Plausible Understanding of the Positive Concept of Freedom - Essay Example

What is the plausible understanding of the positive concept of freedom? The concept of freedom has been a matter of research and philosophical speculation ever since Aristotle’s time. While Rousseau held that the individual exercise of one’s free will should be in tune with the General Will of the state, modern philosophers have categorized the concept of freedom into negative and positive, referring to the absolute or limited nature of freedom enjoyed by the individual. For MacCallum the concept freedom involves a triadic relation-“a relation between three things: an agent, certain preventing conditions, and certain doings or becomings of the agent” and he defines freedom as a condition where “a subject, or agent, is free from certain constraints, or preventing conditions, to do or become certain things” (Carter 2007). While this is a commonly accepted understanding of the concept of freedom, there are many who believe that absolute negative freedom will result in dictatorship or authoritarian leadership whereas positive freedom will culminate in totalitarianism. However, the positive concept of freedom better caters to the modern states as every citizen is bound to subject his individual freedom to the constitution and other social, religious and moral codes that dominate the society. This paper seeks to gather a plausible understanding of the positive concept of freedom as it has been understood by various theorists and philosophers. One needs to have a thorough understanding of the distinction between the concept of positive and negative liberty so as to develop a plausible understanding of the positive concept of freedom. While negative liberty is understood as “the absence of obstacles, barriers or constraints” positive liberty refers to “the possibility of acting — or the fact of acting — in such a way as to take control of ones life and realize ones fundamental purposes” (Carter 2007). To put it in more precise terms, the negative theorists of freedom are preoccupied with the degree to which individuals or groups suffer interference from external bodies whereas theorists of positive freedom emphasise on the potential of the individual to act constructively and to participate in their government. As such, exercise of one’s positive freedom necessitates individual responsibility and morality and one needs to take into account the collective general will of the society while exercising his/her right to freedom. Isaiah Berlin was the first to offer a comprehensive thought on the concepts of negative and positive freedoms in his Two Concepts of Liberty. Berlin defined negative liberty “as freedom from, that is, the absence of constraints on the agent imposed by other people”; on the other hand, he defined positive liberty “as freedom to, that is, the ability (not just the opportunity) to pursue and achieve willed goals; and also as autonomy or self-rule, as opposed to dependence on others” (Cherniss & Hardy 2008). Berlin associated the negative sense of liberty with the classical liberal traditions as was seen in the seventeenth to the early nineteenth centuries in Britain and France. For him, “the positive sense of the word liberty derives from the wish on the part of the individual to be his own master”; he holds that the decisions of an individual depend on oneself rather than in any external forces, that the individual is a subject, not an object, that the individual’s actions are moved by reasons, by conscious purposes, which are one’s own, not by causes which affect him from outside, and that the individual is “ a doer - deciding, not being decided for, self-directed and not acted upon by external nature or by other men” (Berlin 1958). It can thus be concluded that for Berlin the positive concept of freedom involved action where the individual is free to exert his potential and to make his/her own choices. Understanding the concept of freedom necessitates an awareness regarding the concept of one’s free will. Every one has his/her free will to do things the way one wants. However, positive use of one’s free will is closely linked to the concept of moral and social responsibility. Similarly, positive use of freedom can refer to the exercise of one’s free will in such a way that it caters to one’s moral and social responsibility. For René Descartes, the faculty of one’s will is equated with one’s freedom of choice, “the ability to do or not do something” and for him “the will is by its nature so free that it can never be constrained”; even though Rene here warns against adverse dangers associated with negative freedom, there are many other thinkers who hold that “true freedom of the will involves liberation from the tyranny of base desires and acquisition of desires for the Good” (OConnor 2005). The positive concept of liberty is very often associated with the “exercise concept” of liberty. Very often, the State is seen as a fundamental threat to one’s freedom. However, for the advocates of positive freedom, the concept of freedom is not equated with the state staying out. For them, the “conception of freedom has more in common with the “exercise concept” of positive liberty, according to which freedom is not merely the absence of external constraint, but is instead the effective exercise of control over one’s life” (Dyzenhaus & Ripstein 2001, p. 785). In this respect, Kant defines ‘freedom’ as “a causality that is not determined by any alien causes” whereas in his definition on the positive concept of freedom he explains the concept in terms of what it is when he states that “freedom is a causality determined by the moral law” (Kalar 2006, P. 108). It can thus be concluded that the positive concept of freedom exhorts the individual to exercise his free will in such a way that the moral laws are respected, that the individual has complete control over his/her life and that he/she owns responsibility for his/her actions. Rationality is very often associated with the concept of positive freedom. Berlin believed that only rational people could assume positive freedom and he feared that the most rational people would control the government which will result in totalitarianism. Bergmann also shared the same view: “just like Berlin, Bergmann sees this linkage of freedom and rationality, which from the very beginning guarantees that irrational or socially unacceptable behaviour is not judged to be free, as the leitmotif in the history of thought on freedom” (Blokland 1997, p. 50). On the other hand, Taylor established a relation between one’s identity (the ‘true’ self of the individual) and freedom. For him, one’s freedom is restricted when one is unable to exercise his primary wishes as his will. Thus, he postulates that one is not free “when in one’s actions one is motivated by anxieties, by non-authentic, internalized conventions, by a false consciousness, by all those motivations which ultimately work against the basic goals which one strives after in life and which frustrate the realization of one’s identity” (Blokland 1997, p. 61). Thus, for him, true positive freedom stems not just from having opportunities; it stems from self-knowledge and awareness of one’s true identity. For Berlin, the concept of negative freedom is associated with the number of possible choices or unlocked doors that are opened to the individual without any interference. However, he believes that some of those choices are more important than the others. On the other hand, positive freedom, for him, “is a matter of what you can actually do’ in spite of those obstacles that prevent you from “taking full advantage of your opportunities” (Positive Freedom-Two concepts of Freedom). Thus, Berlin’s concept of positive freedom presupposes possible obstacles in the form of governmental control, constitutional laws or moral and social codes which the individual has to take into consideration. Berlin, here, is optimistic that in spite of these obstacles, the individual is free to participate in the governmental decision making process. However, Berlin was suspicious that totalitarian regimes such as Stalinist Communism would dictate certain ways of life for the individual in disguise that they are the most rational course of actions. However, defenders of positive liberty hold that it guarantees equal rights for individuals in terms of education and employment, offers the ability to participate in the governmental process, and that it can safeguard against all sorts of discrimination that prevails in the society. Positive freedom, thus, offers only a controlled freedom to the individual whereas the proponents of negative freedom hold that the individual is left completely free to do whatever he wants to do. As such, the concept of negative freedom is sure to bring about constant tensions and conflicts when man lives in societies or states that are governed by certain dos and don’ts. On the other hand, the concept of positive freedom “is about self-government, rather than about being left alone” and “being in control of oneself means acting rationally” (Carter 1996). To conclude, it can be stated that the concept of positive and negative freedom stand at opposite poles and the triadic relation among an agent, certain preventing conditions, and certain doings of the agent vary considerably in both. While man’s natural inclination is towards absolute freedom, man as a social animal needs to imbibe the concept of positive freedom. The modern states lay more emphasis on the positive concept of freedom as it is necessary to subject one’s individual freedom to the constitution and other social, religious and moral codes that dominate the state. Similarly the absence of obstacles, barriers or constraints on one’s freedom can prove to be dangerous. On the other hand, the concept of positive freedom emphasises on the potential of the individual to act constructively and to participate in the governmental process and to own responsibility for his actions. The positive concept of freedom is built on rationality and self-government and therefore it exhorts the individual to exercise his free will in such a way that the moral laws are respected, that the individual has complete control over his/her life and that he/she owns responsibility for his/her actions. One should also keep in mind that true positive freedom is not all about having opportunities but exercise of positive freedom necessitates self-knowledge, self-government and awareness of one’s true identity. References Berlin, I. 1958, “Two Concepts of Liberty.” In Isaiah Berlin (1969) Four Essays on Liberty. Oxford: Oxford University Press, Viewed 21 March 2010, < http://www.nyu.edu/projects/nissenbaum/papers/twoconcepts.pdf>. Blokland, H.T 1997, Freedom and culture in Western society, Volume 5 of Routledge studies in social and political thought, Annotated Illustrated Edition: Routledge. Carter, Ian 2007, Positive and Negative Liberty, Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy, Viewed 21 March 2010, < http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/liberty-positive-negative/>. Carter, Ian 1996, The Concept of Freedom: Part I: Background, Methodology, and the "negative-positive" Debate, Humane Studies Review, 10 (3). Viewed 21 March 2010, < http://mason.gmu.edu/~ihs/hsrfall96.html>. Cherniss, J & Hardy, H 2008, Isaiah Berlin, Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy, Viewed 21 March 2010, < http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/berlin/#5.3>. Dyzenhaus, D & Ripstein, A 2001, Law and morality: readings in legal philosophy, Revised 2nd Edition: University of Toronto Press. Kalar, Brent 2006, The demands of taste in Kants aesthetics, Continuum International Publishing Group. OConnor, T 2005, Free Will, Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy, Viewed 21 March 2010, < http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/freewill/>. Positive Freedom-Two concepts of Freedom, The Open University, Viewed 21 March 2010, < http://openlearn.open.ac.uk/mod/resource/view.php?id=170285>. Read More