks liberty or freedom only if one is prevented from attaining a goal by other human beings and not because of incapacity to do so. Mere incapacity to attain a goal is not lack of liberty. Berlin elaborates this thus: ‘if my poverty were a kind of disease, which prevented me from buying bread or paying for journey round the world, or getting my case heard, as lameness prevents me from running, this inability would not naturally be described as lack of freedom’. Berlin differentiates between availability of un-interfered area and capacity to make use of it. Liberty is said to be present even when the second aspect is lacking. I have liberty to buy bread though I may not have money to buy it. While the first is liberty in negative sense, the second is incapacity to buy. For Berlin, incapacity to buy is a limitation and a not a problem. However, this is questionable as one can accept individual's limitation in not flying as one does not have wings or aerodynamic shape but to accept that socio-economic deprivations are also limitations in the same sense is unacceptable. Limitations and alterable deprivations must be differentiated which Berlin either overlooks or confuses.

Classical liberal thinkers were concerned with liberty in the sense of liberty to buy bread and were not bothered about whether one has capacity to buy or not. For them, sphere and area of individual action were the main concerns, though they may disagree on how wide the area should be or could be. Different bases for defining scope of this area have been invoked. These include natural law, natural rights, utility, sanctity of social contract or self-regarding actions. While they all, like Locke and Mill in England, Tocqueville and Constant in France, agreed that law could limit area of the individual's actions, they also argued that a certain minimum area of personal freedom must not be violated. Berlin explains his concept of negative liberty in this classical sense. Thus, defence of liberty consists in a negative goal of warding off interference.

Berlin notes three characteristics of negative liberty. Firstly, all coercion in so far as it frustrates human desires is bad; secondly, the concept of liberty as ‘to be left to oneself’ is modern and individual liberty is not found as a political ideal earlier than the Renaissance or the Reformation; and thirdly, liberty in this sense is principally concerned with the area of control and not with its source (whether the individual himself is the source of liberty or it emanates from being not interfered from outside). Thus, the form of government, autocracy or democracy has no direct relationship with negative liberty. Democracy may deprive individuals of many liberties, while a liberal-minded despot may allow a large measure of personal freedom. Hayek also held Berlin's view that there is no necessary connection between individual liberty and democratic rule. Berlin is categorical when he says, the connection between democracy and individual liberty is a good deal more tenuous than it seemed to many advocates of both. Berlin differentiates between the questions, ‘who governs me?’ from ‘how government interferes with me?’ negative liberty is concerned with the latter. According to Berlin, liberty is neither related to capacity nor to its condition (poverty, sickness, illiteracy, deprivation) or to its source (democratic or autocratic rule).

Positive liberal thinkers ruefully realized the inadequacy of the negative liberty and argued for capacity to buy as essential for freedom than the mere presence of liberty to buy. For the positive liberals, liberty meant making the best of oneself or realizing one's own capacity. Adequate conditions of freedom must be provided for enjoying freedom. For Berlin, liberty in a positive sense means answer to the question: what or who is the source of interference or control? Berlin defines liberty in positive sense as ‘being one's own master’.⁴⁶ This means one's life and decisions depend on one's own choices. One wants to be an instrument of one's own, self-directed, and deciding and to be conscious of oneself as a thinking, willing, active being, bearing responsibility for choices. Berlin holds that being one's own master (positive liberty) and being not prevented from choosing as I do by other men (negative liberty) are not logically different from each other except saying the same thing in negative and positive ways.

However, it may not always be the case when the two conceptions of liberty coincides. It may be possible that a person is free in the negative sense as being not interfered by others but may be unfree in positive sense as not self-directed, deciding or active-being due to impulsive behaviour, inebriated condition or lack of self-control. Thus, negative and positive liberty may be present or absent at the same time. However, Berlin is very concerned with two aspects of positive liberty, which may lead to interference from the State. Firstly, interpretations of self-mastery by differentiation in the lower and higher self. While the former may be characterized by irrational impulse, uncontrolled desires, immediate pleasure, etc. autonomous self in the moral and creative sense characterizes the latter. It may happen that the State, in the name of making those realize the higher self and come out from the lower self, will justify coercion. This will be coercing others in the name of their own sake. Berlin argues that this is not desirable. Secondly, zeal for providing conditions such as justice, public health and other socio-economic conditions for realizing freedom, may distort the very logic of freedom itself. He differentiates liberty per se from the condition of liberty. He says that in an excessive zeal to create socioeconomic conditions in which it is claimed, real freedom is realized, freedom itself is forgotten. He apprehends that ‘paternalism can provide condition of freedom, yet withhold freedom itself’. He differentiates between freedom as not being coerced or interfered by others from conditions of freedom. He apprehends that once conditions for freedom and justice are invoked, it will lead to state intervention and hence curtailment of individual liberty through coercion and interference.

Berlin depicts positive and negative liberty as if they mean the same thing. But he also contends that liberty per se is concerned only with area or sphere and not with sources or enabling conditions, as that would be inimical to the very concept of liberty. In fact, he somehow suggests that any attempt at viewing liberty in positive sense will lead to intervention and hence restriction on sphere of individual liberty. Critics have pointed out that Berlin's contention that mere limitations should not be treated as absence of liberty is misplaced. This is because what he calls limitations and seeks analogy of natural limitations such as the individual not flying like an eagle or swimming like a whale, are wrong. There are socio-economic deprivations hence, problem of resource allocation and not limitations. Charles Taylor, Bhikhu Parekh and Crawford Macpherson have criticized Berlin for ignoring conditions as one of the important enabling factor for enjoying liberty.

Charles Taylor maintains that presence or absence of obstacles is important for liberty. However, he suggests that obstacles can be internal as well as external. And liberty cannot simply be interpreted as absence of external obstacles only as negative liberty portrays. Both external obstacles like interference from others and internal obstacles like irrational fear or spite or even too great a need for comfort, are inimical to liberty. He argues: is it sufficient to establish that I am free when I can do what I want? If I follow my strongest desire and do what I want, is it liberty? Taylor, in fact, suggests that freedom should defined as ‘the absence of internal or external obstacle to what I truly or authentically want’. Taylor conceives freedom in terms of self-mastery or self-autonomy free from both external and internal obstacles.

Taking up Berlin's distinction of negative liberty as an area in which subject/individual should be left without interference and positive liberty as concerned with who or what controls, Taylor differentiates between positive and negative liberty in terms of exercise concept and opportunity concept. According to him, positive freedom is exercising of control over one's life. One is free to the extent one has effectively determined oneself and the shape of one's life. On the other hand, negative liberty can rely on the opportunity-concept where one is free to do what one is open to do whether or not one does anything to exercise these options. Thus, negative liberty in terms of opportunity-concept is just there being no obstacle. Positive liberty in terms of exercise-concept requires we discriminate among motivations. Taylor suggests that it is difference in motivations, e.g. irrational fear, etc. that put internal obstacles to freedom. According to Taylor, freedom must be viewed as the ability to fulfil one's purpose. This, in turn, requires being able to recognize adequately one's important purposes and also being able to overcome or neutralize motivational fetters as well as being free of external obstacles. Thus, Taylor feels that freedom cannot be based on absence of external obstacles alone as Berlin and others say.

Bhikhu Parekh poses this question: what would be Berlin's answer, if one individual said that lack of means was the result of social arrangements and hence amounted to interference by others. Berlin would say, this relates to condition for enjoying liberty and is not liberty per se. Macpherson has also criticized Berlin for differentiating positive and negative liberty in such a way that it revolves round the negative view and ignores the role of impediments such as lack of access to means of life and labour. Berlin's view on positive liberty is not the same as we have discussed in a positive liberal sense. It goes without saying that for liberty to be meaningful, it is not enough to have formally unlimited opportunity or choice, but it should also be effectively unlimited in conditions. While negative liberty is a guarantee for absence of obstacles or unwanted restraints, positive liberty is insurance for removal of constraints that impede enjoyment of choices. Berlin either misses or overlooks this aspect.

Milton Friedman, a neo-liberal, who defines liberty in terms of a competitive market economy, equates liberty or freedom with economic freedom, which means freedom of choice in the market place—freedom of the producer what to produce and whom to employ, freedom of the consumer what to buy, freedom of the worker to choose a job or profession.⁴⁷ Economic freedom is found only in free market capitalist economies and freedom stands for absence of government's interference. His book Capitalism and Freedom (1962) and Free to Choose: A Personal Statement (1980) cover the theme of economic freedom. Friedman's contention is that economic freedom is not merely a component of freedom, rather a prerequisite of it. Thus, freedom effectively means presence of economic freedom and a vital condition of political freedom.

He defines freedom as ‘absence of coercion of a man by his fellow men’. This means the individual is not to be restrained, interfered with or face obstacles in performing one's activities. Given the fact that economic freedom and free-competitive to capitalist-market economy are vital, as corollary of this, it is easy for Friedman to say that market must have a larger sphere of activity so that sphere of freedom is enlarged. There should be minimal interference from the state as sphere of freedom lies not in the state but in the market. Friedman allows role to the state only to sustain and supplement market.

Friedman suggests that free-competitive to capitalist-market economy promotes liberal society in two ways: (i) freedom of private enterprise and private initiative being a component of the broader concept of freedom, economic freedom is an end in itself, and (ii) free-competitive to capitalist-market economy and economic freedom ‘promotes political freedom because it separates economic power and political power and thus enables the one to offset the other’. While Plato wanted to marry philosophy and power, Friedman seeks to divorce power and money.

Friedman forces us to accept two inescapable conclusions: (i) political freedom is dependent upon economic freedom and economic freedom is inseparable from free-competitive to capitalist-market economy and (ii) the history of growth of political freedom is the history of development of capitalist institutions. Friedman's conclusions are far-fetched and partial. What he calls free-capitalist to market economy is based on separation between capital and labour. Macpherson suggests that labour having no capital of its won enjoys no ‘choice’ compared to one who has capital. We can say that Friedman equates choice of a capitalist with choice of a worker. What a pity! Further, as the whole production process is beyond the worker, it does not allow him to engage creatively. Many thinkers and writers, especially Herbert Marcuse, have dealt with alienating and dehumanizing the effect perceived as inbuilt in the capitalist system. Given these circumstances, what Friedman advocates as freedom of choice in a capitalist economy, turns out to be freedom of capitalists.

Robert Nozick, in the tradition of Adam Smith, Herbert Spencer, Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman, is a staunch libertarian. In his book, Anarchy, State and Utopia (1974), Nozick has developed a form of libertarianism, which combines defence for the realm of negative liberty of the individual with the concept of inviolable property right. Nozick developed his arguments in response to the ideas of John Rawls contained in his book A Theory of Justice (1971) which argued for distributive justice based on the equality principle.

Nozick seeks to protect the realm of individual liberty so much that Nozick warns against governments coercing citizens even for their own good or protection. In this, Mill's influence on Nozick is visible. Mill says that a person's own good, either physical or moral is not a sufficient warrant for interference. Nozick goes further and asserts that the state may not be justified in compelling people to help others. This implies that the state should not tax people or take away their earned property in the name of welfare redistribution or justice or equality. This position of Nozick is important for not only arguing for a minimalist state but also from the point of view of the inviolability of property.

Nozick supports Lockean's principle of inviolable property rights. Locke maintained that property is created by adding value by a person or on his behalf by someone else (this aptly covers value of property created by paid labour). Being part of natural rights, whatever property one acquires becomes an inviolable part of property rights. Nozick defends inviolable property rights by arguing on the basis of what he calls, ‘entitlement theory’ of justice. According to this, the principle of distribution should be ‘from each according to what he chooses to do, to each according to what he makes for himself (perhaps with the contracted aid of others) and what others choose to do for him and choose to give him what they’ve been given previously … and haven't yet expended or transferred’. Thus, Nozick fully covers the Lockean premise of property and its possession. There should not be any redistribution except by market process. Nozick upholds property rights justly acquired or transferred by others. Clearly, this is a statement of defending the individual's liberty in acquiring and possessing property without being interfered for giving it away or part of it in the name of, welfare, distributive justice or taxation. This, in turn, implies minimal state and refutation of any basis of welfare state.

Nozick has sought to refute Rawls's philosophical justification of neo-welfarism and redistribution. Rawls, considered an equalitarian liberal, has sought to justify welfare state on individualist assumptions. According to Rawls, social and economic inequalities are to be so arranged that they be reasonably to everyone's advantage and inequalities are allowed when this will lead to greater benefit and long-term prospect of the least advantaged. Nozick shows no such concern and argues for non-interference by the state in a market-based process. He holds that all inequalities of wealth and power are due to individual differences in talents and efforts and this should not be removed or reduced by interference. He also advocates an ultra-minimalist state and supports that even protection should be provided to those who can purchase it the market. He favours only maintenance of peace and the security of persons and property and enforcement of contract as the end of the state and nothing beyond this.

Nozick presents an extreme position of right-based libertarian justice. However, one can say that even capitalist states do not exactly follow or are expected to follow such a vision of ultra-minimal state. Despite, the welfare and interventionist state having been hurled with the placard of ‘roll back the state’ and been Thatcherized and Reaganized, it has not come down to what Nozick prescribes.

In the twentieth century, a few more writers and theorists have supported negative freedom and have argued against the state. A. J. Nock in his book Our Enemy the State (1950) has criticized the power of the state as if it has been arrogated from society. The state having no original power should not interfere in the sphere of society and individual. Michael Oakeshott also in his Rationalism in Politics and Other Essays (1962)⁴⁸ argues for a minimal state. He rejects ‘collectivism’ as an enemy of free society, as Popper would term Plato, Hegel and Marx as enemies of an open society. Oakeshott holds that freedom can exist only in an unregulated competitive society and collectivism stands for a managed society. Rejection of power and authority of the state is a pointer to the extent that the State does not interfere and individual liberty is safeguarded. It is a concept of negative liberty.

Marxian Views of Freedom

Freedom as Freedom of the Human Being Not the Individual

Our survey above suggests that liberal tradition, in all its forms—classical, modern and neo-liberal, focuses on individual freedom either in terms of absence of external interference in the sphere of individual actions or removal of obstacles in the development of faculties of the individual. This view is based on the liberal assumption that the individual is sovereign over his/her actions and is the best judge of what to do. The only requirement is he/she should not be interfered with (negative liberty) or obstacles in self-realization should be removed (positive liberty). In fact, the libertarian philosophy advocates laissez-faire individualism and argues that freedom or liberty inheres in economic freedom, which can best be realized in a competitive capitalist economic system.

In Holy Family (1844) Marx and Engels opposed the self-centred, atomistic view of the individual and argued that like an atom being self-sufficient, unrelated individual cannot be a member of civil society. Men and women have to be human beings related to each other and not merely individuals, egoist, self-centred and unrelated. The Marxian perspective looks at human freedom in terms of both individual and classes. This is integral to the understanding of historical evolution of stages of production and realization of freedom in the arena of work that is integral to the Marxian concept of historical materialism. Marx maintains that work, i.e., production of good and services, is the primary activity of human beings. It is in the process of production that human beings produce, engage creatively, realize one's self and achieve self-fulfilment. Human relations are rooted in the understanding of relations of production and class relations.

The Marxian perspective does not agree that plebeians and patricians, serfs and lords, bourgeoisie and proletariat are equally free. It maintains that principles such liberty, rights, fraternity or even equality have been invoked and asserted in specific historical contexts and are not universal. For example, equal rights of men in Greek city-states were not equal rights for slaves. Similarly, as Emile Burns says, principles of liberty, equality and fraternity advocated by the French Revolution meant ‘the liberty of the rising capitalist class to trade freely, the equality of this class with the lords, and the fraternity of this class with itself—the mutual aid against feudal oppression and restrictions.’⁴⁹ It shows that liberty, like all other principles and values, has been evolved in terms of either the interest of the rising classes or to protect the interests of the entrenched classes.

The Marxian perspective talks about humanism and the inner essence of the human being. Freedom implies absence of alienation of the human being and not absence of external restraint or interference. Alienation presents a situation of domination of world of things over man. Due to factors beyond the control of human beings, other than those natural, one feels helpless and alienated. This results in engaging in production or profession in a non-creative manner. Marx, and many others who have followed this way of analysis, have located the main cause of alienation in class structure and domination over themselves of things created by human beings. Two significant facts about Marxian views on freedom may be stated here. Firstly, freedom is understood in terms of absence of alienation and false consciousness, and secondly, it looks at freedom in terms of the individual as well as classes.

Marx adopts a multidimensional conception of human freedom, which encompasses relation of the human being with the self, with each other, with nature, with classes and mode of production, i.e., society at large. Integral to Marxian understanding of freedom is the concept of the human being. In non-Marxian perspectives, concept of man, individual, person, etc. has been associated in various aspects such as anthropological (culturally determined person), biological (physiology and anatomy of man and woman), psychological (rational being, emotional and psychological aspects a la Freud, et al.), religious-spiritual (part of religious and spiritual community) and social (familial, group etc.). The concepts of man, person and individual are partial and unrelated to human relations in terms of the relation of production. Human relations must be understood in terms of the production process and social relationships arising out of class relations. Marx understands the human being in terms of human essence, i.e., human being in the social context. The Marxian position is that the human being cannot and should not be understood devoid of social context and relationships. It is the process of production that human beings produce, engage creatively, realize their self and achieve self-fulfilment. It is argued that Marx views the human being as a self-creating social being. Based on the mode of production, i.e., nature of ownership of means of productions (feudal, capitalist or socialist), the human being will attain self-creativity or get alienated. In general, the Marxian perspective holds that social ownership of production, absence of private property and classes are the context in which the human being will not be alienated. Marx terms ‘man as a species-being’⁵⁰ to signify the social aspect of man. as a social being. His view of the human being as primarily a social being combined with the idea of realizing at work, signifies that the individual has to realize his/her creativity in the process of production and in cooperation with other fellow beings.

This view is primarily against the individualist view of human beings as atomist and self-interested. Atomistic, self-seeking and a self-centred human being is dehumanized and alienated. Humanity in man is primarily due to social relations. The idea is that whatever a human being makes out of himself/herself, is a product of social context. An atomist individual is not destined to be a human being but a competitive winner or loser. By conceiving freedom as part of social relations, the Marxian view refutes the very basis of liberal philosophy based on individuality. Secondly, freedom is not taken as something to be enjoyed due to non-interference of others or removal of obstacles, but primarily as a result of self-creative engagement in work and production. Only in socially owned means of production, an individual will enjoy freedom. This is because one is not subject of a production process that is geared for profit. In short, freedom is absence of alienation. Since alienation is due to private property, abolition of private property is integral to the Marxian conception of freedom. We can discuss different issues that are involved in the Marxian perspective on freedom in terms of dialectical materialism and objective laws that govern human lives, mode of production and class relations, private property, alienation, etc.

Critique of Capitalist Mode of Production as Inimical to Human Freedom

Socially defined relationship of production is what determines freedom of human beings. Work being important and a primary human activity, it is where his/her potential is fulfilled creatively or distorted in the form of alienation. Marx identifies the capitalist mode of production based on private property and private ownership of means of production as against fulfilment of human essence and self-realization. In his ‘On the Jewish Question’ (1843), Marx talked about abolishing private property and social ownership of means of production as only a means of human freedom. However, it was the Economic and Philosophical Manuscript of 1844 (EPM), a draft of Marx's study of economic pillars of capitalist society and examination of bourgeois economist, that presented his critical view on ‘production as social process’, material basis of society and class relations. However, Marx has devoted a significant portion of the EPM in analysing what he calls, ‘Estranged Labour’.⁵¹ Concept of estranged labour is critical and germane to understanding Marx's view on human freedom. ‘Estranged’ stands for ‘alienation’. Simply, ‘alienation means that man is cut off from his work’.⁵² As such, one is not happy and satisfied either with the work one is doing or with the product that is one is creating.

How does this happen? Hegel has used alienation as a concept in terms of movement of spirit and its embodiment in the state. However, Marx though influenced by Hegel and also by Feuerbach, used alienation or estrangement to portray the plight of the human being in capitalist society. As we have noted, for Marx, work provided the most important and primary means for fulfilling basic needs and also expressing one's individuality. As such, in producing an object, one engages in a creative and self-fulfilling manner. Basically, one produces not for earning profit but for the satisfaction of one's needs and also the needs of others in a social relationship. This is as if one is expressing oneself in the work and its products.

However, this cannot happen in a system of production, which is based on private ownership and is dominated by the profit motive. The labour produces not for his/her and other human beings’ needs, but for profit. The object produced is no more a reflection of a worker's creative being, but alien objectified labour. This means the object produced is something that is produced for profit on demand of capital. It is the basis of surplus for the capitalist and exploitation of the worker himself/herself. Now, the worker produces not for self-satisfaction and fulfilment of self-needs and needs of fellow beings but for capitalist surplus. Workers’ own products become the basis for his/her exploitation. The product becomes alien to the worker. The labour process loses its creative substance, and is not attractive to the worker because production is not based on universal needs but on the capitalist surplus motive. Marx forcefully states that ‘the worker is related to the product of his labour as to an alien object’.⁵³ The product is no more a creative fulfillment but an alien object.

Thus, in a capitalist system based on private property and ownership and driven by the profit/surplus motive, production and work is not for self-realization and self-fulfilment or creative reflection but for alien cause, surplus making. This is dehumanizing and inimical to human freedom. But how does it affect human freedom? Alienation expresses itself in four ways: (i) alienation from product of labour or the object produced means one does not find satisfaction and self-fulfilment in products of one's own labour. Further, not able to express one's true self in the work process, as it is no more a social activity but rather a controlled private activity, there is alienation from work; (ii) Since there is alienation from the work process and it is no more a social activity, one is alienated from other fellow workers; (iii) being an alien activity which is also routinized and monotonous, one is alienated from their human or essential nature also; and (iv) one is also alienated from oneself or true self because of not being able to express one's true or creative self through the work and product.

As a result of multiple alienation, workers become alienated and lose their true self. Creative and human faculties become subordinated to an alien production process. Essence of human beings is lost and there is no freedom. In the capitalist system, worker is reduced to the domination of the realm of necessity and there is no chance for realizing the true self. Marx attributes this to commodification of products with introduction of money as a medium of exchange. Products of labour become tradable commodities and no more creative reflection of labour. In fact, not only product of labour, labour itself also becomes a commodity. In the capitalist system, a human being loses the human essence and there is no freedom worth its value.

Concept of estranged labour or alienation presents a humanist perspective of Marx. It reflected his concern for degeneration of human beings because of private property and private ownership of means of production. Marx advocated abolition of private property and private means of production as a solution for this. Establishment of socialist means of production would restore the creative freedom of human beings. Freedom also requires leap from the realm of necessity. While the liberal position seeks to present that freedom and liberty is possible within the capitalist mode of production, the Marxian position maintains that there is no possibility of freedom in capitalist system.

However, alienation as a causal factor of restricting freedom did not find much mention in the writings of Engels or Lenin. However, with publication of George Lukacs's History and Class Consciousness, alienation becomes an analytical concept in the Marxian perspective. Some of the writers, such as Milovan Djilas, maintained that even in the socially owned means of production in communist countries (now ex-communist countries), labour was not free, as there had developed control of a small group of elite. However, Marx's concern for human freedom as the ‘development of human potential for its own sake’ realized by the experience of creative labour working with fellow beings for the satisfaction of needs, could be treated as a concern for development of a multidimensional human being. His is a humanist perspective and a statement of revival and restoration of human dignity and freedom.

Herbert Marcuse, C. Wright Mills and André Gorz on Alienation

Marcuse is a critical social theorist who has criticized advanced industrial society as ‘an all-encompassing system of repression’. He has been influenced by Hegel and also by the Marxian perspective in his writings. In his One Dimensional Man (1964), he has concluded more or less in the same manner as Marx did about alienation of the worker in the capitalist mode of production. His main argument is that Western industrial society is driven by false needs largely created by mass media. He maintains that most of the needs ‘to relax, to have fun, to behave and consume in accordance with the advertisements …,’⁵⁴ are created needs. People no longer seek fulfilment in them and in their relations with others, rather in commodities and mechanical and electronic gadgets. As such, industrial man and also woman are alienated from every sphere of their life. The short point Marcuse is making, is that the industrial society presents commodities and products as if they define human essence. People also identify their worth with commodities. This has great potential of treating human beings as means. Human beings are consumers and it is beyond the control of consumers to resist what the market and media advertise. Alienation is rampant and creates a man who thinks in one dimension, media and market-created needs. Man (and woman) of an advanced industrial society is the one-dimensional man (and woman). Recall what we said earlier, Socrates was not Socrates because he drank hemlock but because he drinks cold drink now. X Y Z is X Y Z because he or she carries palmtop, blue tooth-driven mobile set or may be an iPod.

Wright Mills, in his book White Collar, has applied Marx's concept of alienation to non-manual workers and has argued that non-manual workers present their unreal personality in the market situation. For example, a receptionist or a sales girl is always supposed to give a cosmetic smile even though she actually has different emotions to express at that particular time. Market requirements demand that the customer must be pleasantly welcomed. In this, the receptionist or the sales girl is not herself. She has to transform herself and wear a market-needed personality. What Mills call ‘personality market’, is based on fake and market driven personality. Look at the smile of a sales girl, a receptionist, an air hostess; the voice of a customer service attendant, a call centre attendant; the walk of a ‘beauty’ on ramp, all are simulated, all temporary, all fake. One may say that this is professionalism; the other may argue it is alienation. But the fact remains for debate: is it the true self of that person? Wright Mill will say that aspects of personality are being bought and sold in the market like labour.

André Gorz, a French sociologist, has argued that alienation at work leads to search for self-fulfilment in leisure. But leisure is also shaped and decided by external sources. We consume what the media and entertainment industry present. In fact, an alienated manual worker and a non-manual worker, also become passive consumers of leisure. Hence, one is alienated both from work and leisure.

Marx and Lukacs raised pertinent questions of human freedom in terms of self-realization by employing alienation as a concept. Marcuse, Gorz and Wright Mills have further analysed alienation in an advanced industrial society. It seems freedom and liberty could continue their journey with different perspectives fighting for giving their own interpretation. However, freedom, if it has to instal the human being as an end and not merely as a means, must provide the fullest condition of self-fulfilment and realization of human potentiality.

Review Questions

1. Discuss the concept of liberty and its conditions, and debate on negative versus positive liberty.
2. Discuss the principles and issues related to liberty, and are liberty and equality contradictory or complementary?
3. ‘Liberty consists in doing what one desires’ (J. S. Mill). In the light of this statement discuss the concepts of liberty, licence and authority.
4. ‘Paternalism can provide condition of freedom, yet withhold freedom itself’ (Berlin). In the light of this, discuss the relationship between positive and negative liberty.
5. ‘Th ere is no necessary connection between individual liberty and democratic rule’. Discuss this critically in the light of views of Locke, Mill, Hayek, Berlin and Macpherson.
6. Liberty is ‘a positive power or capacity of doing something or enjoying something worth doing or enjoying and that too, something we do or enjoy in common with others’ (Green). In the light of this statement, critically discuss the concept of positive liberty.
7. Liberty is ‘an area within which a man can act unobstructed by others’ (Berlin). Discuss the negative concept of liberty.
8. Discuss the Marxian view on freedom. What role does the concept of alienation play in Marxian analysis?