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There are many different types of freedom. And over time freedom has not been a unitary experience. Each of these different types of freedom have had their own often discrete and fascinating history. While each has a discrete history, they are not entirely separate and they often overlap. Various authors have described a range of the most commonly discussed types of freedom and liberty. The concept of freedom has varied over time and in different societies. Here we have a basic list that covers most of the various concept. Actually there is no way to create a discrete list of freedoms. There is a substantial overlap between the various forms of freedom, no matter how the list is constructed. The Greeks had a high degree of political freedom, but very restricted national freedom. The Romans had little political freedom, but a high greed of national freedom. And concepts of freedom have varies. The Soviets and Chinese had and th Cubans today have no political freedom, but they claim that they have freedom because most people were economically relatively equal meaning poor. While in America, freedom meant the ability to work and aquire property and wealth (the pursuit of happiness). In such a system, differences in wealth within limits are not only inevitable, but beneficial. The primary freedom is political freedom, because without political freedom and a bill or guarantee of rights, there is no guarantee of any other rights. But even political freedom is no guarantee of other freedoms. The Greeks has political and a high degree of economic freedom, but with it slavery and no religious freedom. And many Muslims today while advocating political freedom and democracy do so with the idea that they can deny political and religious freedom to minorities.
It was political freedom that the ancient Greeks who essentially invented freedom believed to be central in the very idea of freedom. All other freedom essential flowed from political freedom. That is not to say that this occurred in the Greek city states. There were limits on both expression and especially religious freedom, but this was because the Greek city states through their political system placed limits on freedom. With the disappearance of the Roman Republic, the idea of political freedom disappeared, although other form of freedom such as religious and economic freedom flourished. And these would eventually play into the rebirth of political freedom. The fall of the Western Empire to Germanic barbarians, created a curious split. The Western Church developed as the only continuing Roman imperial institution. And it would be independent of the new states that crystalized throughout Europe after the collapse of the imperial political structure. The conflict between church and state (pope and emperor) would be a factor in the rebirth of political freedom. Another factor was in the feudal system. This entailed duties and responsibilities. As monarchies developed, the king and emperors wanted absolute control. The nobility resisted, most famously with the Magna Carta in England (1215). The rights conferred were to the powerful barons, but it established the principle of limits on arbitrary rule and royal absolutism. This process took different paths throughout Europe. Eventually city burgers also began demanding rights. Parliaments developed throughout Europe. Ultimately the American Revolution led ton the fiurst important republic since Rome in which citizens and not subjects controlled the government and were guaranteed political rights by written constitution. And unlike ancient Greece, there were limits placed on the rule of the majority. It is notable that it is Western Europe that the idea of political freedom was born and it is only in Western Europe and is North American colonies, essentially Western estensions, that the idea of political freedom was reborn. There was no similar development any where else in the world. There were of course important cultural achievements in non-Western cultures, but political freedom was not one if them. Ironically the burst of creativity generated by freedom in the West gave Europeans the military power to dominance the rest of the world. Just as Arab power earlier made the African (Indian Ocean and Saharan) slave trade possible. European power opened up the Atlantic slave trade. thee were the two most egregious violations of human freedom in history. Ultimately Western political freedom would end slavery in the form of the British Royal Navy and the American Federal Army during the American Civil War. It would be the British Royal Navy that would suppress slavery in the Arab world. Unlike the Christian West, the Muslim world never generated its own Abolitionist Movement.
At the time of the Enlightenment, national freedom was a rare phenomenon. Europe was governed by great multi-national empires. They were the Austrian, English, French, Turkish (Ottoman), Portuguese, Prussian, Russian (Tsarist), and Spanish Empires. This was nothing new. For time memorial, monarchies have governed people of many different ethnicity. This began with the first empire--Sargon's Akkadian Empire (c2334-2279 BC). And the pattern followed in countless subsequent empires. Some of these modern empires were overseas empires (especially the Portuguese and Spanish Empire, but even Spain had desires on Portugal. The French Empire, especially after he loss of Canada, was mostly located in Europe and had been blocked by explaining further when a coalition of European states united against Louis XIV's military adventures. England' empire was a first limited to the British isles (Ireland, Scotland, and Wales). Prussia's empire began with the Polish partitions, but was at first limited because they bordered neighboring states with considerable military power. These various empires governed a wide range of ethnic groups which after the French Revolution wold begin to assert demands for nationalist identity. This would all come to fruition in World War I (1914-18). Four great empires controlled most of Europe (Austrian, German, Ottoman,and Russian Empires--all of which went to war and failed to survive it. The nationalities issue would be addressed in President Wilson's Fourteen Points. Wilson of course would be motivated by the many ethnic groups that now made up up the American body politic as a result of the great wave of European migration to America (1870s-1910s).
There is a long history of the development basic of civil liberties —- the fundamental individual civil rights protected from government intrusion. Most importantly the whole concept of civil liberties is a uniquely Western concept. Intertwined here is the concept of law. Now law is not a uniquely Western concept. But the idea of law that binds even the monarch or other civil authorities is uniquely Western. And we see this in the classical civilizations of Greece and Rome. Of course with the rise of the Roman principate (1st century AD), the authority of the emperor commonly overrode law. With the fall of Rome, ideas of law and civil liberties were lost in the general decline of civilization. There was one connecting thread -- canon (church) law.
Often ignored are religious (Jewish and Christian) roots of basic human rights and the degree to which religion has shaped the West. There was also the growth of English common law. The first major development came in England with Magna Carta (1215). Now Magna Carta had nothing to do with civil liberties for the people of England. But it did mandate rights for the great barons of the realm. Its importance was that it was the first written charter limiting the power of the monarchy. Thus it is foundation for our modern robust constitutional protections. The Enlightenment generated primarily in England and France raised these basic issues. Philosophers like John Locke popularized the idea of 'natural rights' (life, liberty, and happiness/property) and the social contract, which would heavily influenced the American founding fathers. There were other historical milestones. Parliament enacted the English Bill of Rights (1689). This limited the King's power and codified rights like trial by jury and freedom from cruel punishment.Enlightenment. But this was an act of Parliament. And what one Parliament, the next Parliament can take way. There are no Constitutional guarantees as is the case in America. Britain has for centuries resisted a written constitutions limiting the power of Parliament. The Chartist movement failed (19th century). Britain still has no written constitution. The dangers here were shown when Prime-minister Kier Starmer (2024-26) began arresting and jailing British subjects (citizens) for 'hate speech'. Giving the government the authority to define hate speech and making violations a crime is a straight, time-tested path to legitimizing government censorship. It is one of the most egregious violations of civil liberties in modern English/British history. It is no accident that Starmer is a devoted socialist. America with the Revolution (1776-83) went down a different road. The Articles of Confederation were replaced with a new strong Constitution (1789). Some of the founding fathers like Jefferson were frightened by the power of the new Government created. During the debate over ratification, there were complaints that here was no protection for civil liberties. The proponents of the Constitution argued that this was not needed because the protections were understood as was the case in Britain. But the complaints were appreciated by Madison -- the father of the Constitution. The result was the Bill of Rights--the first ten amendments (1791). The Bill of Rights formalized basic civil liberties in the Constitution in: including freedoms of speech, religion, and the press, as well as guaranteeing the rights of the accused and other important civil liberties. These rights were later expanded by the 14th Amendment through 'incorporation' to apply to state governments. This was one of the three Civil Rights Amendments. It introduced the 'Due Process Clause' into American jurisprudence. As part of the Constitution, these protections are virtually unassailable by any President or Congress. Since these landmark steps, the courts actively test and expand on the basic rights. The American Bill of Rights was actually preceded by the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (1789). However in France it was followed by chaos, terror, and a new imperial monarchy imposing a strict state censorship more severe than that of the Bourbon monarchy it replaced. Napoleon's secret police and feared security network was one of the most formidable and feared systems in 19th-century Europe. In many ways the predecessor of the 20h century NKVD and Gestapo. It was primarily created and organized by Joseph Fouché, Minister of General Police. Fouché proceeded to build a vast web of informants, spies, and censors that worked itself into virtually every aspect of French life, from the high-society salons to brothels and the street culture. Gradually Europe moved toward liberal democracy and regimes guaranteeing civil liberties. This progress was interrupted by he rise totalitarian socialist regimes (NAZI and Soviet) suppressing all forms of civil liberties. World War II eliminated the NAZIs and the new United Nations issued the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948). This was ignored, however, by the Soviets and Communists who prevailed in China (1949). The new Arab states also had profound reservation about state guaranteed human liberties--understanding the reaction of Islamic clerics.
The history of individual liberty is a long and complicated one. Often historians begin with the American Revolution. This was a major step in the history of individual liberty, but hardly the beginning. One might think that hunter-gathers had considerable liberties, but based on modern primitive people, physical power and lineage often prevailed and there was no established law to protect liberties. With the Neolitic/Agricultural Revolution this changed. With the organization needed for agriculture, powerful state and religious figures dominated the growing cities. Individuals lost land ownership. There was little or no protection from law. This was the situation for millennia. The first known written law was Hammurabi's Code (1754 BC). Other codes followed such as Hittite Law. These laws provided a range of legal protections, but did not guarantee individual rights as we know them. The primary right guaranteeing any these early codes was property rights. The peasantry, the vast proportion of the population, has few rights to speak of, but they were not slaves. Every free born Egyptian for example had the right to appeal to the pharaoh. Individual liberties as we know them were born on the plains of Marathon (490 BC). Greek society was not perfect and there was not protection from the tyranny of the majority. Slavery was endemic, but for the first time, ordinary people had the civil liberties we would add more today along with the right to own property. Such rights were a creation of the West. We see them in no other ancient society, Nor do we see them outside of Europe until modern times. Rome continued in this tradition, although with the advent of the principate (Empire), Romans lost political rights, but many other rights were protected by Roman law. Even Paul who was eventually executed in the anti-Christian persecutions was protected by Roman law. He could not be beaten and was beheaded rather than crucified. Individual liberties in the West were lost with the fall of Rome. The conquering Germanic tribes were not without legal traditions protecting rights, but it was very basic. All German freemen had the right to participate in a general assembly (things) and the king or chief was bound to uphold ancestral law, but because it was unwritten this was never a sure guarantee and the chief could make new laws. The result was that in the early medieval era the kings amassed increasing power and were actually buttressed by the tradition of Roman imperial absolutism. Common people had little or no rights. This only gradually began to change. One of the most important steps in the reappearance of individual liberties was English common law. And a critical moment was the Magna Carta which set the tradition of limits on royal power and arbitrary Government (1215). This question was finally settled with the English Civil War (1642-51). This was at the time that royal absolutism was becoming increasingly pronounced on the Continent. The English Civil War not only ensued the survival of individual liberty in England, but meant that the English colonies in North America would develop with few royal controls and become a hot-bed of Enlightenment thinking and natural rights. The American Revolution led to the first written guarantee of individual liberties in history--the U.S. Constitution. The story of course does not end there. Socialist thought in the 19th century led to the bloody totalitarian powers (Communist and Fascist) of the 20th century. And while individual liberties are enshrined in the U.N. Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) there are still authoritarian regimes and religious leaders, mostly Islamic, that are intent on denying individual liberties to their peoples and others.
Free spech has to be at the center of any discussion of basic human liberties/civil rights. And here there are some imprtant subsets. They include individual speech as well as academic, artistic, and press freedom. In modern terms, individual speech has become largely a matter of digital expression. The internet has had a powerful impact on many aspects of modern life. In many ways it has democratized speech. Anyone can have their say on the internet. But in other ways it has introduced a whole new type of censorship. In this case it is not government-imposed censorship, but censorship by powerful internet companies like Google and Facebook. Using algorithms or biased moderation they are censoring out conservative thought. This includes both actual posts as well as visibility of those posts. Countless reports from conservatives have surfaced in recent years. We have noticed this in our attempted participation in Quora a discussion site which advertises itself as "a question-and-answer website where questions are asked, answered, edited, and organized by its community of users in the form of opinions. Its publisher, Quora Inc., is based in Mountain View, California. The company was founded in June 2009, and the website was made available to the public for the first time on June 21, 2010. Users can collaborate by editing questions and suggesting edits to answers that have been submitted by other users." Our experience is that Quora Moderation, more like Quora censors, have not uncommonly deleted conservative posts that attract significant numbers of readers. This has happened so often that we have decided to archive the examples of Quora's liberal bias and censorship. The university is largely a Western creation. And academicians from an early point have pushed the idea of academic freedom. And over time achieved it. We note, however, that in recent years that this aspect of freedom has been significantly been eroded as our great universities have become left-wing enclaves. University professors are overweeningly liberal (today meaning socialist) and many are outright anti-American Marxists. They not only exclude conservative ideas and shame and downgrade students who express conservative ideas, but encourage their student to shame and confront other students with conservative ideas. There have even been physical attacks and riots to attack and shit down conservative speakers. We are not entirely sure how universities have become so dominated by liberal professors. And which has happened at institutions supposedly dedicated to promote exposure to and discussion of ideas. Press freedom is another threat to free speech. The mainline networks are also relentlessly liberal and the news programs carefully select and exclude items to promote liberal and supress conservative ideas. The coverage of the Russian collusion charges against President Trump. We now know that there was no evidence of such collusion, but this did not stop the networks from giving this fake story massive coverage for 2 years, not only predominately but almost exclusively presenting new stories designed to falsely show the President guilty. An important aspect of free speech is press freedom. Both are important attributes of any democracy. This has become an important issue in America with the Mainline Media accusing President Trump of attacking press freedom.
Curiously the birthplace of the very concept of freedom, ancient Greece, was not a society that accepted the idea of religious freedom. Athens, the very center of the birth of freedom, did not extend the idea of religious freedom. The people of Athens were expected to venerate Athena and the city gods. Socrates, one of the great teachers in world history, was executed for blasphemy and corrupting the young for his ideas. In contrast Persian, the embodiment of oriental despotism, tolerated diverse religious thought. The Persians when they added new territory to their empire, did not impose their religion. The Roman Empire, despite its fierce reputation of egregious persecution, was actually a highly tolerant society. After Caesar and Augustus and the foundation of the Empire, political freedom was extinguished, but not religious freedom. Rome was a highly tolerant society in which a wide range of sects and religious thought flourished. Conquered people could retain their religion, although they had to sacrifice to the emperor as a religious duty. Jews and Christians were a rare religious sect that were persecuted, but only because they refused to sacrifice to the emperor. The Emperor Nero turned the full force of the Empire on the Christians in an effort to redirect public feeling against him, a tactic that future tyrants would copy. Persecutions were often horrific, but episodic. And when under Constantine, Christianity became the state religion, his did not usher in an era of religious freedom. Rather the Church in league with the emperor persecuted other religions. Judaism were the only other religion tolerated, and this toleration declined over time. The persecution of other religions, including differing Christian views was a major factor in the explosive growth of Islam. For centuries the Muslim world would be more tolerant than Christendom. Some states like al Andalus became a beacon of religious tolerance. The domination of the Church as least in Western Europe only began to change with the Renaissance and Plague. People began to question the Church. This proved dangerous as Galileo and others experienced. Christendom was rocked by the Reformation. The Reformers did not, however, argue for religious freedom. they simply disagreed as to the doctrines which should be imposed on the people, Protestant contained, however, a germ of tolerance that would eventually spread throughout the Christian world. Luther and other Protestants believed that people should read and study the Bible rather than rely on priests. And as the Catholic Church understood, this would inevitably lead to differing interpretations. And this is precisely what happened. A dizzying list of new denominations spread throughout northern Europe. The religious wars which developed with the Reformation was not only a struggle between Catholics and Protestants, but among Protestants as well.
The religious based slaughter finally ended with the Treaty of Westphalia (1648). After a century of struggle, Catholics and Protestants finally agreed in one thing, they could not defeat the opposing religious camp. Thus the temporary expedient of allowing each individual state to chose an established religion. This was the atmosphere in which the English colonies in North America were founded. The ensuing Enlightenment finally developed the modern principle of religious freedom and this would become a basic principle embedded in the Constitution of the new American Republic (1789). It would take longer to be fully accepted in Europe. The Muslim world moved in the opposite direction, becoming increasingly intolerant of other religion. Other currents appeared in the 19th century with Marx condemning the very idea of religion which became a primary tenet of socialist thought. Lenin condemned religion as the 'opiate of the masses' and launched the Soviet atheism campaign intensified by Stalin and his NKVD. The result was the death of millions, mass killing on a scale unknown at the height of the 16th-17th century religious wars. The assault on religion has not only occured in totalitarian socities. In liberal America, today's liberals/progressives have interpreted the precious guarantee of freedom of religion to mean the right to pursue a campaign mandating freedom from religion.
Economic conditions and living standards vary immensely around the world. Of course the distribution of resources vary. But one of the most prosperous countries in the world is Japan, a country virtually without resources. And Russia, a country with vast resources, has a virtually Third World economy. Prosperous countries are concentrated in Western Europe and North America. Here the Industrial Revolution and technology have transformed societies. And now there are also increasingly prosperous countries now found in Asia. Africa continues to be a weak spot as does the Middle East unless the country is lucky enough to have oil. The question arises as to why economic conditions are so varied around the world. The Communists claimed it was because evil capitalists were exploiting their own workers as well Third World countries. Many people bought this and other Socialist tenants, especially on the heels of the Great Depression. The only thing is that in the later part of the decade several surprising economic trends emerged which not only undermined, but disproved the Marxist thesis. Others argued that natural resources were critical. Again we see countries disproving this thesis, Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, Singapore, Taiwan, and other countries proved that successful economies can be built by countries without notable resources if the country develops its human capital. Increasingly it is becoming obvious, much to the dismay of Socialist acolytes around the world is that the key to economic success is economic freedom. And to test out that theory, one has to compare indices of economic freedom with actual economic conditions. The Wall Street Journal and the Heritage Foundation, a respected free market think tank, have tracked the economic freedom trends around the world with its Index of Economic Freedom. They define economic freedom as "the fundamental right of every human to control his or her own labor and property. In an economically free society, individuals are free to work, produce, consume, and invest in any way they please, with that freedom both protected by the state and unconstrained by the state. In economically free societies, governments allow labor, capital and goods to move freely, and refrain from coercion or constraint of liberty beyond the extent necessary to protect and maintain liberty itself." You can go to their site to see the country rankings and a detailed discussion of conditions in each country. While one can debate the precise findings and individual country assessments, the basic findings are unmistakable. Countries high on the economic freedom list are successful countries with high living standards. Countries ranking low on the economic freedom list are countries with failed economies with a population condemned to poverty. What the index does not measure very well is the ability of countries with oil-based economies to avoid freeing their economies. A variety of cultural factors can also affect economic conditions.
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