Freedom From and Freedom For

The NY Times Opinionator blog carries thoughts by philosophers. Here's a snippet from a posting in honour of July 4th and directed to the issue of America's Independence Day:

Song of Freedom

By J.M. Bernstein

When Janis Joplin achingly sang that “Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose,” she (or the song’s composer, Kris Kristofferson) was critiquing a widely held ideal of independence: namely, the aspiration toward maximum liberty from all binding attachments and obligations. Isn’t it obvious, the argument goes, that each promise, and each unbreakable emotional bond, entails a loss of true freedom, an abrogation of true independence? Joplin’s refutation is simple and elegant: in actuality, absolute freedom is a picture of perfect emptiness, since if you have nothing left to lose, you have nothing.

However much the ideal of unencumbered freedom has become associated with the Declaration of Independence, freedom from binding attachments is no part of its philosophical underpinnings. In protesting against British tyranny, the American colonists were not proclaiming an ideal of individual freedom from government. On the contrary, they were pleading the cause for a vital conception of political community.

The above is more charitable to the ideals of American society than I would be. I find that the emphasis on "freedom" is overdone in the US. It is a pursuit of "freedom from" at the expense of self fulfillment within the context of social obligations.

I also believe, as Mark K. Smith points out in an article on Erich Fromm, the emphasis on "freedom from" can lead to a craving for authoritarianism. I find this to be especially true of the right wing politics in the US:

In 1941, the first of Erich Fromm’s deeply influential books appeared: Escape From Freedom. It argued that ‘freedom from the traditional bonds of medieval society, though giving the individual a new feeling of independence, at the same time made him feel alone and isolated, filled him with doubt and anxiety, and drove him into new submission and into a compulsive and irrational activity’. This alienation from place and community, and the insecurities and fears entailed, helps to explain how people seek the security and rewards of authoritarian social orders such as fascism.

We learn from our mistakes and Fromm was writing in the context of the mid-20th century disaster of fascism and war. The rise of authoritarianism was a dire problem. Fromm was pointing that the ideal of "liberty" in the Declaration of Independence was not a simple "good". It could be abused and could lead to the mass of people embracing fascism.

Bernstein is right to condemn the emphasis on "freedom from" as a blind alley that leads to "nothing left to lose". Certainly people need individual liberties to allow them to develop their individual talents. But this is not despite the larger society. A free society imposes obligations. At the very least, one must reciprocate and enlarge the freedoms of others to pursue self-development, but not at the expense of the larger society to have their fair share of security and happiness. Bernstein notes that the "freedom" people really need is the freedom for self realization in a social context of mutual obligations and a society that emphasizes realizing your individual potential in a socially responsible way.

The last 30 years has seen an era of egomania in the US that has allowed the top 0.1% of the population to become maddenlying wealthy at the expense of the larger society. This was the "freedom from" any social obligations and the wild frenzy to seize economic wealth at the expense of the broader society. The economic condition of the bottom 80% of the population has stagnated while the elite has grown rich beyond their wildest imagination.

The elite in the US must use the opportunity of the Great Recession to turn back toward social obligation and focus on "freedom for" the great mass of the population to realize their dreams. We've had 30 years of "freedom from" social obligations by the elite and it has led to tragedy. That now needs to be balanced by greater emphasis on social connectedness and the obligations toward a civil society.