LIBERTY:-

Name-kundan kumar
Roll-129

THE CONCEPT OF 'liberty' or 'freedom' denotes a very important principle of

The champions of liberty have, however, always challenged the claims of the
privileged classes to such excellence. The ideal of liberty has inspired many
revolutionary struggles against despotism and foreign regimes. It is significant
that the struggle for liberty is always informed by a philosophy of equality. That
is, when some oppressed sections rise against their oppressors—as in peasant
revolts or national struggles of independence—they challenge the alleged
superiority of their oppressors, demanding equality and justice on the universal
principle of human equality.

SCOPE OF LIBERTY:-

The problem of liberty involves the adjustment of claims between individual and
society (or community). The state comes into the picture because it is the
instrument or agency for regulating their relations. If the claim of the individual is
stretched to an extreme in utter disregard of the interest of society, liberty would
be reduced to 'licence'. On the other hand, if liberty of the individual is increasingly
restricted in the supposed interest of society, the result would be an unconditional
submission to authority, hence the loss of liberty. It is, therefore, essential to
draw a distinction between liberty and licence on the one hand, and to fix the
proper frontier between liberty and authority, on the other.

DIMENSIONS OF LIBERTY:-

CIVIL LIBERTY

Civil liberty, according to Barker (Principles of Social and Political Theory; 1951), is the liberty of
man in the capacity of an individual person—his personal liberty. This consists in three
somewhat differently expressed articles: (a) physical freedom from injury or threat to the life,
health, and movement of the body; (b)intellectual freedom for the expression of thought and
belief; (c) and practical freedom of the play of will and the exercise of choice in the general field
of
contractual action and relations with other persons.
POLITICAL LIBERTY:-

Whereas a man enjoys civil liberty in the capacity of an individual person, he enjoys political
liberty in the capacity of a citizen. To William Blackston (1723-80), political liberty meant the
power of curbing government, from which it follows
that he conceived of government as
something external. But in modern democracy, where government is constituted by the people
themselves, political liberty is "liberty not of curbing government, but of constituting and
controlling; constituting
it by a general act of choice or election, in which we all freely share on the basis
of universal suffrage; controlling it by a general and continuous process of
discussion, in which we all freely share according to our capacities." (Ernest
Barker, Principles of Social and Political Theory; 1951) This view of political liberty postulates
the positive right of the people to be represented in decision-making bodies, and to influence
their decisions by freely
articulating their views and opinions on issues of public policy. In effect, it is intended to ensure
that the state shall be sensitive and responsible to the prevailing
social consciousness. In any case, mere provision of political liberty in this sense cannot be
treated as adequate. Where elections are fought and won with the help of money and
manipulative power, and where the media of mass communication are held in ownership or
under strong influence of a privileged class, particularly by big business magnates, mere
political liberty can hardly secure real or substantive freedom for the people.

ECONOMIC LIBERTY:-

Economic liberty, broadly speaking, belongs to man in his capacity as a worker whether with
hand or brain, engaged in some gainful occupation or service. In this sense, Barker suggests
that economic liberty is implied in the articles of civil liberty already enumerated. In fact,
however, economic liberty is a ticklish ​issue.It​ is capable of conflicting interpretations by
conflicting parties: employer and worker, trader and consumer, landlord and tenant, etc. One
party would interpret it as the freedom to secure maximum profit; the other would insist on
reasonable terms, reasonable price and quality, reasonable rent, etc. Under such
circumstances, if the stronger party is not curbed to safeguard the interests of the
weaker party, the principle of liberty will be reduced to mockery. This is the sphere where the
adjustment between the claims of liberty and equality becomes most essential. As R.H. Tawney,
in his Equality (1938), has significantly observed: When liberty is construed, realistically, as
implying not merely a minimum of civil and political rights, but the securities that the
economically weak will not be at the mercy of the economically strong, and that the control of
those aspects of economic life by which all are affected will be amenable,
in the last resort, to the will of all, a large measure of equality, so far from being inimical to
liberty, is essential to it. i
In short, it is in the economic sphere that the claims of negative liberty and positive liberty come
into direct conflict and confrontation. Unless social policy is geared to safeguard the interests of
the vulnerable sections in this sphere, the application of the principle of liberty or freedom would
be devoid of any content or substance.

CONCLUSION:-
As we proceed to analyse the problem of liberty or freedom in various contexts,
its complexity is gradually revealed to us. At the outset, when liberty is defined as 'absence of
restraint', it seems to be a simple matter. This was the earliest definition put forward by the
classical liberalism. According to this view, the state may impose certain restraints on the
individual only in order to maintain public order and security and to ensure enforcement of
contracts. Liberty is seen as an area where the state has no interference. It is argued that in
order to allow maximum
liberty to the individual, the state should restrict itself to minimum functions
which are most essential. Market forces (like 'invisible hand of the market'—Adam Smith's
phrase) are seen as the natural regulatory mechanism for the mutual adjustment of civilized
individuals who generally know and abide by the rules of the game. This was precisely the view
upheld by laissez-faire philosophy. But subsequently it was realized that market is not a smooth
and humane agency for the adjustment of human relations; that the individual is not deprived of
his freedom only because of the restraints imposed by the state but he suffers from
a large number of constraints including those emanating from the vagaries of
blind market forces. A welfare state with a vast network of regulations was, therefore, seen as a
necessary instrument of freedom.
In a nutshell, the quest for freedom is a continuous process. Although freedom
is sought for the individual, yet it cannot be enjoyed by the individual in isolation. Genuine
freedom—or maximum possible freedom—can be attained only in a
congenial social order where (on the lines of Marx's phraseology) free
development of each will be the necessary condition for free development of all.

Reference-
(i) o.p gauba -basic political theory

(ii)andrew shorten- political theory