Introduction

Hegel and Karl Marx had a lot to say about how social relations and political institutions are instrumental for the exercise of freedom. The dual nature of freedom – the fact the freedom can be found in pursuit of conflicting objectives – is an essential aspect of what freedom is. The analysis of the practical situations which concepts of freedom need to address shows that all too often, a viable concept of freedom has to leave significant freedom aspects aside. The key aspect of my reconstruction of the positive/negative freedom distinction is eliciting the fundamental role of positive freedom in the understanding of freedom altogether. The fourfold matrix of freedom emanates from the first, relation-to-authorities, criterion for the distinction and from the observation that we should distinguish between political and moral authorities. Thus, the matrix examines the positive/negative freedom distinction in two contexts: moral and political. The chapter also presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book.