Isaiah Berlin and the Quest for Freedom

Sunday Morning. May 12, 2019.

This morning I was studying the great political philosopher and historian of ideas Sir Isaiah Berlin.

He believed that societies always struggle with competing values where there are no absolute "right" answers about what we should do.

He developed concepts of "negative liberty" and "positive liberty." Negative liberty means the government leaves you alone to do what you want, like start a business, or speak your mind. Positive liberty means you have the ABILITY to do what you want, like go to college, or get medical care.

These are both good things but we will usually find that we can only increase one of them at the expense of the other. And there are no tablets of stone to tell us how to find the ideal balance.

My own example of this is the tension between individual freedom and democracy. If individual freedom means individuals get to decide and democracy means groups get to decide that means we can only get more freedom by restricting democracy, and we can only get more democracy by restricting freedom. We need BOTH. But there are no tablets of stone to tell us where the perfect balance is.

Isaiah Berlin himself believed that the closest the world has ever come to a perfect balance was in the United States of America, during the New Deal under Franklin Roosevelt. Could be....

As I studied Isaiah Berlin this morning I started feeling envious. He spent his whole life studying philosophy and history.

And then I remembered... so have I. ;-)

Sunday Morning

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[If you want to understand politics, REALLY understand it, you have to read Isaiah Berlin.]

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Copyright © 2019 by Joseph Wayne Gadway