We should try to explain what Sen means by "substantial freedoms." Substantial freedoms are (1) valuable things that can be divided up and delivered to human beings (or groups of people in a region) in varying amounts.
Perhaps it is not too much of a stretch to treat Sen's perspective as an ethical perspective that may also help us evaluate the interactions between people in families and other associations. Public policy-the programs and rules by which government and other public agencies arrange our lives in society-is supposed to be the means by which human beings pursue what is good or ethically desirable in the public sphere. Sen's "perspective of freedom" is concerned with "enhancing the lives we lead and the freedoms we enjoy," in other words, "expanding the freedoms we have reason to value," so that our lives will be "richer and more unfettered" and we will be able to become "fuller social persons, exercising our own volitions and interacting with-and influencing-the world in which we live." (DAF, 14-15) In his view, positive freedom is "intrinsically important as the preeminent objective of development," that is, of public policy. Nussbaum's extension of Prof.Ĭomposed: SeptemRevised January 2003 This summary is mainly based on Amartya Sen's 1999 book, Development asįreedom (New York: Random House), hence DAF. Other, and (3) relates it to the notion of "capability," which is distinct fromĪ raw capacity and an actual exercise of a capability. (2) distinguishes it from negative freedom on the one side and happiness on the This webpage (1) lays out the basic idea of positive or substantial freedom,
Amartya Sen's Ethics of Substantial Freedom Amartya Sen's Ethics of Substantial Freedom © by Dr.
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