Lecture 6: Hegel’s Theory of Freedom

Hegel Modernity and Subjectivity

The common man thinks he is free when he is allowed to act arbitrarity, but this very arbitrariness implies that he is not free. §14 Addition.

The right of the subjects particularity to find satisfaction, or – to put it differently – the right of subjective freedom, is the pivotal and focal point in the difference between antiquity and modernity. §124

The right of the subjective will is that whatever it is to recognizes as valid should be perceived by it as good…§ 132

§260 The principle of modern states has enormous strenght and depth because it allows the principle of subjectivity to attain fulfillment in the self-sufficient extreme of persomal particularity, while at the same time bringing it back to substantial unity and so preserving this unity in the principle of subjectivity itself.

1. Kant’s Theory of Moral Freedom

A free-will is a will which enjoys ‘independence from empirical conditions’ V 29.

A free will and a morally autonomous will, i.e. a will that is subject only to the moral law, are one and the same.

Insofar as one acts from inclination alone one is not free. Action on inclination alone is heteronomous action. Only action which is not done from inclination alone does one act autonomously i.e. with moral freedom

Only actions performed in conformity with duty, and for the sake of duty or out of duty, are morally free and have moral worth.

In Kant’s Religion Within the Limits of Pure Reason Alone, (1793) Kant famously argued that Christian morality, if based on the authority of Scripture or the Church is just another form of superstition, and as heteronomous as any other form of dogmatic belief. Hence there is no difference.

‘between a shaman of the Tunguses and a European prelate ruling over Church and state alike,…between the wholly sensuous Wogulite…and the sublimated Puritan and Independent of Connecticut: for as regards principle, they both belong to one and the same class, namely the class of those who let their worship of God consist in what in itself can never make man better (in faith in certain statutory dogmas or celebration of certain arbitrary observances.).’ Religion 164.’

Hegel’s answer in his early writings (around 1800) is that dutiful actions, willed independently of all sensible considerations, are just as heteronomous as actions on dogmatic religious beliefs, since they are performed out of slavish obedience to a rational principle which is external to all sensible inclinations.

B}etween the Shaman of the Tunguses, the European prelate who rules church and state, the Voguls and the Puritans, on the one hand, and the man who listens to his own command of duty on the other, the difference is not that the former make themselves slaves while the latter is free, but that the former have their master outside themselves while the latter carries his lord inside himself, and yet at the same time is his own slave. (Werke 1, 323)

(This metaphor of self-mastery and the idea that what is master of itself must also in some way be a slave to itself, can be found also in Hegel’s Republic.)

Hegel’s first point is that external imposition of reason on sensible inclinations is a form of self-mastery, and just as heteronomous and unfree as superstitious religious actions. Freedom is not self-mastery in the sense of freedom from determination by inclinations per se. My true self cannot be identified with my merely rational self as opposed to my inclinations. Reason is not opposed to and separate from sensible inclination.

Hegel’s second point is that morality (internal freedom) is not simply a matter of command and obedience, of the capacity to abstract away from the contingent causal promptings of inclination to some purely rational principle.

Freedom = internal self-rule. (Kant and Hegel agree on that). But Hegel develops this thesis in the Philosophy of Right in the following way.

1. He argues that the self-rule or self-legislation of an individual is only possible when the right kind of relation exists between the ruling element, (reason universality), and the ruled element (inclination – particularity). That relation must not be coercive, imposition or rational order on chaotic (or as Kant called them – pathological) inclination. To put it crudely inclination and reason have to be pulling in the same direction.

2. Hegel argues that 1. will only happen when subjects are socialised and educated in the right way, and brought up (have their character and habits shaped) by customs, practices and laws that are rationally organised i.e. that demonstrably serve the common good. They will develop good (i.e. social altruistic inclinations), an eye for what is the in the common good, and because of their sense of belonging to the ethical life of the community, the common good will be something they deeply care about, and will want to serve.

NB note that the reciprocal relation between universal-particular that is internal to the subject, contained in the relation of reason to inclination, is also the same one that applies between the laws and the citizens of the state.

2. The Concept of Freedom in Social Political Philosophy

i. Wilhelm von Humboldt (1795).

The proper understanding of politics requires that two different questions be distinguished from one another, and that a clear priority to one of them is given.

a) Who rules? How is government organised. What kind of constitution/regime does a society have? What structures exist for the exercise of political power and who controls these structures?

b) To which ‘object’ (i.e. to which spheres of human life ought the government powers to extend their reach, and from what ought they to be excluded?

(Think about what answers have or could be given to both questions!)

Humboldt thinks that traditional political theory has put too much weight on the first question and not enough weight on the second. The real political question is not what kind of government should we have but to what areas or life ought it to be permitted to extend?

Answers to these two different questions could be seen as reflecting two basically different answers to the question of what freedom is.

Answer a): A society is free if it has this or that apparatus of government which is controlled in this or that way.

Answer b): A society is free in which the effective powers of government, no matter of what type they are or who controls them, are as limited as possible.

Answer b) is characteristic of modern liberalism. If one thinks of powers of the government as restrictions on the self-activity (and freedom) of individuals, then like Humboldt one must think that the best government or the most free society is one where the sphere of government action is as limited as possible.

(Neo-liberals in America still think this. They especially want the government to refrain from imposing taxes and limiting freedom of exchange and contract. [Ironically often exactly the same bunch of people, who want the least possible interference in their moneymaking activities, want a lot of government interference with scientific investigation into stem-cell research, or family planning issues, and they seem to be pretty happy with a lot of interference by their government and military in the political affairs or other countries.]

ii. Isaiah Berlin’s distinction between Negative and Positive Liberty

Positive Liberty: Freedom is self-governance. ‘That society is freest that has the most fully developed structure of internal self-rule.’

Negative Liberty: Freedom is the absence of external obstacles to one’s activities. ‘That society is freest in which the individuals are least, externally obstructed or interfered with by government.’

Freedom from and freedom to. Positive and Negative liberty is not equivalent with the meaning of the expressions ‘freedom from’ and ‘freedom to’. Free from does not only refer to external obstacles. Free to can mean capacity, opportunity or permission.

Opportunity or Capacity to Exercise.

N.B. Freedom can be thought of either as an opportunity or as an exercise concept. My freedom of opportunity can be maximised even though I lack the capacity to exercise it. I may live in a society where there is no legal bar to my purchasing a very fast car all to myself, but I may lack the money to do so I cannot effectively make use of that freedom.

Freedom as an Attribute of Individuals and Societies.

In ancient Greek societies positive freedom eleutheria was a status term that appertained to individuals who were not slaves. Then it became extended to cover dependent territories – city-states who exercised rule over themselves (and other city-states), and those who were subject to external rule from elsewhere. Freedom can be attributed either to individuals or to communities (states).We have seen that Kant and Hegel explicitly attribute positive freedom internal self-legislation or self-rule, to individuals. Indeed The have different and opposed conceptions of what shape this individual freedom construed as internal self-rule should take.

These considerations yield a picture according to which there aer at least four basic conceptions of human freedom.

When Liberals answer the question of freedom they tend to be thinking of C. They give strict priority to Humboldt’s second question. And they also tend to assume that the only things that count as external obstacles or hindrances to freedom are government and state, and the activities of other human beings. However in principle there is no reason to think why an increase in the power of the state might not lead to an increase in the negative freedom of individuals.

Think of vast and lawless societies where the real present danger to one’s own freedom is the random violence of marauding gangs. In such a society one might think that massive crack down by police, say the rigorous enforcement of a curfew might be necessary measure to increase or to safeguard the negative freedom of individuals.

In a lawless and consequently weak state, man is defenceless and unfree. The Stronger the state, the freer the individual.’ Vladimir Putin ‘Open Letter to Russian voters,’ 25 February 2000.

3. Hegel’s Concept of Freedom

Hegel is normally thought of as having a positive conception of freedom of society. So when there is talk of Hegel’s concept of freedom generally it is B that is referred to. However, as we have just seen, Hegel also thinks that A is an important question. However he thinks that A depends on B or at least that the two questions are interwoven.

EPR §1 & 4. Hegel claims that Right, Law/Norm – the rule of law – broad term which includes the constitution, and the formal political institutions of the state, together with the informal social institutions of civil life – e.g. the family – are the ‘actualization of freedom’ or better still, ‘the way the Idea of right gives actuality to itself.’

§129Z Each stage (in EPR i.e. abstract right, morality and ethical life) is in fact the idea, but the earlier stages contain it only in more abstract form.

Basic Argument so far

1. The concept of the will is freedom

2. The content (goal) of will is itself, its own freedom

3. Willed freedom is freedom made real and actual in the world through human action.

4. For 3 to take place, individual free wills must live in a social world with certain determinate rational structure. Ethical life is that determinate rational structure

3.1 Ethical Life (Sittlichkeit) as the Actualisation of Freedom

§142 – 4 is the Idea of Freedom in its fully developed form.

Note that the order in which the various determinations of the will (or concepts of right) are treated is not an ‘historical’ one but a rational one, the order in which the free will determines itself. §32Z

The opening section of Part 3 §142 - § 147 defines Ethical Life, shows how it has arisen out of AR and M §142-150, and says how it goes beyond them §151-156.

Ethical is custom and habit, or a ‘second nature’ of individuals.

151Z in ethics ‘the will is present as the will of spirit and has a substantial content which is in conformity with itself.’ (Remember the critique of AR and M is that they are ultimately empty of determinate content.)These customs and habits are shaped by education.

‘Education is the art of making human beings ethical: it considers them as natural beings and shows them how they can be reborn, and how their original nature can be transformed into a second spiritual nature so that this spirituality becomes habitual to them.’

However note that education is a way of giving human wills the right content, such that self-will and conscience are no longer in opposition to law, custom etc. That content must be such as to be capable of being willed i.e. recognised by individuals.

EL must embody the ‘right of the subject’s particularity to find satisfaction’ or make room for ‘subjective freedom.’ §124 §154 See esp. §260 This is why education must be at one with upbringing within the laws of the state and not separate from and opposed to it like in Rousseau’s Emile. §153

3.2 Frederick Neuhouser’s Thesis: Foundations of Hegel’s Social Theory Harvard U.P. 2000

This process in which the idea of right gives itself actuality has three stages and the result of the process three constituents:

Personal Freedom – Abstract Right (Property/Contract/Crime &Punishment)

Moral Freedom – Moral Right (Responsibility/Intentions/Good/Conscience)

Social Freedom – Ethical Life (Family/Civil Society/State)

Concrete or substantial freedom or full freedom consists in a determinate historical coalescence of these three kinds of freedom, whereby 3 is the Aufhebung or sublation of 1 & 2.

According to Neuhouser Hegel has a fundamentally diggerent and original answer to the question that bothers liberals so much, the question of how the interests and desires that citizens possess as individuals relate to the good (actualized freedom) that he conceives to be embodied in the rational social order.

Note the strategy he rejects. Freedom only means B above. This freedom may be something that subjects enjoy already in the freedom of nature. The State is merely an instrument or convenient device for better enabling humans to remain free in sense B. (This view is often called atomism – social atomism. Hegel usually cals it ‘abstract’. CF Margaret Thatcher – ‘There is no such thing as society. There is only a collection of individuals.) Those liberals who have a ccused Hegel of being a totalitarian thinker, (Isiah Berlin + Karl Popper) have usually done so on the assumption that Hegel argue for the absolute authority of the state on the basis that the citizen properly speaking has no interests of his or her own. Not just that the good of the state is prior to the good of the individual, but that the real interests of the individual are necessarily at one with the common interests, so that when the individual has any interests or desires that are not directly subservient to the common good, they can be overridden or discounted.

It is impossible to reconcile these dismissal of Hegel with Hegel’s insistence on the right of subjectivity.

FN. Freedom applies to individuals but also is what he calls ‘a strongly holistic property’ of the social whole of which they are a part. They can partake o this higher form of freedom, but identifying themselves with the commuity and the common good, but the positive freedom of the society cannot be reduced to the freedom (netaive or positive) of the individual.

3.3 Allan Patten’s Thesis: Hegel’s Idea of Freedom Patten gives a Civic Humanist version of a Self-Actualization Model of Freedom. On Patten’s view Hegel’s concept of freedom consists in the peculiar and historically determinate combination of two discrete moments:

1. Subjective Freedom

2. Objective Freedom

3. Full Concrete or Substantial Freedom = 1+2.

1. An agent is subjectively free iff s/he finds some subjective satisfaction in her actions and relationships (determinations of the will).

2. An agent is objectively free iff her determinations are prescribed by reason: they are determinations to which a fully rational agent would, in the circumstances, be committed. An agent is fully free iff he wills the right things.

3. The fully free agent is free in both these senses, and is such by virtue of her participation in the practices, customs and institutions of modern Sittlichkeit or ethical life. (Patten p. 35 passim)

Ethical Life or Sittlichkeit is necessary for objective freedom, because the capacities and self-understandings that subjective freedom involves ‘can be reliably developed and sustained only in the context of certain institutions and practices’ i.e. property, contract, morality etc. However, a society containing only those capacities and self-understandings and the institutions that sustain them ‘may not be stable and self-reproducing unless the agents who inhabit it are disposed to act in certain ways. Only subjects who are brought up within (and shaped by) the institutions of modern Sittlichkeit have the requisite dispositions – very roughly a general concern for the common good, combined with an understanding of how one’s individual actions serve the common good..

Therefore modern Sittlichkeit – family, civil society and the state – ‘is the minimum self-sufficient institutional structure in which agents can develop, maintain, and exercise the capacities and attitudes involved with subjective freedom’. Because ethical institutions ‘imbue them with goals, values and convictions such that, when they freely consult their own evaluations and commitments about how to act, the answers they arrive at reinforce that order rather than weakening it or destabilizing it.’ Alan Patten Hegel’s Idea of Freedom p. 38.