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Abstract(s)
Liberty has always been the connecting value across centuries, ever since the struggle between liberty and authority was noticed, paving thus the way for discus- sion and quarrels on what liberty meant. Despite its abstract features, natural liberty and liberty under the law had differentiated implications that shackled societies and triggered ideological debate. Thomas Hobbes in the seventeenth century defined li- berty as the absence of obstacles for the fulfillment of desires. As such, total indivi- dual liberty would lead to a condition of war. To avoid the destruction of individuals, it was crucial to transfer man’s rights into a Sovereign in the form of a social contract. John Locke would later claim that a civil society ensured the preservation of rights. Liberty under the law meant protection against the tyranny of the political rulers. The Enlightenment movement, an intellectual and political reaction to religious bigo- try (Hamilton, 1992), praised, first and foremost, individual liberty, reason, and auto- nomy. The Enlightenment, cosmopolitan and rationally-driven, put aside the idea of custom and tradition, starting anew against the slumbers of Middle-Age superstition. Autonomy and individual liberty motivated the liberal theory to sustain its principles in important documents such as Magna Carta (1215), Bill of Rights (1689), Virginia Bill of Rights (1776) and Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (1789). Setting the context for the discussion of (political) liberty considering the Enlighten- ment movement and the liberal tradition in Britain, this paper focuses more specifi- cally on the interpretation that Isaiah Berlin, a 20th century British liberal, made on the Enlightenment and how it influenced the purposes and outcomes of the French Revolution under the banner of abstract and, alas, contending values like liberty and equality. By delving into Berlin’s conception of liberty, we aim therefore to unveil some misconceptions about the use and appropriation of the word liberty over time.
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Keywords
Liberty Equality Enlightenment Liberal tradition French Revolution
Citation
Silva, Elisabete Mendes (2021). Uses and misuses of liberty over time: Isaiah Berlin on political liberty. In IV Colóquio de Línguas Estrangeiras. Bragança
Publisher
Instituto Politécnico de Bragança