Freedom: Political, Metaphysical, Negative and Positive

Yildiz Silier

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781351157988
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Philosophy
• Subtopic: Philosophy History & Theory

Isaiah Berlin made a now classic distinction between negative and positive conceptions of freedom. In this book Yildiz Silier introduces a fresh way of looking at these conceptions and presents a new defence of the positive conception of freedom. Revealing how the internal debate between various versions of negative freedom give rise to hybrid conceptions of freedom which in turn are superseded by various versions of the positive conception of freedom, Silier concludes that Marx's concrete historical account of positive freedom resolves many of the key debates in this area and provides a fruitful framework to evaluate the freedoms and unfreedoms that are specific to capitalism. This book examines the thought of the paradigm thinkers in this debate, F.A. Hayek on negative freedom and T.H. Green on positive freedom and then ranges over the contributions to this debate made by both classical thinkers such as Kant, Hegel, and Marx, and those involved in contemporary debates on communitarianism, capitalism and self-determination, such as C. Taylor, D. Miller, F. Oppenheim and C.B. Macpherson.

Introduction

'What is freedom?' For a long time this has been the question I was most curious about. I thought that in order to be free, I first needed to know what freedom meant. Is it merely satisfaction of desires without being interfered with by others? Being a single child, brought up by a devoted mother who fulfilled all my wishes I should have been free with respect to that 'common sense' definition. But still I did not feel free; I always felt something was missing which was beyond my individual control. Then, another possibility occurred to me: maybe I was free, but mistakenly thought I wasn't. Another question was added to my list: is a person always the best judge of her own freedom, or can she sometimes be mistaken? If she is mistaken, then can somebody else know better whether she is free or not, and help her become more free? What is the relation between the objective and the subjective aspects of freedom? These questions were my starting point when I started writing my PhD thesis in philosophy, which laid the basis of this book.

I should confess this wasn't my first attempt at this broad project. In my Master's dissertation, I had approached freedom from another aspect, by comparing the relationship between needs and freedom. I thought, if freedom is not doing what one desires, then probably it is related to doing what one needs. But what do we really need? Is there a universal set of needs, or do needs change through history and vary across different cultures? Can we be mistaken about our needs? There, I focused on the debate between Rousseau and Marx, the former defending the view that the historical evolution of needs enslave us, whereas the latter claimed the same process to be liberating. When I finished my Master's dissertation, I thought both of them were right in a sense. But now I realize that it was Marx who had won the debate; he has much more to offer us about the meaning and the social conditions of freedom, as we shall see in the last chapter of this book, from a different perspective.

My analysis of the meaning and the conditions of freedom is based mainly on Isaiah Berlin's influential distinction between negative and positive conceptions of freedom. Although his distinction introduces a useful theoretical tool, the way he defines positive freedom is far from rigorous. His clear definition of negative freedom (as the absence of state coercion and interference by others) is in sharp contrast with his vague characterisation of positive freedom, which seems like an aggregate of all that Berlin loathes.¹

Throughout this book, I will replace Berlin's inadequate definition of positive freedom with my own interpretation of positive freedom and then defend it against Berlin's criticisms. We can define positive freedom as having two aspects: rational self-determination (chapter 7) and the power for self-determination (chapter 10). The former aspect contrasts with negative freedom as the arbitrary satisfaction of desires, whereas the latter aspect challenges the distinction between unfreedom and inability that lies at the basis of the negative view (chapter 2).

Are negative and positive conceptions of freedom rival theories, or does the latter include and go beyond the former? On the one hand, they are rival views because they start with different conceptions of the self and derive opposite social and political conditions of freedom. On the other hand, the positive conception of freedom includes and transcends the negative conception. The positive view provides us with a more comprehensive account of the metaphysical grounds and the essential normative aspect of freedom. Furthermore, it succeeds in combining the objective and subjective aspects of freedom.

This book demonstrates how the inadequacies of the negative conception of freedom carry us towards the 'hybrid view' and its defects opens the way towards the positive conception of freedom. The negative view focuses entirely on finding out the universal constraints on freedom of action; it reduces constraints to personal interventions and state coercion. The hybrid view investigates the goal of freedom underlying the negative view and reveals the internal constraints on freedom, as well as incorporating the notions of free agency and freedom of choice. The positive view explicitly discusses the goals of freedom and includes impersonal social and economic constraints. Finally, the historical account of freedom (the 'concrete' version of positive freedom) explores the changing conditions of freedom through history, in parallel with the changing forms of domination. My analysis will culminate with an application of the historical view to elaborate the new freedoms and unfreedoms in capitalism.

My method will significantly change in the two parts of this book because of the different methods employed by two sides of the debate. The negative view emphasizes the inter-personal aspect of freedom, and analyses various configurations of the relation between a coercer and a coerced person. This approach takes free action as the unit of analysis and considers the notions of free individual and free society as either derivative or meaningless. It claims to give a purely descriptive theory of freedom and denies that there is a specific notion of human nature, or any particular vision of the good life underlying the negative conception of freedom. In contrast, the advocates of positive freedom focus on the relationship between a free agent and a free society by explicitly defending a specific theory of human nature and good life, arguing that any conception of freedom has a normative dimension.

This is why the first part on negative freedom will basically include the debates between different versions of the negative view, as represented by contemporary 'analytical' philosophers with their distinctive micro-analysis of free action, whereas the part on positive freedom will involve a discussion of the metaphysical foundations of free agency by historical thinkers (such as Kant, Hegel and Marx) as well as some contemporary ones.

Here is a brief summary of the themes and main arguments I will explore in each chapter. I will elaborate the negative conception of freedom in the first five chapters that form Part I. Hayek's account of negative freedom that involves a tension between the subjective criteria of free action and the objective criterion of a free individual will be discussed in the first chapter.

The contemporary debate between different advocates of the negative view (Steiner, Oppenheim and Miller) about the universal constraints on free action is critically evaluated in chapter 2. They agree that freedom of action is restricted only when there is a definite person who is responsible for depriving one of his freedom. The central theme of the debate is whether to take freedom as the absence of prevention (free behaviour) or as the absence of intervention (free action), and whether causal responsibility or moral responsibility is an adequate notion to capture the source of constraints. This discussion will reveal the narrow understanding of constraints underlying the negative view, and will highlight the problems that arise in the attempts to enlarge the set of constraints to include impersonal factors, whilst remaining within the framework of negative freedom.

In chapter 3, I will analyse how the negative view considers the relation between free action, free person and free society. We will see the problems involved in deriving the overall freedom of a person by aggregating his free actions. This chapter will expose some of the pitfalls for any purely descriptive account of freedom. The negative view cannot pass from the level of free action to that of a free individual without assuming a particular hierarchy of freedoms, and thereby embracing the normative dimension of freedom. The neo-liberal followers of Hayek claim freedom of contract based on voluntary consent to be the most important freedom and the basis of a free society. This normative choice leads them to defend capitalism as the model of a free society.

Is capitalism a society where everyone has equal negative freedom? This question is the basis of chapter 4, where I will critically evaluate Cohen's internal critique of capitalism. This will include considering three pillars of capitalism (private property, wage labour and free markets) in relation to negative freedom. The chapter will also include a brief consideration of the meaning and limits of consumer freedom, as well as an argument showing that freedom of contract does not automatically yield individual freedom when it involves a relationship between individuals with unequal power.

In chapter 5, I will evaluate those thinkers who try to extend and revise the negative conception of freedom so that it will include the internal constraints on freedom. I have called this position the 'hybrid view' because it lies in the middle ground between negative and positive conceptions of freedom. I will distinguish between two versions of the hybrid view. The first version (late-Berlin, Benn, Weinstein) shifts the focus from freedom of action to freedom of choice, by defining freedom as the non-restriction of options. It challenges the implicit assumption of the negative view that takes the goal of freedom to be doing what one wants, by showing how it leads to the 'paradox of the contented slave'.

On the other hand, the second version of the hybrid view (Frankfurt, Dworkin, Watson) challenges the idea of the self as a simple unity, which is implicitly assumed by the negative view. When the self is taken as 'internally complex', it becomes possible to speak about internal constraints on freedom. Moreover, freedom can then be defined as doing what one values, rather than as doing what one desires. Although the hybrid view extends the set of constraints on freedom and introduces some central themes such as free choice and moral agency, it is still not an adequate theory of freedom in so far as it fails to conceive poverty and ignorance as restricting the effective exercise of choice. This defect leads us to move forward to the positive conception of freedom, discussed in Part II.

Chapter 6 is on Green's account of positive freedom as a social achievement, linked with self-realization and requiring the necessary abilities and social opportunities to achieve one's goals. Here, I will also answer Berlin's criticism that the positive view has 'totalitarian' tendencies in so far as it allows the possibility that we can be 'forced to be free'.

Kant's notion of rational self-determination, autonomy and their defence against Berlin's criticisms will be the main theme of chapter 7. As opposed to the negative view, Kant shows that we are free not as natural beings, but as rational and moral beings who can transcend the natural causal determination and act on self-imposed laws.

Chapter 8 focuses on Hegel's account of concrete freedom as opposed to the negative view and Kant's theory as two versions of abstract freedom. Hegel teaches us that morality and rationality are socially evolving phenomena and freedom is possible only through fulfilling social relations and identifying with one's various social roles, rather than as an isolated self-legislating agent. This introduces the vision of a socially embedded self in contrast to the atomistic self that underlies the negative view.

Recent communitarian thinkers such as Taylor and Sandel who develop some Hegelian insights will be discussed in chapter 9. I will argue that although communitarians have the merit of defending a socially embedded notion of the self and showing that autonomy is a socio-historical product rather than a universal value as the liberals suppose, their romantic portrayal of the community as based on shared values is problematic. This is partly why they cannot provide a concrete vision of a free society, which will be pursued in the following chapters.

In chapter 10, we will see why having negative freedom and having the material means to exercise negative freedom is neces...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• Bibliography
• Index