To read this progam is to assume that lesbian and blackwomen have nothing to say of existentialism, the erotic, women'sculture and silence, developing feminist theory, or heterosexualityand power

we shall naturally break with the elitism oftraditional republicans and assume that our concern must be universalin scope. The brand of republicanism that we shall be developing is inthis respect a characteristically modern or inclusive brand: one thatshares with the liberalism to which the likes of Bentham and Paleygave birth the assumption that all human beings are equal, and that anyplausible political ideal must be an ideal for all

individuals to pursue in a decentralized way. The strategy of recip-rocal power holds out the prospect of too many problems to be takenseriously. The lesson is that we should explore the alternative andmore promising strategy of relying on constitutional provision, andthe remainder of the book is given to that pursuit

No one would be able totrade or travel, for example, without having to equip themselves withcostly resources of resistance and defence. The choices available topeople might be undominated, but they would be very expensive andvery restricted

Any system of law and government is bound to mean thatcertain options are no longer available to agents, or at least no longeravailable on the previous terms.

Itremains in the present section, then, to indicate why freedom as non-domination satisfies the negative condition: why it is not somethingthat individuals can satisfactorily pursue by relying just on their ownprivate efforts.

Why is freedom as non-domination different, as republicans have always taken it to be?

To be a person is to be a voice that cannotproperly be ignored, a voice which speaks to issues raised in commonwith others and which speaks with a certain authority: enough author-ity, certainly, for discord with that voice to give others reason to pauseand think

To be able to live your lifewithout uncertainty about the interference you will have to endure; tobe able to live without having to stay on your toes in dealing with thepowerful; and to be able to live without subordination to others: theseare great and palpable goods and they make a powerful case for theinstrumental attractions of freedom as non-domination

But freedom as non-dominationdoes much better in three other respects, all of them of intuitively greatimportance. It promises to do better in delivering a person fromuncertainty, and from the associated anxiety and inability to plan;from the need to exercise strategy with the powerful, having to deferto them and anticipate their various moves; and from the subordina-tion that goes with a common awareness that the person is exposed tothe possibility of arbitrary interference by another: that there isanother who can deploy such interference, even if they are not likelyto do so.

the enjoymentof freedom as non-domination goes with the possibility of their seeingthemselves as non-vulnerable in that way and as possessed of a com-parable social standing with the other

live with uncertainty, is a serious cost

Advancing someone's freedom as non-domination means reducingother people's capacities for arbitrary interference in their lives,

of unpredictable interference, and so they can organize theiraffairs on a systematic basis and with a large measure of tranquillity.

mphasize the advantage of their ideal in this respect whenthey say that the unfree person is exposed to the inconstant, uncertainwill of another and consequently suffers anxiety and wretchedness.'Having always some unknown evil to fear, though it should nevercome, he has no perfect enjoyment of himself, or of any of the bless-ings of life' (Priestley 1993: 35). Their assumption is that if we try tofurther someone's freedom as non-domination then we will removethe spectre of such uncertainty

compromising side of the compromising/conditioning divide, whilethe second argue that a suitably non-arbitrary form of law belongs onthe conditioning side of that distinction.

is the benefit of not having your choices blocked orinhibited by others, at least not in an intentional or quasi-intentionalmanner. Consistently with enjoying a total absence of interferenceyou may find yourself constrained by all sorts of natural obstacle—byyour own lack of power or wealth or by the unfriendliness of the envi-ronment—but you will not be constrained by obstacles of an inten-tional sort, for such obstacles would represent interference

it is bound to be easier for people to achieveautonomy once they are assured of not being dominated by others.

there can hardly be any meaningful form of self-mastery without non-domination.

Those who hail freedom as non-interference and who thinkthat the minimal state is not normatively satisfactory generally invokeother values as independent criteria of political evaluation: valueslike equality, or welfare, or utility, or whatever. Freedom as non-domination does not call for the same sort of supplementation since,as we shall see, it already requires institutions that perform well inregard to values like equality and welfare; thus those values do nothave to be introduced as distinct desiderata.

for why and how non-domination can figure as a political idea

nd potentially dominating state issimply that, properly constituted, such a regime serves to advance thatvalue

The differences all stem from thefact that you can be dominated by someone, as in the case of the luckyor cunning slave, without actually suffering interference at theirhands; and you can be interfered with by some agency, as in the caseof subjection to a suitable form of law and government, without beingdominated by anyone.

for they can do it by their own authority, they can by their own authoritygive judgement that the debt is due; which is as much as to be judge intheir own cause

but ifthe debt be to one of the company, the creditor is debtor for the whole tohimself, and cannot therefore demand his debt, but only from the com-mon stock, if there be any

eir incorporating is to make their gain the greater;

if the sovereignbe not judge, though in his own cause, there can be no judge at all.

And that which is said here of the rights of anassembly for the government of a province, or a colony, is applicablealso to an assembly for the government of a town, a university, or acollege, or a church, or for any other government over the persons ofmen.

I have to say is this: that whatsoever debt isby that assembly contracted, or whatsoever unlawful act is decreed, isthe act only of those that assented, and not of any that dissented, or wereabsent, for the reasons before alleged.

but did to each plantation send one governor: for thoughevery man, where he can be present by nature, desires to participate ofgovernment;

And as to their affairs, some areordained for government;

But when the representative is an assembly, and the debt to a stranger;all they, and only they, are responsible for the debt that gave their votesto the borrowing of it,

Itis the act of the assembly because voted by the major part; and if it be acrime, the assembly may be punished, as far forth as it is capable, as bydissolution, or forfeiture of their letters (which is to such artificial andfictitious bodies, capital) or, if the assembly have a common stock,wherein none of the innocent members have propriety, by pecuniarymulct

hat I may seek to avoid is simply being ignored, orpatronized, or despised, or being taken too much for granted—inshort, not being treated as an individual,

repressedbyreason:

{ must not use stones tamake violins, nor try to make born violin players play flutes. Ifthe universe is governed by reason, then there will be no need forcoercion; a correctly planned life for all will coincide with fullfreedom—the freedom of rational self-direction—for all.

A rational (or free)state would be a state governed by such laws as all rational menwould freely accept; that is to say, such laws as they would them-selves have enacted had they been asked what, as rational beings,they demanded; hence the frontiers would be such as all rationalmen would consider to be the right frontiers for rational beings.But who, in fact, was to determine what these frontiers were?

s instances of such pseudo-objective forces, he pointed to thelaws of supply and demand, or of the institution of property, orof the eternal division of society into rich and poor, or owners andworkers, as so many unaltering human categories.

Knowledge:liberates,.asEpicurus: taughtlong.ago,byautomatically eliminatingirrationalfears:anddesires.

what I cannot be sure of, I cannot truly want.

who desires what he can perform, and doeswhat he desires.’

Condorcethad alreadyremarkedthat thenotionofindividuatrightswasabsentfromthe legalconceptionsof theRomansandGreeks;thisseemstoholdequallyoftheJewish,Chinese,andallotherancientcivilizationsthathavesincecometolight.!

Yet it remains true that the fresome must.at-timesbe curtailed.to seeurs-the [reedom.¢ :Upon what principle should this be done?

individual freedom is noteveryone’s primary need.

hey supposed that it cuufd not, asthings were, be unlimited, because if it were, it would entail astate in which all men could boundlessly interfere with all othermen; and this kind of ‘natura!’ freedom would lead to social chaosin which men’s minimum needs would not be satisfied; or elsethe liberties of the weak would be suppressed by

‘economicfreedom’ and its counterpart, ‘economic slavery’.

[am unable to jump more than ten feet in the air, or cannotread because 1 am blind, or cannot understand the darker pagesof Hegel, it would be eccentric to say that I am to that degreeenslaved or coerced.

What, or.who, is the source of control orinterference that can determine someone.to.da,_ar be,.this ratherthan that?”