Essay Sample on The Difference Between Negative and Positive Freedom

Introduction

Freedom is defined as the right or power to speak, think, or act as one wants. The idea of freedom was formulated in ancient Greece. Freedom, otherwise known as liberty is considered to be next to religion because of the ideology behind the two terms. Freedom has been the motive of good deeds as well as the pretext of crime.

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The seed of freedom was planted more than two thousand years ago and would later be harvested by men of our times. It took nations a long time to understand the true meaning of freedom and what it meant to be free. However, every age freedom thrived, it was set back by its natural enemies namely superstition and ignorance. In some cases, freedom was affected by the lust of conquest, a strong man who craved power, or a poor man who longed for food.

One common factor throughout the entire process was the fact that friends of freedom have always been rare. Its triumph has been championed by minority groups who have been met by tough opposition; the kind that gets people killed. The true nature of freedom has been a constant obstacle that has been difficult to overcome or understand. Since its conception, individual freedom has witnessed some great challenges in the first half of this century. One huge enemy of freedom is international warfare which has been waged by various nations. There has also been a huge problem in achieving complete democracy in many countries which have, in turn, affected the nature of liberty and the systems of free enterprise (Lutz).

Difference between Positive and Negative Freedom

Positive freedom refers to the possession of the ability to act upon a person's free will (Berlin, 2017, 22). It involves freedom from internal or external constraints. According to social science, structure and agency are both founded on positive freedom. Agency refers to the recurrent patterned arrangements that affect the opportunities and choices available to a person. The agency, on the other hand, is the capability of a person to act.

The reason these two are founded on positive liberty is that they for the two concepts to existing an individual needs to be free. He or she needs to be free from any internal or external inhibitions from the environment or society around him or her. The individual should be in a position to excise free will.

Various structural factors can hinder a person's ability to carry out free will. The first is classism also referred to as class discrimination. Discrimination based on social class is one of the biggest hindrances to positive freedom in society today. It is based on individual practices, behaviors, attitude, and system policies that are designed to benefit the upper class at the expense of the lower class.

This is a common problem in society today as people group individuals based on their wealth, education, social network, or occupation. Another inhibitor is sexism or discrimination based on gender or sex. It is considered to affect mainly girls and women, and in the past, it has been linked with gender roles and stereotypes. Sexism makes a certain gender feel superior to the other. In some cases, sexism may lead to sexual harassment.

The act of making people of the same age feel and look weak in society leads to their oppression and assaults. Ageism is as a result of attitude, and discrimination towards people of a certain age. The act of discrimination based on ageism includes denying services, rights, and ignoring the old. It is easy to avoid ageism by avoiding the discrimination and rejection of older people. There is a feeling of dependence that comes along with old age. Therefore, if there were no discrimination in terms of ageism, old people would not be thinking less about themselves.

Moreover, people feel better when they are treated good. There is the prejudice of people because of their disabilities. It is a problem when people segregate others because they are unable to do things in a certain way or manner. The society has made it normal to a group and defines people according to their disabilities.

In modern society where people and society have merged, one hindrance to positive liberty is racism. For many years, racism has hindered people's freedom because of one race believing to be superior over others which often leads to discrimination or prejudice towards individuals based on their ethnic or racial backgrounds. In many modern and developed societies where positive freedom has been embraced, racism has been one of the biggest hindrances towards achieving liberty. Racism interferes with a person's freedom and prevents society from achieving positive liberty.

Positive liberty is also concerned with helping those in society achieve sociological agency. This is because it gives the citizens an opportunity to participate in the running of their country through active participation in government. Positive freedom encourages people to voice their grievances and interests which they may recognize, and in turn, the government can act upon them.

Negative liberty refers to the freedom from interference by those that surround an individual. It is mainly concerned with freedom from external contrasts and restraints with positive freedom. An individual has negative liberty to the point where his or her actions are available in a negative sense.

Isaiah Berlin (1958, 121), identify the distinction between positive and negative liberty in his essay "The Concepts of Liberty." According to him the two concepts of freedom could be found in the statements people made (Gray, 1980, 98). For example, a statement like, "I am a slave to no man," is an example of negative freedom. This is because this particular type of freedom is based on another individual's direct interference.

He went on to contrast this statement with a positive liberty statement indicating, "I am my own master," which is based on freedom to choose one's direction in life. According to Charles Taylor, Negative Freedom is viewed as an opportunity concept. This means that a person possesses negative freedom if he/she is not enslaved by external forces while having access to the resources around him. He also mentions that positive freedom is an exercise concept whereby an individual that exercises it is not internally constrained. Such individuals must be able to act according to their self - standards, and reason. Positive freedom is all about being mature in the way one makes his or her decisions, free from any external or internal restraints. Such restraints include fear or ignorance.

An example of how positive and negative freedom work is found in the following example. A driver is driving through town and comes across a fork in the road. He or she turns left, but no one forces the driver to go one way or the other. After a few miles, the driver comes across a crossroad. At that point, he or she turn right even though no one is preventing them from turning left or going straight on. At the cross-road, there is the absence of any traffic or police roadblocks. This means that the driver is completely free to make their own decision on the route they would like to take. But if the driver made these turns because of other reasons like they were addicted to alcohol and they were rushing to the nearest bar, then the driver would no longer be driving, but instead, they would feel like they were being driven to satisfy their urge. The decisions this individual makes are internally influenced.

Such a scenario shows the contrast between the two ways of liberty is viewed. On one side, liberty is viewed as the absence of obstacles that are external to a particular agent. This means that an individual is free if no one stops them from doing whatever they want to do. Like in the scenario provided, the individual appears free. On the other hand, liberty is viewed as the presence of control but on this particular agent.

Freedom involves self-determination which means that a person should have the ability to control his or her destiny depending on their interests (Carter, 2003, 56). In the second part of the scenario, the individual is unfree since they are not able to control their destiny since they fail to control a passion that they would rather get rid of because it prevents them from realizing they recognize as their true interests. From a different point of view, one might view the first part of the story as the freedom to recognize the number of doors open to the agent while the second section is about going through the right door for the right reason.

Conclusion

There is a significant difference between the two concepts in terms of the external and internal factors that affect the agent. Those that have studied negative freedom are mainly interested by the degree to which an individual or people are affected by interference from external factors while those that study positive freedom are interested with the internal factors that affect the extent to which people act autonomously (Young, 2017, 114)..

In politics, positive freedom has often been viewed as necessarily being achieved via collectivity. This is well explained in Rousseau's theory of freedom which indicates that individual freedom is accomplished through participation in the process where the individual's community exercises communal control over its affairs through what is referred to as general will.

Democratic societies are free societies because they are described as self-determined societies where members are free to the point where they participate in democratic processes such as electing their leaders. This explains why governments are argued to actively create conditions that enable individuals to be self-sufficient or help them achieve self-realization if they want the country to grow and develop (Crocker, 1980, 16). However, it was pointed out that positive liberty carries with it the danger of authoritarianism. Therefore, in places where there are minority groups, it is important to ensure that they too are free to exercise positive liberty.

References

Berlin, I., 2017. Two concepts of liberty. In Liberty Reader (pp. 33-57). Routledge.

Carter, I., 2003. Positive and negative liberty.

Crocker, L.H., 1980. Positive liberty: an essay in normative political philosophy (Vol. 7). Springer Science & Business Media.

Gray, J.N., 1980. On negative and positive liberty. Political Studies, 28(4), pp.507-526.

Isaiah, B., 1958. Two concepts of liberty. I. Berlin.

Young, R., 2017. Personal autonomy: Beyond negative and positive liberty. Routledge.