John Stuart Mill on the Relation between society and individual regarding personal liberty

Mill conceives the principle of liberty as a guideline of behavior established for society so that individuality and the autonomous development of individuals can be protected. He argues that individuality is something commendable in itself, since it constitutes an essential element of human well-being, not simply an abstract political right:

If it were felt that the free development of individuality is one of the leading essentials of well-being; that it is not only a co-ordinate element with all that is designated by the terms civilisation, instruction, education, culture, but is itself a necessary part and condition of all those things; there would be no danger that liberty should be undervalued (Mill, 2003: 122).

Mill understands individuality as the ability to make the decisions that allow us to live our own lives. In this sense it is an end in itself, not simply a means to achieve happiness. Individuality is what allows man to achieve the autonomy to determine for himself his behavior and make his own decisions accordingly. This autonomy is for Mill something that we all have to develop though our own individuality; this can only take place if the necessary conditions of freedom are present (Hamburger, 1999: 225).

that the concept of positive freedom has often led in practice to the elimination of freedom, since it has justified coercion for the sake of individual's self-realization. This happens when it is considered that individuals are not generally able to decide for themselves what is rational and correct. So the best way of life for them has to be defined by some authority better able to determine a way of life than they, so easily leading to authoritarian and despotic political systems. So limiting individual freedom in the name of greater freedom for individuals is an approach to liberty which justifies obedience, paternalism or other forms of control that can end up becoming oppression. Thus Berlin's deep suspicion about positive freedom and his championing of negative freedom, which he ascribes also to Mill.

¹⁷In this work we can find an extensive list of those who defend the presence of the two types of liberty in the thought of Mill, as well as of those who, in the line with Isaiah Berlin, maintain that Mill basically defends negative freedom.

In Mill, therefore, one encounters not only the negative concept of liberty as separation and isolation from others, but also the positive, which claims that liberty consists of the determination of one's own behavior, without external coercion, over one's own decisionsSome authors consider nevertheless that Mill's emphasis on the value of individual freedom for human well-being, as well as his insistence on non-interference in the domain of individual choice of good life, are not sufficient to qualify him as a proponent of positive liberty.. With this conception of liberty Mill argues, above all, for the autonomy of the individual. He considers that this is the only path for the individual to really develop his or her potential and reach the personal development of which he or she is capable. This is the fundamental reason why Mill opposes paternalism on the part of the state in a sufficiently advanced form of society. In limiting the freedom of citizens according to what the state considers good for them, it would impede the progressive development of the individual and, therefore, of society as a whole (Ten, 1991).

In his essay, Mill asserts repeatedly that liberty has value in itself, while all restrictions are intrinsically bad. Such assertions have led to Mill being considered to hold a negative concept of liberty. Thus, freedom for him would basically consist of the independence and separation of the individual from the others. However, taking into consideration other equally fundamental approaches that appear in On Liberty, it is clear that Mill also supports a positive concept of liberty, according to which freedom consists in the individual's ability to determine him or herself. Mill develops this point so far that he considers that the absence of conditions necessary for autonomy, such as poverty or lack of social rights, necessarily imply a limitation on liberty. Only from this point can one understand his affirmation that liberty has an intrinsic value. If freedom were understood by him simply as the absence of interference in individual behavior, such a statement would be meaningless. This is expressed with the greatest concision in one of the central phrases of the work: “The only freedom which deserves the name, is that of pursuing our own good in our own way” (Mill, 2003: 83). Only if freedom is understood as such can it be considered as having intrinsic value.

The capacity of a person to determine himself is, for Mill, the fundamental element of the constitution of character. This self-determination is intrinsically linked with individuality, from which the person can find his identity and realize his own development (Donner & Fumerton, 2009: 62-68). He considers that the greatest enemy of self-determination is despotism, for here the person is determined by an agency which is external to himself.

Only within the field of liberty can the individual control his own autonomy. This implies participation and involvement in social life, as opposed to the passive role in which the individual serves in a despotic regime. Mill, however, understands that tyranny and oppression may be exercised not only by the state, for the society itself has extremely effective mechanisms to oppress and subdue the individual. Society can exercise despotism that causes a human being to lose individuality and be absorbed by the social, abandoned to conformism and passivity. Under the conditions of developed capitalism and the democratic regimes that flourish within it, a mass society develops in which the freedom of the individual is completely drowned. The struggle against this form of despotism is one of the fundamental elements of On Liberty, and it is undoubtedly a profound vision of what would become one of the greatest dangers in a future society as social democracy develops. This aspect of Mill's thought is one that gives his concept a greater relevance, for this danger which he envisaged in the middle of the 19th century has only increased since then.

Thus the individuality that Mill defended is not that of a human being isolated from society. Such an atomized individual is an easy prey for the mechanism of generating uniformity within a mass society. The individual has to participate in society, to access truth through rational and free discussion. It is only in this way that he can control his autonomy and develop his character (Fitzpatrick, 2006: 63 ff.). This shows the intimate connection between individuality and spontaneity. For Mill it is fundamental that the desires and impulses of a human being belong to him. The crucial element for making this possible is spontaneity, so that such desires arise out of the very nature of man. This means that such desires are not to be taken from outside of the individual himself. He must not accept them in any case in an uncritical way as something imposed by others, as something that the individual simply has to adopt. From here, the idea of spontaneity is linked to the idea of education of the human being as an independent being, rejecting any conception of culture as merely indoctrination of the individual. To educate sentiments means to help them flourish spontaneously according to the nature of man, and this can only take place in an atmosphere of freedom. In this sense, spontaneity is intrinsically linked to the free development of the individual.

This shows clearly that Mill's conception of culture is fundamentally centered on the individual. He considers that creativity can only come from individuals, and that custom and cultural institutions cannot lead to social progress. In this sense his position can be considered elitist, since it holds that only the most gifted, even brilliant individuals can generate new necessary forms and advance society (Cowling, 1990).This author emphasizes the elitist aspect of Mill's thought. He is opposed to the orthodox opinion that considers Mill one of the most prominent liberals of modern thought, and even accuses him of “moral totalitarianism”. He maintains that Mill's concern for freedom and individuality is not related to the ordinary person but to the intellectual elite, and that Mill's theory is designed to impose on the people a social ideal determined by that elite. But this does not mean that these individuals should be allowed to have the power to impose their own models on the rest. What he claims is that in safeguarding individual liberty, each can draw his or her own plan of life, so that brilliant individuals can be allowed to develop their own life path. In this sense they can lead the way for others, but in no case oblige them to follow it. What Mill intends is that the intellectual and moral authority of the most qualified individuals be recognized. But this ought not to confer on them any coercive political or social power to compel other individuals to follow their path, for then they would be preventing others from determining themselves and developing their own personality.

Mill considers, in short, that a person who does not determine himself autonomously does not have a character, since only a “person whose desires and impulses are his own -- are the expression of his own nature, as it has been developed and modified by his own culture -- is said to have a character” (Mill, 2003: 125). A person without character is one whose sentiments and ways of thinking are determined by habit. The personality of someone like this is shaped by society, becoming simply a mechanical part of a larger machinery. Hence Mill's concern about the loss of individuality within a mass society, for it is public opinion that has the power to force conformity amongst individuals, losing all autonomy to shape themselves and equip themselves with a character. Therefore, in a mass society it is absolutely necessary to strengthen and develop one's own sentiments and one's own ways of thinking and acting, for only then can one resist the pressure of public opinion on the individual. Only then will the human being be able to determine him or herself and choose his or her own way of life, and this is what ultimately gives meaning to the principle of liberty.

REFERENCES

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