Freedom

Freedom refers to the power or right to think, speak and do what one wants. The ideology of freedom has been in existence since the civilization of man and is currently applied in three distinct aspects of human life: social, political, and economic. Social freedom deals with all facets of one’s social life, political freedom focuses on the partisan policies and how human beings associate with each one of them, while economic freedom analyzes all economic activities that guarantee the sustainability of human life. The origin of the word freedom is still unknown, but analysts suggest that its original meaning resonates in modern usage, which is why the word is exclusively utilized in the modern age. Many people tend to thinks that freedom is a right that they are accustomed to but in reality, it is a privilege. A good example of freedom is being released from imprisonment or choosing something without being forced. Nevertheless, this privilege is highly misused by those in power by either manipulating or oppressing the less fortunate. In line with outlining examples of liberty, this essay will focus on defining different aspects of freedom. 

The word freedom was first documented in the English dictionary during the 16th century and was considered as the possession of certain privileges (List and Laura 1043). Naturally, human beings have specific and universal wants. The acquisition of these wants without limits or restrictions is what is referred to as freedom. In the modern world, the word, freedom has been widely associated with socio-political facets, mostly slavery. This is because, the socio-political aspect influences other determinants such as religion, expression, state of life, association, belief, and education.

The first aspect of freedom is social freedom.  Also referred to as social justice, social freedom refers to the necessary limits of a person’s freedom emanating from their condition of social life. Social freedom is achieved when there is a balance between people, and the society dignified by comparing the distribution of wealth disparities, from personal liberties to fair privilege opportunities (Ng 795). In Asian and Western cultures, the concept of social freedom has often been considered as the process of ensuring that people fulfill their social roles as well as receive what is due to their actions. Recent scholars have proposed that the original movement for social freedom emphasized breaking the blockades for social mobility and the establishment of safety havens as well as economic justice. Social freedom assigns duties and tights to the institutions of a given society.

The idea of social freedom is firmly associated with the ideas of common freedoms and basic liberties, in which inequitable social orders are normally given legal assurance from the state, enabling individuals to receive common benefits and burdens of collaboration (Ng, 801). The associated institutions include public services, labor law as well as regulation of business markets, social insurance, and taxation.

Interpretations that associate justice to a reciprocal mutual relationship to society are facilitated by differences in social norms, some of which sensitize the individual obligation towards society while others the balance between admittance to power and its liable use (Ng, 805). Therefore, social freedom is invoked today while referring to historical icons who introduced philosophical arguments related to disparities among human beings in efforts for social, ethnic, and gender equality for promoting justice for prisoners, immigrants, and the environment.

The second aspect of freedom is political freedom (otherwise referred to as political agency or political autonomy) is a focal idea in history as well as a political idea and quite possibly the main attributes of a democratic society (Zhang 1). Political freedom has been portrayed as independence from persecution or pressure, the shortfall of disabling conditions for a person and the satisfaction of empowering conditions, or the absence of life states of constraints, for example, monetary compulsion, in the general public. Though political freedom is frequently deciphered contrarily as the freedom from undetermined external factors on activity, it can likewise allude to the positive exercise of rights, limits as well as opportunities for a defined activity either individually on in a social setting. The idea can likewise be considered as freedom from internal limitations on political activity or discourse (for example social congruity, consistency, or inauthentic conduct).

The history of political freedom can be traced from ancient Greek mythology and politics. Hannah Arendt, a German-born yet an American political theorist, once suggested that the ideology of freedom has always been inseparable from political action. In her study, Arendt was able to establish that politics could only be applied by those who had freed their will from life necessities to effectively participate in the demesne of political affairs (Zhang 7). Arendt also proposed that the perception of freedom became kinked to the Christian conception of inner freedom or freedom of the will, during the 5th century. Since then the correlation of freedom as a form of political activity has been overlooked even though it is known as “the raison d’être of politics”.

The scholar continues to state that political freedom has always contradicted will power or sovereignty since in ancient Rome and Greece the theory of freedom was attached with performance and did not originate as a conflict between self and will (Zhang 11). In connection to this, the conception of freedom as freedom from political activity is an idea of freedom as then aptitude of stating a fresh, which the researcher considers as a corollary to the innate humane state of neutrality or human nature as new beginners.

In the researcher’s view, political activity is a disruption of the automatic process either historical or natural (Zhang 13). The freedom to start afresh is thus a derivation of the freedom to mention something into being, by virtue that it was in existence before, not offered, or even purported as an object of imagination or cognition, and which so, austerely speaking, could be undetermined.

The third aspect of freedom is economic freedom. Also known as economic liberty is the ability of individuals in a given society to take economic activities. This term is mostly used in policy and economic debates (Gwartney 3). One of the building blocks of economic freedom originated from the liberal traditions that sensitize on private property, free trader, and free markets under free enterprise. Another element to economic freedom is derived from the welfare of economics study of a person’s choice, with certain economic freedom emanating from a bigger set of probable choices. Other constituents of economic freedom include freedom to participate in collective bargaining and freedom of want.

In the world of business, economic freedom is considered as the liberty to produce, trade as well as consume defines goods or series acquired ethically (Gwartney 4). This idea is relatively featured in the rule of law, freedom of contract and property rights, and affected by internal and external openness of market and freedom of economic initiative. In most cases, economic freedom will significantly depend on social and political freedom as they determine the sustainability of any society

In conclusion, freedom is the quality or condition of being free without any coercion or constraints from external forces. Naturally, human beings are born of a free will to choose what they desire, however these choices should not harm the immediate society. In any given society, freedom is always expressed in three ways. The first is social freedom which is defined as the necessary limits of a person’s freedom emanating from their condition of social life. The second is political freedom which refers to the independence from persecution or pressure being affiliated to a certain political party. The third is economic freedom which is viewed as the ability of individuals in a given society to take economic activities.

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