Freedom

Topic: Political Theory: Freedom and Rights · NCERT: Class 11, Ch 2 "Freedom"

Meaning

Freedom has two parts: no outside force stops a person from acting, and the person has the conditions (such as education, health and opportunity) to develop their creativity and capabilities. A free society lets all its members develop their potential with the minimum of social constraints. Freedom matters because it lets people make their own choices and use their own reason and judgement. A person who cannot choose is not treated as a full human being.

Explanation

The two parts of freedom

• Absence of external constraints: no outside force stops you from doing what you want. That force could be the state, society or other people.
• Presence of enabling conditions: you have what you need to grow your creativity and capabilities, such as education, health and opportunity.
• Why both parts are needed:
• Removing a chain is not enough if a person is too poor, sick or uneducated to act.

• So freedom means having no barriers and also having the means to act.

• Minimum, not zero, constraints: a free society still has some rules. It just keeps social constraints as few as possible.

Negative and positive liberty

• Negative liberty means freedom from interference by others or the state. Isaiah Berlin made this term well known.
• Positive liberty means freedom to develop oneself, backed by the social and economic conditions needed to do so.
• Freedom from fear and want:
• Aung San Suu Kyi, in Freedom from Fear (1991), wrote that "real freedom is freedom from fear". She meant fear of authority (the state, police, rulers), of one's community, of peers (people of one's own age or group) and of ridicule (being laughed at).
• The lesson: a person can be free under the law and still unfree in practice if fear stops them from acting.
• The UDHR Preamble calls a world where people have "freedom of speech and belief and freedom from fear and want" the "highest aspiration of the common people" [2].
• "Want" means poverty. So the UDHR puts political freedom (no fear) and economic freedom (no poverty) together.

Freedom as a struggle: national and individual

• National freedom came first: colonised peoples fought British, French and Portuguese rule. A nation ruled by foreigners cannot let its people shape their own future.
• National freedom is not enough:
• Nelson Mandela fought apartheid (legal separation by race) in South Africa. Black people were forced into townships (crowded areas set aside for them), controlled by pass laws (permits needed to move around), and barred from marrying across race by the Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act, 1949.
• He spent 27 years in prison, including at Robben Island from 1964 to 1982. He was released on 11 February 1990 under President F.W. de Klerk [6].
• He fought for the freedom of all South Africans, white people included. In this view, freedom belongs to everyone. It is not one group taking revenge on another.
• Both Mandela and Suu Kyi fought governments run by their own countrymen. So self-rule alone does not guarantee personal freedom.

Indian ideas: swaraj and all-round freedom

• Swaraj = swa (self) + raj (rule). It has two meanings:
• Rule of the self: political self-government. The nation rules itself.

• Rule over the self: self-control. A person masters their own desires.

• Tilak: "Swaraj is my birthright and I shall have it." For Tilak, self-rule is a natural right.

• Gandhi's Hind Swaraj (1909):
• "It is Swaraj when we learn to rule ourselves."
• For Gandhi, swaraj means more than removing the British. It restores self-respect, builds self-responsibility, opens the way to self-realisation (becoming one's best self), and frees people from dehumanising institutions (systems that treat people like machines).
• It is guided by justice, so the individual and the community grow together.

• The book's aim is often summed up as an exploitation-free society where an ordinary person can claim and defend their rights [5].

• Subhas Chandra Bose:

• In his address to the students' conference at Lahore on 19 October 1929, he called for all-round freedom: freedom for the individual and society, rich and poor, men and women, and all classes.
• This means more than political freedom. It also means equal distribution of wealth, abolition of caste barriers and destruction of communalism (hostility between religious communities).
• He called this the ideal that "alone can appease the hunger in the soul".
• His idea is close to positive liberty. Removing the British is only step one. Poverty, caste and communalism must also go.

In the Constitution and practice

• Preamble: promises liberty of thought, expression, belief, faith and worship. It pairs liberty with justice (social, economic and political) and equality. This pairing echoes Gandhi and Bose: freedom needs fairness to be real.
• Negative liberty in Part III (Fundamental Rights):
• Article 19 protects freedoms such as speech and expression, assembly and movement.
• Article 19(2)–(6) allow the state to place reasonable restrictions on these freedoms. This is the "minimum of social constraints" idea written into law.

• Article 21: no person shall be deprived of life or personal liberty except according to procedure established by law.

• Positive liberty in the rest of the Constitution:

• Article 17 abolishes untouchability. This matches Bose's call to end caste barriers.
• Part IV (Directive Principles of State Policy) asks the state to build the conditions for freedom. For example, Article 39 asks the state to spread ownership of material resources for the common good and to prevent wealth from piling up in a few hands.

• Fundamental Rights remove barriers. Directive Principles build the conditions. Together they give a positive-liberty reading of the Constitution.

• From Purna Swaraj to Republic:

• The Lahore session of the Indian National Congress (December 1929) adopted the Purna Swaraj (complete independence) resolution. It rejected dominion status (self-rule inside the British Empire) [3][4].
• 26 January 1930 was observed across India as Purna Swaraj Day / Independence Day [3][4].

• The Constitution came into force on 26 January 1950 to honour that date. This links the 1930 demand for full independence to formal constitutional self-government in 1950 [4].

• Global practice:

• Mandela and de Klerk shared the 1993 Nobel Peace Prize for leading South Africa from apartheid to a multiracial democracy [6].
• Suu Kyi was State Counsellor (Myanmar's de facto head of government) from 2016 to 2021. She was detained again after the military coup of February 2021. Critics say she failed to defend the Rohingya Muslim minority while in power.

Don't confuse with

• Negative liberty vs positive liberty: negative liberty means only that no one stops you. Positive liberty also needs the conditions to act. NCERT's definition of freedom includes both.
• Freedom vs absence of all rules: freedom means the minimum of social constraints, not zero. Article 19 freedoms carry reasonable restrictions.
• Swaraj vs Purna Swaraj: swaraj is the broad idea of self-rule and self-control (Tilak, Gandhi). Purna Swaraj is the specific demand for complete independence adopted at Lahore, December 1929 [3][4].
• National freedom vs individual freedom: national freedom ends foreign rule. Individual freedom can still be denied by one's own government, as the struggles of Mandela and Suu Kyi show.

Prelims Hooks

• "Freedom of speech and belief and freedom from fear and want" → UDHR Preamble (adopted 10 December 1948). Trap: it is not in the UN Charter [2].
• Hind Swaraj → written in Gujarati aboard the Kildonan Castle, 13–22 November 1909. It first appeared in Indian Opinion (December 1909). Its English title is Indian Home Rule. Trap: it was not written in English, and not in India [5].
• Bose's "all-round freedom" → students' conference, Lahore, 19 October 1929. Trap: it was not an INC presidential address.
• Purna Swaraj resolution → Lahore INC session, December 1929. 26 January 1930 was observed as Independence Day, which is why the Constitution began on 26 January 1950 [3][4].
• Book–author pairs: Freedom from Fear (1991) → Aung San Suu Kyi. Long Walk to Freedom (1994) → Nelson Mandela.
• Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act, 1949 → apartheid South Africa. Mandela was released on 11 February 1990 and shared the 1993 Nobel Peace Prize with de Klerk [6].

Mains Points

• Freedom needs more than the absence of restraint:
• Mandela, Suu Kyi, Gandhi and Bose all show that freedom needs enabling conditions: no fear, no poverty, no caste or communal barriers.

• The Indian Constitution reflects this by joining Fundamental Rights (Part III) with Directive Principles (Part IV), and liberty with justice and equality in the Preamble.

• Gandhi vs Bose on swaraj:

• Gandhi stressed moral self-rule and freedom from dehumanising institutions.
• Bose stressed social and economic equality: wealth, caste and communalism.

• Together they foreshadow the Preamble's pairing of liberty with social, economic and political justice.

• Ideals vs practice:

• Independence does not guarantee personal freedom. Suu Kyi, a champion of "freedom from fear", was accused of failing to protect the Rohingya once she was in power.
• This argues for institutional safeguards (independent courts, enforceable rights, minority protection) rather than relying on individual leaders.

Related concepts

• Freedom from fear
• Swaraj
• Subhas Chandra Bose's idea of freedom

Read more

• The ideal of freedom: struggles, swaraj and Bose