Freedom or liberty (the two terms are best used interchangeably) is, in its broadest sense, the ability to think or act as one wishes. An important distinction is nevertheless made between negative freedom and positive freedom ( Berlin, 1958 ). Negative freedom means non-interference: the absence of external constraints upon the individual. The individual is thus ‘at liberty’ to act as he or she wishes. The clearest manifestations of negative freedom are in the form of freedom of choice, *civil liberty and privacy. Positive freedom is linked to the achievement of some identifiable goal or
benefit, usually personal development or self-realisation, although Berlin defined it as self-mastery and linked it to *democracy. For Berlin the negative/positive distinction was reflected in the difference between being free from something and being free to do something. However, the ‘freedom from’ and ‘freedom to’ distinction is misleading, because every example of freedom can be described in both ways. For instance, being free from ignorance means being free to gain an education. G. C. MacCallum (1991) proposed a single, value-free concept of freedom in the form: ‘X is free from Y to do or be Z’. This suggests that the apparently deep question ‘are we free?’ is meaningless, and should be replaced by a more complete and specific statement about what we are free from, and what we are free to do.