ABSTRACT
This chapter considers the relation of freedom to power. It examines a conception of positive liberty that identifies freedom with the power to act on one's desires. The debate between advocates of liberal, negative liberty and liberty as power is highlighted in the debate whether it makes sense to distinguish a person's liberty from the worth or value of that liberty. According to freedom as effective power, however, the general idea of a free person becomes lost. A person can have the power to do things for many different reasons, one of which is that he has "power over" others. Political theorists have long debated precisely what is involved in one person having power over another. The chapter explores the conception of positive liberty according to which freedom is equated with "power to". It briefly examines Edmund Burke's conservative, antirationalist view, which abjures a general analysis of freedom, locating the important liberties of a people in their historical-legal tradition.
