Berlin's positive and negative liberty, liberty as interference, and introduction to the idea of libertas as civitas

"I am free to the degree to which no human being interferes with my activity'." Berlin, 1958:7.

This is Berlin's statement on the meaning of negative liberty. He also commends a concept of positive liberty which states that I am free to the extent that I achieve "self-mastery with its suggestion of a man divided against himself." (Berlin, 1958:19)

So, both positive and negative liberty involve interference but not necessarily anything concerning the quality of that interference. All infringements, whether good or bad, are seen as interference and therefore as contrary to liberty. But this version of liberty based as it is solely on the concept of interference without reference to the larger set of values within which interference is both possible and necessary. This is the realm of the rational and democratic use of force, through the law, to impart regularity and stability. A rule of law, an enforcement capability, the place for commerce to grow, etc...

Philip Petit in Republicanism describes the basis of a concept of freedom as non-domination, that is to say, a person enjoys liberty if she is free from another who dominates her. To dominate somebody is to "1. have the capacity to interfere 2. on an arbitrary basis 3. in certain choices that the other is in a position to make." Petit, Republicanism, p. 52. (Don't be fooled by the term "republican". This is pure political theory and not "party politics" which bear little resemblance to the nomenclature found in these texts.) So, liberty as non-domination focuses on the principles which underly non-arbitrary bases of interference as examples of restrictions, for instance, which may promote civic virtue and the common good and are therefore examples of a form of interference which, in fact, promotes Berlin's "positive liberty" and republican liberty as well. So, interference, should it be the necessary adjunct of a just basic structure which is subject to democratic decision making procedures and even moral persuasion may paradoxically promote the positive interests and liberty of the people to form civil society. Where interference is thought to be arbitrary and without basis and without democratic control there is a substantial truncation of the equality of the individual citizen. But where the political culture and civic culture and dominant legal space of the society is concerned, the citizen has possession of an identity which is not dominated by any thing other than laws for which she agrees to live under and are rational to her as a free and equal person. This is what Petit is getting at. Here below is an quote by him.