Why Liberty is Necessary

Without choice, the individual can never become a moral person.

Photo by Julius Drost on Unsplash

The Corona-crisis has reinvigorated discussions on our fundamental freedoms. Governments across the world have been able to pass so much legislation that robs the individual basic liberties.

Our near future will in great deal be affected of fixing the post-pandemic world. This will first be dominated by a major economic discussion, but it will be followed by a large discussion of regaining the freedoms we have borrowed to the state. When this discussion comes, it will be of the utmost importance to understand why liberty is not a choice, but a necessity for society and the individual.

I address this issue on two levels. The first is at the societal level, where the lack of freedom may ultimately lead to an abuse of power and therefore my argument is that the power of the state must be balanced by society. My second argument is at the individual level. I argue that freedom is not only a means to an end (as in the first argument), but an end in itself. For without freedom, one cannot become a moral person, because one has been deprived of the freedom to chose between right and wrong.

And these argument naturally assume the extremes between libertarianism (complete freedom) and authoritarianism (complete state power)…