Explain Hegel's conception of freedom. HEGELIAN CONCEPT OP FREEDOM
Ans.
Hegel had the reputation of being the most difficult of philosophers. This reputation rested upon the complexity of the language in which he expressed his thought. He concerned himself with the persistent issues of politics as consent, freedom and authority. His principal pre-occupation was with freedom. He regarded his political philosophy as supplying the only valid reconciliation of freedom and authority. Hegel asserted that men are free when they obey the commands of the state.
1. Value of Freedom: Hegel was one of those young Germans who had enthusiastically welcomed the French Revolutioa But as things developed under Napeolean, these young Germans had to re examine their beliefs. Hegel's political philosophy is the most significant fruit of this reaction. According to Hegel freedom is the distinctive quality of man. In his words, "To renounce one's freedom is to renounce one's humanity, Not to be free, therefore, is a renunciation of one's human rights and even of one's duties". This truth Hegel gathered from Rousseau and Kant.
2. Differences from Kant: Hegel believed that Kantian conception of freedom was negative, limited and subjective on account of which the attitude of Kant towards the stale was grudging and individualistic. In opposition to Kant, Hegel put forth his positive concept of freedom and less individualistic conception of the state and it's freedom.
3. Freedom As Social Phenomena: The chief defect of the Kantian concept of freedom is that he did not show it to be a social phenomenon. He viewed it as theattribute of men as an independent unit. He nowhere stressed the point that freedom can be realised only in and through participation in the legal and ethical life of the community. Hegel sought to emphasize that freedom is a social phenomenon. It is made possible only by participation in the moral life of the community. He reunited the individual with a social system and urged that freedom can be possible only and within the state. The main point which Hegel emphasizes is that civilization is not repressive of individual freedom; that 'social forces are a medium in which the individual always moves and from which he derives the elements even of his individuality, that to be man at all required participation in the life of some sort of communities; that education and culture are in general a means of liberation'. For men freedom can exist only in a national state. The latter alone can create the highest form of freedom and consequently utmost emphasis should be put upon the creation of the state.
4. Freedom only in the state: Freedom is possible only within the state and not outside it: The state is a necessary condition of freedom. The state sustains freedom. Man is free only when he lives in a state. Without it, he is completely in subjection. That is what Hegel means by his phrase that "nothing short of the state is the actualisation of freedom". But the stale which Hegel conceives of is nothing short of the perfection of Spirit or Reason. He called it the "divine idea on earth" and the final embodiment of spirit, the concrete universal.
5. Freedom is obedience to Law: Since the state represents the social morality in its highest form, therefore, obedience to its laws guarantees freedom. According to Hegel, freedom does not consist in the absence of restraints or in satisfying the desires and passions as they rise but in obedience to the laws of the state which represent Reason. The absence of arbitrary restraints may be a condition of freedom but is not its essence. Hegel does not make the individual conscience the final court of appeal because it is incapable of telling us what is eternaliy right. Moreover, individual consciences change from place to place and from time to time. Therefore, for realisation of freedom we must look to the state, for its laws alone represent the eternal reason. Freedom consists in the willing obedience to the laws of the state. Men are free hence they are aware of the necessity. The state regularizes and rationalises human desires and makes men aware of their identity with it. Men see that what they really want is what the state commands. The contradiction between freedom and obedience is seen to be merely apparent. The obedient citizen is the only free man, because, in the last analysis be is obeying himself. In duty, the individual acquires his substantive freedom. Thus, the second point to be noted in the Hegelian concept of freedom is that freedom consists in obedience to the commands of the state. The only way to secure freedom is voluntary submission to the more perfect expression of reason in the state. An individual is free only when he consciously identifies himself with the laws of the state which are deductions from the nature of Reason.
Criticisms
Some critics are of the opinion that by identifying freedom with obedience to the laws of the state, Hegel has sacrificed the individual at the altar of the state. While Hegel sought to give a more satisfactory definition of liberty than that provided by those who regard the state as a machine, he in the end sacrified the individual to the Great Leviathan. In the words of Barker, Hegel turned the edge of the principle of freedom by identifying it with obedience. According to Sabine, to level obedience at freedom is a paradox rather than explanation.
