Berlin\'s Two Concepts of Liberty

Berlin's Two Concepts Of Liberty

Isaiah Berlin:

Two Concepts of Liberty

American society is based primarily upon a concept of liberty so sacred, and so inviolable, that we have gone to war time and again to protect it, and have even ventured so far as to fight to protect this basic right for other people all around the world. In fact, without liberty, it is not possible that American society would exist as it does today. For someone who is wholeheartedly American, this concept of liberty entails the freedom of a person with regards to speech, religion, press, assembly, land, voting, etc. However, such freedom, so very precious for one, may not seem the same for another, especially for those who have lived whole lives under authoritarian regimes. Thus, the imposition of liberty upon these peoples, some argue, is inherently an antithesis to the very purposes of the concept. In order to further examine the concepts of liberty, this paper will examine the article by Isaiah Berlin, entitled "Two Concepts of Liberty," and will also provide other intellectuals' view upon Berlin's outlook on liberty.

Summary

Berlin begins his paper by stating that any study, even that related to the topic at hand, thrives on discord. Discord is, in fact, a prerequisite to the above-mentioned freedoms, as well as their reinforcer. Berlin also states that the time in which he writes (approximately late 1950s), is a time of surprise and danger, when numerous human being have had their entire lives altered by "fanatically held social and political doctrines."

He adds that, with respect to this inherent danger of current times, philosophers seem "oddly unaware" of the devastating effects that their dogma and "blind scholastic pedantry" have had on the much too real and much too practical world.

In an effort to explain the very political thought he seems to criticize, Berlin aims to define the political field as a branch of moral philosophy and states that it "starts from the discovery, or the application, of moral notions in the sphere of political relations."

It is to political movements and thus to philosophy that Berlin then attributes the central questions of life: why should I follow orders? Why should I obey? Why should I agree?, etc.

These questions then turn to ask what exactly freedom means and Berlin turns to finding out what depriving a man from freedom truly signifies. To Berlin, freedom is so fluid and porous, that he does not see the need or the purpose of a definition, and this is perhaps why he has never written a book upon his work and rather chose to divide his ideas in essays. The two definitions Berlin does give, however, in order to better exemplify his point-of-view are those of "negative" and "positive" liberty. The negative case 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?"

The second case, the positive, seeks to answer the questions "What, or who, is the source of control or interface that can determine someone to do, or be, this rather than that?"

With these two characterizations in mind, Berlin then proceeds to define political liberty in the sense to which it pertains to restricting man from doing what he truly wants to do. By being free, Berlin thus means having no interference from others in one's life. However, being free, especially due to social contracts that humanity is inevitably subject to, is also being free to do what one wants within certain social norms. In order to illustrate these purposes Berlin references the Enlightenment philosophers in both cases.

At this point, it is important to mention that in Berlin's time, colonization had begun to crumble, but there were still nations in the world that were subject to gruesome regimes. With this view in mind, Berlin's statement on Western liberal conscience is better understood. This statement exemplifies that view that Berlin illustrates with the statement, "What troubles the consciences of Western liberals is, I think, the belief not that freedom that men seek differs according to their social or economic conditions, but that the minority who possess it have gained it by exploiting, or, at least, averting their gaze from, the vast majority who do not."

With this statement Berlin aims to make the point that those who have freedom have achieved it by exploiting others, and, at the same time, by placing those individuals within certain categories of social and economic degrees of freedom, to which they themselves are not subject.

Despite his high rhetoric which goes on for over 30 pages, Berlin does conclude that he is of the opinion that no matter whether liberty is negative or positive, it is, nonetheless, important, should be available to all, and simply because values are compromised does not mean that they are not eternal or secure. The reader, thus assumes by the end of the commentary that Berlin is indeed of the opinion that liberty is of the utmost importance to a functioning society.

Critique

There are various critiques upon Berlin's work. The one to be examined here will be that of Roberto Toscano who comments upon Berlin's concepts directly and may be of better assistance than my rendering above. Toscano being by illustrating once again the two concepts in his own view, but prefaces them by stating that it is impossible to truly categorize Berlin's actual beliefs or actual discipline (i.e. The man and his ideas are somewhat of a confused anomaly):

Negative Liberty: "A right to act without unreasonable external constraint or interference according to one's own purposes."

Positive Liberty: "A capacity to pursue and perhaps achieve one's ends, which capacity might demand constraints on oneself or others, or the provisions of certain basic conditions for that pursuit."

In order to illustrate these definitions, Toscano also adds that, negative liberty means "freedom from" and positive liberty means "freedom to," and further adds that though unclear in Berlin's work, these simple statements are meant to clarify his definitions. Toscano's criticism thus begins after defining these various terms. The author thus analyzes Berlin quite neutrally, and accepts that the former may have been a victim of believe too much in the importance of privacy within liberty, but doing a great job in the paper to limit this sensibility.

The critique goes on to state:

"In other essays, Berlin spells out what he feels are the consequences of both negative and positive liberty if they are brought to their absolute and radical consequences. In his article on Johann Georg Hamann, on one hand, he shows the extremes of negative liberty, and warns: " Every creature has a natural right to appropriate all that surrounds it to the limits of its power." But this is indeed the core problem of negative liberty, if taken by itself."