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Negative liberty is freedom from interference by other people. Negative liberty is primarily concerned with freedom from external restraint and contrasts with positive liberty (the possession of the power and resources to fulfil one's own potential). According to Thomas Hobbes, "a free man is he that in those things which by his strength and wit he is able to do is not hindered to do what he hath the will to do" (''Leviathan'', Part 2, Ch. XXI; thus alluding to liberty in its negative sense). An idea that anticipates the distinction between negative and positive liberty was G. F. W. Hegel's "sphere of right" (furthered in his ''Elements of the Philosophy of Right''), which constitutes what now is called negative freedom and his subsequent distinction between "abstract" and "positive liberty."〔George Klosko, (''History of Political Theory: An Introduction: Volume II: Modern'' ) (2nd ed.), Oxford University Press, 2013, p. 465: "we should note that Hegel's realization of the distance between his own and the traditional liberal conception of freedom, which he calls "abstract freedom," is clear in his embrace of positive freedom , Routledge, 2014: "Hegel's collective vision of positive liberty in and through ''Sittlichkeit'' is reduced to no more than the "mischief" and "mystification" of an amoral, regressive and anti-liberal political vision."〕 In the Anglophone tradition the distinction between negative and positive liberty was introduced by Isaiah Berlin in his 1958 lecture "Two Concepts of Liberty." According to Berlin, the distinction is deeply embedded in the political tradition. In Berlin's words, "liberty in the negative sense involves an answer to the question: 'What is the area within which the subject—a person or group of persons—is or should be left to do or be what he is able to do or be, without interference by other persons'."〔Berlin, I. (1958). "Two Concepts of Liberty." In Isaiah Berlin (1969): ''Four Essays on Liberty''. Oxford: Oxford University Press.〕 Restrictions on negative liberty are imposed by a person, not by natural causes or incapacity. Helvetius expresses the point clearly: "The free man is the man who is not in irons, nor imprisoned in a gaol, nor terrorized like a slave by the fear of punishment ... it is not lack of freedom, not to fly like an eagle or swim like a whale." Frankfurt School psychoanalyst and humanistic philosopher Erich Fromm drew a similar distinction between negative and positive freedom in his 1941 work, ''The Fear of Freedom'', that predates Berlin's essay by more than a decade. Fromm sees the distinction between the two types of freedom emerging alongside humanity's evolution away from the instinctual activity that characterizes lower animal forms. This aspect of freedom, he argues, "is here used not in its positive sense of 'freedom to' but in its negative sense of 'freedom from', namely freedom from instinctual determination of his actions."〔Erich Fromm, ''The Fear of Freedom'' (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd., 1966):26.〕 For Fromm, then, negative freedom marks the beginning of humanity as a species conscious of its own existence free from base instinct. The distinction between positive and negative liberty is considered specious by socialist and Marxist political philosophers, who argue that positive and negative liberty are indistinguishable in practice, or that one cannot exist without the other.〔(Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy on Negative/Positive Liberty )〕 Although he is not a socialist nor a Marxist, Berlin argues: "It follows that a frontier must be drawn between the area of private life and that of public authority. Where it is to be drawn is a matter of argument, indeed of haggling. Men are largely interdependent, and no man's activity is so completely private as never to obstruct the lives of others in any way. 'Freedom for the pike is death for the minnows'; the liberty of some must depend on the restraint of others."〔Berlin, I. (1958). "Two Concepts of Liberty." In Isaiah Berlin (1969): ''Four Essays on Liberty''. Oxford: Oxford University Press.〕 == Overview == ''Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' describes negative liberty: "The negative concept of freedom ... is most commonly assumed in liberal defences of the constitutional liberties typical of liberal-democratic societies, such as freedom of movement, freedom of religion, and freedom of speech, and in arguments against paternalist or moralist state intervention. It is also often invoked in defences of the right to private property, although some have contested the claim that private property necessarily enhances negative liberty."〔〔Cf. Cohen, G. A., 1991, ''Capitalism, Freedom and the Proletariat''.〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Negative liberty」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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