Positive and Negative Liberty
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H I S T O R Y O F P O L I T I C A L T H O U G H T – POSITIVE & NEGATIVE LIBERTY
Transcript of Positive and Negative Liberty
H I S T O R Y
O F
P O L I T I C A L T H O U G H T
–
POSITIVE & NEGATIVE LIBERTY
Individual
LIBERTYSocial Control
Born unfree and unequal 2
Berlin (1909-1997)3
Central question in politics:
obedience
and
coercion
Positive freedom 4
What, or who, is the source of control or
interference that can determine someone to
do, or be, this rather than that?
Freedom as self-mastery
Individual
LIBERTYSocial Control
Berlin - Freedom? 5
Where lies the frontier?
Health care 6
ONE true purpose: rational self-direction
↓
Universal pattern
↓
Conflict = rational vs. irrational
↓
Obedience to rational law = freedom(?)
Despotism = freedom?
Leninism 8
Positive freedom 9
Freedom as self-mastery:
Slave to no man:
not to another man
¬ to yourself
Positive freedom 10
Reason (high-nature)
vs.
Passion (low-nature)
Man of Reason = director of life
Man of Passion = slave to nature
Positive freedom 11
Passions 12
Daniel Ginns,
Addiction Pyramid
(2012)
13Freud (1856-1939)
Liberation through psychoanalysis
Negative freedom 15
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?
Freedom from interference
Leviathan ch. 21:
LIBERTY, OR FREEDOME,
signifieth (properly) the
absence of Opposition;
(by Opposition, I mean
externall Impediments of
motion;)
16Negative freedom
Individual
LIBERTY
Absence of
social control
= anarchy
Negative freedom 17
Individual
LIBERTYSocial Control
Berlin - Freedom? 18
Where lies the frontier?
Liberty ≠ equality, fairness 19
Critical remarks:
•Highly modern doctrine
•Negative liberty not prerequisite for individual
flourishing
•Liberty not incompatible with autocracy
Negative freedom
-Economic libertarian
-adviser to Ronald Reagan
The ‘welfare trap’
What are his arguments
against interference by the
state?
22Friedman (1912-2006)
Absolute negative freedom?
Individual
LIBERTY
23Friedman
Individual
LIBERTYSocial Control
Positive vs. Negative freedom 24
Where lies the frontier?
Berlin - Freedom? 25
Acceptance of pluralism and temporality of values
-deliberate behind a veil of
ignorance
26Rawls (1921-2002)
27Original position
28Original position
