Freedom for the Relationship between the Individual and the State - Essay Example

Compare the Implications of Negative and Positive Freedom for the Relationship between the Individual and the State. Introduction Negative and positive rights are not distinct kind of rights rather are verified as conflicting, and incompatible demonstrations of political and social coexistence. One way to compare the two kids of rights would be; “the right to” implying positive and the “freedom from” implying negative rights. They can also be verified as the ability to acquire the things that are vital for human survival and having the right to be left alone when doing the things that interests the self and speak your opinions at any time and place of your choice such as a forum. They are distinct concepts yet one can hinder the other from being exercised in certain cases. Individual’s liberty is normally seen as the basis foundation of liberty. However, this freedom can be categorized in two forms; Negative and positive form. Birch, H. notes that negative liberty is normally linked with classical liberalism and it stands for the belief for void interference with ones actions or practices.1The external constraints are restricted to interfere with individual’s actions. Therefore its implication is that, individuals should be granted the freedom of pursuing their own interests without any interference from any external constraints like the state. In contrast, however Miller D negates that, negative liberty does not imply that individuals have total and unobstructed freedom. A classical liberal, Mill, S. postulated that, if freedom was not limited, it would result to a limiting factor of license. Implying the; the right to cause harm to other individuals or may be infringing their accepted rights to property, life and liberty. In this manner, the classical liberals will often support little restrictions on the people so as to avoid individuals causing harm on other individuals. Positive freedom is the rights where individuals can acquire particular things that are vital for survival. Examples of these include; welfare payments, education, food, shelter and healthcare. Christman, J. postulates that these are rights that that need action and justification of an individual and not by the body in authority.2Implying that, an individual should give a claim to such right prior to accessing the said right. Healthcare is a positive freedom where by the Medicare system is a government funded program that is aimed at providing every individual with access to treatment whenever need arises. This means that the government advances subsidies for healthcare facilities to the citizens of the United Kingdom. An individuals’ right to healthcare can be shown by the individual who believes they need some sort of medical procedure. For the individual to be able to access the medical subsidy, they would have to prove this by ensuring a certain criteria of the medical process so as to give the needed healthcare to the individual. The individual will has to earn less than a given certain amount of combined annual earnings. Implying that, the individual earning over a certain amount of income would not be allowed to Medicare subsidies.3 Another form of criterion is that, it is a necessity and not a requirement. An individual whose face is badly damaged in a tragic accident would require corrective plastic surgery to correct the face. This would be a worthy claim to public surgery. However it would not be the case for plastic surgery done for beauty purposes. This then shows the restrictions that positive rights could impose on the individuals who would attempt claiming for positive rights such as healthcare. Negative rights are rights that are made to restrict individuals from certain things or validate them for taking certain course while making decisions they believe in. They are typically rights of not being subjected to various circumstances. 4These negative rights are; freedom of speech, freedom to expression and freedom to belief and religion. According to White, M, negative rights ensure that an individual does not have interference from others and that he or she is allowed to do whatever that relates to self. They bear a great deal of normative power. In that we put great essence on not violating the negative rights of other individuals. Though, by implying these, we do not expect to get such rights if we violate similar rights upon other people. For instance, you would not mug an individual on the street if you would wish to feel secure and not be mugged by someone else on the same street. The mugger would be categorized under the right to be free from harm. This is a negative right as it needs the action of participation of the authority to enforce such freedom and ensure it is observed. Mackinnon says that this absolutely requires the reinforcing of the government who would use rules, laws and authorities carried out by police force to sustain such freedom and see to it that it is maintained. However there aren’t any particular fields or responsibilities on the part of the individual to ensure guarantee of the negative rights, the rights are made available to the individual by the state as in a situation where the right to be free and safe will be violated by the mugger. Even whether they are justified in their act; they do it for survival- a “positive right”, they are violating your negative right to be safe and free. People are granted the negative right to freedom of speech. Goodwin B, in his book points out that this form of rights lets individuals communicate what is on their minds without restrictions from anyone or organizations’ form of any force should be imposed on anyone who tries to air out his or her opinions in any given forum of their choice. 5 Stanford argues that the right to autonomy, another form of negative freedom, grants the individual with the right to make decisions that would affect the self with or without justification of such decisions without external restrictions. Positive and negative freedom compliments each other. For instance, if you are dealing with a rather hard decision it is necessary to observe which rights of other people you are violating. It may fall back to a situation where you would ought to violate someone else’s positive rather than his or her negative rights which would be tangled into law that most negative rights fall under. A real life event of where the negative and positive rights may conflict each other is where a woman may want to have an abortion at a particular time of her pregnancy. If the woman would want to use her positive right to have the abortion, she has to justify the decision as to why she should carry out the abortion so as to get the public medical subsidy to aid her medical bills. The government may be legally allowed to carry out the abortion if the health of the pregnant mother is at risk irrespective of the stage of the pregnancy. The authorities on the other hand, may required to exercise the negative rights of the unborn baby if the woman already past the first trimester of pregnancy, as it becomes late to carry out an abortion due to the dangers associated with carrying out the abortion at such a time of pregnancy on the basis of choice and not necessity. 6The medical body will have to let the mother have an abortion, because of the risks associated with the pregnancy is a clear demonstration of the extent to which some negative rights overpower one’s positive rights. The mothers’ positive right overpowers the negative right of the medical officer of not to kill intentionally. 7On the other hand, the woman has to justify her intentions to why she would want the pregnancy terminated so as to receive the healthcare to have her terminate the pregnancy. Positive rights grant people the right to certain facilities and services yet they ought to be justified in claiming the facility. These positive rights however can also be blocked when the negative rights are violated in the process. Nelson in his book writes that, rights are viewed as inalienable and absolute even further and that sometimes in real life it is noted to be a graded absolutism. 8. They will always be listed according to the weight of importance attached to it in the process of acquiring that particular right. Therefore the right not to be murdered is unchallengeable and the corresponding obligation of not to kill others is generally acceptable to have a single exception of self defense. According to Heywood, Particular largely conventional negative compulsions like refraining from murder or theft can be considered as “prima facie” implying that the legitimacy of the compulsion is accepted on its appearance but even whether not questioned, such compulsions may still be put on ethical investigation.8For instance, a thief could have a negative compulsion of no stealing, the policeman could have a negative compulsion of not tackling people, but the policeman taking on the thief may meet the burden of proof that he his actions would be justified, because it was a breach of a lesser compulsion and negated the breach of the greater compulsion. In the same way the shopkeeper could not tackle the thief by pulling a gun on him, it would not be justified; the burden of proof would not have been met. The compulsion not to kill is greater than the compulsion not to steal, therefore the breach of killing the thief does not justify the breach of the thief stealing from the shopkeeper. Miller in his other book the “liberty reader” points out that, positive compulsion confers responsibility.10.For the police officer, exercising a responsibility could violate negative compulsions- not to kill. Because of this reason, the law comes in to enforce positive obligations such as not to kill but wherein killing can be given one exception of self defense. Conclusion In conclusion, negative and positive rights are human duty and obligation that are entwined to enhance human survival. A negative right is a right of not being subjective to any given circumstance of another individual or even the state in a form of harm or abuse. A positive right on the other hand grants the individual ability to access to facilities and services vital to human survival such as public funded or subsidized education, healthcare, unemployment benefits and social security. Negative rights can be linked to perfect responsibilities while positive rights are associated with imperfect duties granted by authority such as the government. Rights could be viewed be viewed as unchallengeable and absolute and ranked with the weight of importance, harming the lesser ones are agreed in the course of trying to avoid violations of greater ones in an exception of self defense. 9The state guarantees the positive rights by making them available to the citizens and enforces the negative rights to ensure that they are observed by the citizens to ensure that its citizens are free and safe and that they can do anything in their interest and speak their opinions in any forum without any external restrictions. Bibliography Birch, H. “Concepts and Theories of Modern Democracy”. (3rd ed). Rutledge, Oxon, (2007) Christman, J. Saving Positive Freedom, “Political Theory,” Vol.33 Issue 1, Pp 79-88 Goodwin, B. Using Political Ideas,(5th Ed ) John Wiley And Sons, Chichester, (2007). Print Heywood, A. “Political Theory”. Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke, (2004) Print. Mackinnon, C. “Issues in Political Theory”, OUP. Oxford, (2003) Print. Miller, D. Political Philosophy.” A very Short Introduction.”OUP, Oxford (2003) Print Miller, D. “The Liberty Reader”, Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh, (2006) Print Nelson, E. Liberty, One Concept Too Many? “Political Theory”. Vol 33 Issue 1 Pp 58-78 Stanford, P. Encyclopedia of Philosophy. “Positive and Negative Liberty.” White, M. “Negative Liberty, Ethics”, Vol. 80, Issue 3 Pp 185-204 Read More