What is the difference between autonomy and liberty

Some people will be less able to judge for themselves what their own good is and hence be more susceptible to justified paternalistic intervention Conly ; see also Killmister , chap. Often such an obligation toward another person requires us to treat her as autonomous, independent of the extent to which she is so concerning the choice in question.

At least this is the case when a person is autonomous above a certain threshold: she is an adult, not under the influence of debilitating factors, and so on. I might know that a person is to some degree under the sway of external pressures that are severely limiting her ability to govern her life and make independent choices. But as long as she has not lost the basic ability to reflectively consider her options and make choices, if I intervene against her will for her own good , I show less respect for her as a person than if I allow her to make her own mistakes.

Which is not to say, of course, that intervention in such cases might not, in the end, be justified; only that something is lost when it is engaged in, and what is lost is a degree of interpersonal respect we owe each other. However, as we saw in the last section, this move depends on the determination of basic autonomy and an argument that such a threshold is non-arbitrary.

Also relevant here is the question of procedural versus substantive autonomy as the ground of the prohibition of paternalism. As I mentioned above, the response to this challenge must be that the decision making capacity itself is of non-derivative value, independent of the content of those decisions, at least if one wishes to avoid the difficulties of positing a substantive and hence non-neutral conception of autonomy as the basis for interpersonal respect.

This is merely a sampling of some of the central ways that the idea of autonomy figures in moral philosophy. Not discussed here are areas of applied ethics, for example in medical ethics, where respect for autonomy grounds such principles as that of informed consent. Such contexts illustrate the fundamental value that autonomy generally is thought to represent as expressive of one of the fundamentals of moral personhood.

The conception of the autonomous person plays a variety of roles in various constructions of liberal political theory for recent discussion, see, e. Principally, it serves as the model of the person whose perspective is used to formulate and justify political principles, as in social contract models of principles of justice Rawls Also and correspondingly it serves as the model of the citizen whose basic interests are reflected in those principles, such as in the claim that basic liberties, opportunities, and other primary goods are fundamental to flourishing lives no matter what moral commitments, life plans, or other particulars of the person might obtain Kymlicka , 10—19, Waldron —6.

Keornahan , Cornell , Young , Gould ; cf. For our purposes here, liberalism refers generally to that approach to political power and social justice that determines principles of right justice prior to, and largely independent of, determination of conceptions of the good though see Liberalism ; see also Christman , ch. The fact of permanent pluralism of such moral conceptions is therefore central to liberalism. One manner in which debates concerning autonomy directly connect to controversies within and about liberalism concerns the role that state neutrality is to play in the justification and application of principles of justice.

Neutrality is a controversial standard, of course, and the precise way in which liberal theory is committed to a requirement of neutrality is complex and controversial see Raz , —64, Waldron , — Recall that some theorists view autonomy as requiring minimal competence or rationality along with authenticity, where the latter condition is fleshed out in terms of the capacity to reflectively accept motivational aspects of oneself.

This conception of autonomy is adopted, according to its defenders, because doing so is the only way to ensure that autonomy is neutral toward all conceptions of value and the good that reasonable adults may come to internalize Dworkin , Freyenhage Critics of this view have pointed to cases where it is imagined that persons adopt what we all would call oppressive and overly restrictive life situations but in a way that meets the minimal conditions of autonomy on proceduralist accounts, so that on such accounts they count as autonomous because of the self-governing processes by which they entered such oppressive conditions.

On the basis of such a judgment, they argue that normatively substantive conditions should be added to the requirements of autonomy, conditions such as the ability to recognize and follow certain moral or political norms See Benson , Wolf ; for criticism, see Berofsky , ch. This criticism suggests that considerations concerning the autonomous self cannot avoid questions of identity and hence whether the self of self-government can be understood independently of the perhaps socially defined values in terms of which people conceive of themselves; this is a subject to which we now turn.

Autonomy, as we have been describing it, certainly attaches paradigmatically to individual persons; it is not in this usage a property of groups or peoples. So the autonomy that grounds basic rights and which connects to moral responsibility, as this concept is thought to do, is assigned to persons without essential reference to other people, institutions, or traditions within which they may live and act.

Critics claim, however, that such a view runs counter to the manner in which most of us or all of us in some ways define ourselves, and hence diverges problematically from the aspects of identity that motivate action, ground moral commitments, and by which people formulate life plans. But we are all not only deeply enmeshed in social relations and cultural patterns, we are also defined by such relations, some claim Sandel , 15— For example, we use language to engage in reflection but language is itself a social product and deeply tied to various cultural forms.

In any number of ways we are constituted by factors that lie beyond our reflective control but which nonetheless structure our values, thoughts, and motivations Taylor , 33f; for discussion see Bell , 24— To say that we are autonomous and hence morally responsible, bear moral rights, etc.

In a different manner, critics have claimed that the liberal conception of the person, reflected in standard models of autonomy, under-emphasizes the deep identity-constituting connections we have with gender, race, culture, and religion, among other things.

These challenges have also focused on the relation of the self to its culture Margalit and Raz, , Tamir This is problematic in that it excludes from the direct protection of liberal policies those individuals and groups whose self-conceptions and value commitments are deeply constituted by cultural factors. Or, conversely, the assumption that the autonomous person is able to separate himself from all cultural commitments forestalls moves to provide state protection for cultural forms themselves, insofar as such state policies rest on the value of autonomy.

There have been many responses to these charges on behalf of a liberal outlook e. The most powerful response is that autonomy need not require that people be in a position to step away from all of their connections and values and to critically appraise them.

Mere piecemeal reflection is all that is required. There is a clarification that is needed in this exchange, however. For such a view is open to the charge that liberal conceptions fail to take seriously the permanent and unalterable aspects of the self and its social position Young, , Our embodiment, for example, is often not something which we can alter other than marginally, and numerous other self-defining factors such as sexual orientation for some , native language, culture and race, are not readily subject to our manipulation and transformation, even in a piecemeal manner.

To say that we are heteronomous because of this is therefore deeply problematic. What must be claimed by the defender of autonomy-based liberalism is that the ability in question is to change those aspects of oneself from which one is deeply alienated or with which one does not identify, etc. But if one feels fully at home within those unalterable parameters one does not lack autonomy because of that unalterability for a different way of approach this issue see Mahmoud and Khader As we said, several writers have claimed that proceduralist accounts of autonomy would wrongly attribute autonomy to those whose restricted socialization and stultifying life conditions pressure them into internalizing oppressive values and norms, for example women who have internalized the belief in the social authority of husbands, or that only by having and raising children are their lives truly complete, and the like.

If such women reflect on these values they may well endorse them, even if doing so is free of any specific reflection-inhibiting conditions. These and related considerations have sparked some to develop an alternative conception of autonomy meant to replace allegedly overly individualistic notions. These views offer a provocative alternative to traditional models of the autonomous individual, but it must be made clear what position is being taken on the issue: on the one hand, relational accounts can be taken as resting on a non-individualist conception of the person and then claim that insofar as autonomy is self-government and the self is constituted by relations with others, then autonomy is relational; or these accounts may be understood as claiming that whatever selves turn out to be, autonomy fundamentally involves social relations rather than individual traits Oshana, Some such views also waiver between claiming that social and personal relations play a crucial causal role in the development and enjoyment of autonomy and claiming that such relations constitute autonomy for discussion see Mackenzie and Stoljar, b, 21—26; for a recent overview, see Mackenzie These claims often are accompanied with a rejection of purportedly value-neutral, proceduralist accounts of autonomy, even those that attempt to accommodate a fully social conception of the self.

One question that arises with relational views connected to self-trust in this way: why, exactly are such relations seen as conceptually constitutive of autonomy rather than contributory to it and its development , where the self-confidence or self-trust in question is the core element to which these sorts of social relations are an important albeit contingent contributor.

Another question to be considered arises from those cases where self-trust is established despite lack of social recognition, as when runaway slaves manage to heroically push on with their quest for freedom while facing violent denials from surrounding others and surrounding social structures that they enjoy the status of a full human being capable of authentic decision making.

Finally, self-trust is not always merited: consider the brash teenager who insists on exercising social independence based on her unwarranted confidence in her abilities to make good judgments see Mackenzie , n. Nevertheless, these approaches have all importantly shifted philosophical attention concerning autonomy to the social and interpersonal dynamics that shape its enjoyment, connecting ideas about autonomy with broader issues of social justice, recognition, and social practices.

This brings us back, then, to considerations of the liberal project and its potential limitations, where autonomy remains central. As noted earlier, there are various versions of liberal political philosophy. All of them, however, are committed to a conception of political legitimacy in which political power and authority is justified only if such authority is acceptable to all citizens bound by it see Rawls , — This connects to a broader view of the foundations of value that at least some liberal theorists present as central to that tradition.

That is the claim that values are valid for a person only if those values are or can be reasonably endorsed by the person in question. By extension, principles guiding the operation of institutions of social and political power — what Rawls calls the institutions of the basic structure Rawls , — are legitimate only if they can be endorsed in this way by those subject to them.

Dworkin , — Models of autonomy considered above include a condition that mirrors this constraint, in that a person is autonomous relative to some action-guiding norm or value only if, upon critical reflection of that value, she identifies with it, approves of it, or does not feel deeply alienated from it.

Combining this view with the endorsement constraint, liberalism carries the implication that autonomy is respected only when guiding values or principles in a society can be embraced in some way by those governed by them. This will connect directly to the liberal theory of legitimacy to be discussed below.

Perfectionists reject this set of claims. Perfectionism is the view that there are values valid for an individual or a population even when, from the subjective point of view of those agents or groups, that value is not endorsed or accepted Wall , Sumner , 45—80, Hurka , Sher ; see also Perfectionism. In short, it is the view that there are entirely objective values. While there are perfectionist liberals, this view generally resists the liberal claim that the autonomous acceptance of the central components of political principles is a necessary condition for the legitimacy of those principles.

Moreover, perfectionists question the liberal commitment to neutrality in the formulation and application of political principles Hurka , — Perfectionists specifically target the liberal connection between respect for autonomy and neutrality of political principles Wall , — For many, liberalism rests on the value of individual autonomy, but this reliance either assumes that respect for autonomy is merely one value among others in the liberal view, or autonomy has overriding value.

In either case, however, neutrality is not supported. If autonomy is merely one value among others, for example, then there will clearly be times when state support of those other values will override respect for autonomy paternalistic restrictions imposed to promote citizen safety, for example Sher , 45—, Hurka , —60, Conly On the other hand, autonomy could be seen as an absolute constraint on the promotion of values, or, more plausibly, as a constitutive condition of the validity of all values for a person, as the endorsement constraint implies.

Perfectionists reply, however, that this is itself a controversial value position, one that may not find unqualified general support Hurka , —52, Sher , 58—60, Sumner , —83; cf. Griffin , — To answer these objections, one must turn to consideration of the liberal principle of legitimacy. For the claim that liberals make concerning the limits of state promotion of the good — a limit set by respect for autonomy — depends heavily on their view about the ultimate ground of political power.

Liberalism is generally understood to arise historically out of the social contract tradition of political philosophy and hence rests on the idea of popular sovereignty. The concept of autonomy, then, figures centrally in at least one dominant strand in this tradition, the strand the runs through the work of Kant. The major alternative version of the liberal tradition sees popular sovereignty as basically a collective expression of rational choice and that the principles of the basic institutions of political power are merely instrumental in the maximization of aggregate citizen welfare or, as with Mill, a constitutive element of welfare broadly considered.

But it is the Kantian brand of liberalism that places autonomy of persons at center stage. That is, it is a device in which persons can choose principles to impose upon themselves in a way which is independent of contingencies of social position, race, sex, or conception of the good Rawls , — For under such conditions, no theory of justice which rests on a metaphysically grounded conception of the person could claim full allegiance from members of a population whose deep diversity causes them to disagree about metaphysics itself, as well as about moral frameworks and conceptions of value related to it.

For this reason, Rawls developed a new or further developed understanding of the foundations of his version of liberalism, a political conception Rawls Justice is achieved only when an overlapping consensus among people moved by deeply divergent but reasonable comprehensive moral views can be attained, a consensus in which such citizens can affirm principles of justice from within those comprehensive views.

Political Liberalism shifts the focus from a philosophical conception of justice, formulated abstractly and meant to apply universally, to a practical conception of legitimacy where consensus is reached without pretension of deep metaphysical roots for the principles in question. The operation of public reason, then, serves as the means by which such a consensus might be established, and hence public discussion and democratic institutions must be seen as a constitutive part of the justification of principles of justice rather than merely a mechanism for the collective determination of the social good.

But the role of autonomy in the specification of this picture should not be under- emphasized or the controversies it invites ignored. For such a consensus counts as legitimate only when achieved under conditions of free and authentic affirmation of shared principles.

Only if the citizens see themselves as fully able to reflectively endorse or reject such shared principles, and to do so competently and with adequate information and range of options, can the overlapping political consensus step beyond the purely strategic dynamics of a modus vivendi and ground legitimate institutions of political power.

Indeed, the assumption that all those subject to political authority enjoy the developed capacity to reflectively accept their life path and the values inherent in it invokes a level of idealization that belies the conditions of many victims of past and ongoing oppression.

This virtually ensures that such structural conditions of society as racial domination, profound inequality of power, and patterns of exclusion of groups from equal standing in social space will be assumed away as irrelevant to the question of legitimacy Mills Therefore, social conditions that hamper the equal enjoyment of capacities to reflectively consider and if necessary reject principles of social justice, due, say, to extreme poverty, disability, ongoing injustice and inequality, or the like, restrict the establishment of just principles.

Autonomy, then, insofar as that concept picks out the free reflective choice operating in the establishment of legitimacy, is basic to, and presupposed by, even such non-foundational political conceptions of justice.

Critics of political liberalism arise from several quarters. However, among the objections to it that focus on autonomy are those that question whether a political conception of legitimacy that rests on shared values can be sustained without the validity of those values being seen as somehow objective or fundamental, a position that clashes with the purported pluralism of political liberalism. Otherwise, citizens with deeply conflicting worldviews could not be expected to affirm the value of autonomy except as a mere modus vivendi see, e.

A line of response to this worry that could be pursued would be one that claimed that values that amount to autonomy in some conceptualization of that idea are already functional in the social structures and cultural practices of otherwise defensible democratic practices as well as some critical projects that emphasize oppression and domination, as we saw above. This point raises the issue, to which we now turn, of the connection between autonomy, political liberalism, and democracy.

In closing, we should add a word about the implications of political liberalism for the traditional division between liberal justice and democratic theory. But traditionally, liberal conceptions of justice have viewed democratic mechanisms of collective choice as essential but highly circumscribed by the constitutional provisions that principles of justice support.

Individual rights and freedoms, equality before the law, and various privileges and protections associated with citizen autonomy are protected by principles of justice and hence not subject to democratic review, on this approach Gutmann However, liberal conceptions of justice have themselves evolved in some strains at least to include reference to collective discussion and debate public reason among the constitutive conditions of legitimacy.

On this view, legitimacy and justice cannot be established in advance through philosophical construction and argument, as was thought to be the case in natural law traditions in which classical social contract theory flourished and which is inherited in different form in contemporary perfectionist liberal views.

Rather, justice amounts to that set of principles that are established in practice and rendered legitimate by the actual support of affected citizens and their representatives in a process of collective discourse and deliberation see e.

Systems of rights and protections private, individual autonomy will necessarily be protected in order to institutionalize frameworks of public deliberation and, more specifically, legislation and constitutional interpretation that render principles of social justice acceptable to all affected in consultation with others Habermas , This view of justice, if at all acceptable, provides an indirect defense of the protection of autonomy and, in particular, conceptualizing autonomy in a way that assumes reflective self- evaluation.

For only if citizen participants in the public discourse that underlies justice are assumed to have and provided the basic resources for having capacities for competent self- reflection, can the public defense and discussion of competing conceptions of justice take place cf. This approach to justice and autonomy, spelled out here in rough and general form, has certainly faced criticism.

These charges are stated here much too generally to give an adequate response in this context. But the challenge remains for any theory of justice which rests on a presumption of the normative centrality of autonomy. To be plausible in a variously pluralistic social setting, one marked by ongoing histories of oppressive practices and institutions, such a view must avoid the twin evils of forcibly imposing a reasonably contested value on resistant citizens, on the one hand, and simply abandoning all normative conceptions of social order in favor of open ended struggle for power on the other.

The view that individuals ought to be treated as, and given the resources to become, autonomous in one of the minimal senses outlined here will, I submit, be a central element in any political view that steers between the Scylla of oppressive forms of perfectionism and the Charybdis of interest-group power politics.

The Concept of Autonomy 1. Autonomy in Moral Philosophy 2. Autonomy in Social and Political Philosophy 3. The Concept of Autonomy In the western tradition, the view that individual autonomy is a basic moral and political value is very much a modern development. Bibliography Alcoff, Linda Martin, Appiah, Kwame Anthony, Arneson, Richard, Jamieson ed. Arpaly, Nomy, Baumann, Holgar, Bell, Daniel, Communitarianism and its Critics , Oxford: Clarendon.

Benhabib, Seyla, Benn, Stanley, Removing from persons their legal capacity to transact with others is justified not only in the name of protecting the integrity of the transaction, but also of protecting the person. The ethical and legal question in this classic approach to autonomy in bio-medical ethics and the theory of informed consent is on what basis, by what criteria, should autonomy be restricted?

When individuals have not met the legal tests, with the first dating back to Roman law, their autonomy has been restricted. While autonomy and negative liberty are often equated as one and the same thing, they can be distinguished. Liberty is the principle which founds and grounds the right to autonomy. We can achieve and exercise our autonomy in many ways. We can say no to touch and intervention and constraint by others. We can choose to speak up, provided we have the space and protection to do so, or we can choose to remain silent.

We can choose to withdraw from relations with others. We can also exercise our autonomy through the exercise of the associated right to legal capacity — our legal right to enter relationships and agreements with others that give effect to our individual decisions.

It is a particular view about what is required to protect against constraints on freedom. What we need is the absence of coercion, regulation and intervention by the state and other entities. Autonomy… connotes on an ideological level that an individual who conforms to the dominant notions of independence and self-sufficiency is both freed from the prospect of regulatory government action and freed through governmental structures from interference by other private actors.

The freedom through the government is the nonintervention point stated in positive terms — the right to be let alone is also the guarantee of privacy. In establishing and adhering to a norm of nonintervention and regulation for those individuals deemed self-sufficient, the state grants them autonomy. We evolve and realize capabilities for autonomy in relation to others and through social, economic and political conditions that make this possible.

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