Happy Birthday! On F.A. von Hayek’s
The Constitution of Liberty at 65
Nowhere is freedom more important than where our ignorance is greatest – at the boundaries of
knowledge, in other words, where nobody can predict what lies a step ahead.
Friedrich A. von Hayek (1899-1992)
Take Away
Published in 1960, on the 100th anniversary of J. St. Mill’s essay ‘On Liberty’, Friedrich A. von Hayek’s The Constitution of Liberty became a milestone of the entire socio-philosophical literature. In this massive restatement of Liberalism, Hayek develops the ethical, anthropological and economic foundations of a free economic and social order. The book’s first part defines the concept of freedom and explains its significance for the development of society’s creative forces. The second portion is primarily focused on the historical/philosophical foundations of the Rule of Law and the importance of the state’s role for the advancement of a free society. The final part addresses the socio-political liabilities of the modern Welfare State. In 1975, Margret Thatcher impatiently interrupted the Conservative Party’s leadership, slammed The Constitution of Liberty on her desk and vocally made clear that this book was her economic and socio-political credo. Perhaps she was thinking about the book’s crucial Postscript, entitled “Why I am not a Conservative”.
The Constitution of Liberty
After more than 3 years of hard work on writing The Constitution of Liberty, Hayek hand-delivered his typewritten manuscript of well over 800 pages to the editor on his 60th birthday, May 8, 1959. A large part of the text has been drafted in the solitude of an alpine grove high above the village of Obergurgl in the Tyrolian Alps. A bronze plaque mounted on his favorite crooked pine tree commemorates that he worked and finished his magnum opus there. The book was published in Chicago (University of Chicago Press) in 1960 and must be considered a classic of the social science literature. Even after 65 years it is arguably the most well-founded analysis of the welfare state’s ideology.
However in certain self-styled intellectual circles The Constitution of Liberty is recurrently dismissed with a simple shrug and denounced as eccentric or antediluvian. And some time ago it was even belittled as one of those “dinosaurs that still occasionally stalk on the scene apparently impervious to natural selection”. And yet, it is still going strong and in print after 65 years and has been translated into multiple languages, including French, German, Italian, Japanese, Spanish and Portuguese.
Individual freedom
During the past 170 years but even more so in our times, most preeminent social philosophers claim that a theory of freedom cannot be employed in a world in which the starting conditions are unequal for all people. Accordingly, all historically evolved human inequalities or socio-economic conditions ought to be overcome by way of either an unreal construction of a utopian paradise or the enforcement of equalizing political measures, before the subject of freedom may effectively be tackled. These efforts seem to have missed the point. All attempts to find an operational definition of freedom by separating the individual from society as a condition in which one can do whatever one wants is somewhat naïve. The demand for a maximization of freedom, in the sense of being able to do whatever one wants, can only mean that this unrestricted freedom of action will lead to rather absurd conclusions and untenable claims. After all, it is rather vain to theorize about Robinson Crusoe’s freedom, because only with the appearance of Friday, the idea and the concept of individual freedom becomes relevant and problematic for both. The concept of freedom has become so vague by way of intentional or unwitting misinterpretations that it can be used to justify almost all social and political goals.
According to the widespread claim in favor of an equality of freedom, everyone would be entitled to equal freedom. As freedom cannot have quantitative characteristics the argument for equal freedom for all offers no protection against restrictions imposed by others. Therefore the usual demand for the greatest possible negative freedom (freedom from) for all must, conversely, lead to the maximization of positive freedom (freedom to/freedom of action) for all. The argument becomes empty, as more opportunities (to set a fire on a house) must be granted to everyone equally.
On the other hand, F. A. von Hayek however argues in his The Constitution of Liberty (1960) that the main task of social philosophy is neither the design nor the construction of a collective utopian paradise. Defined as the absence of coercion by others, for Hayek only individual freedom is the creative force and the essential guarantor of a prosperous civilization. Coercion, in this context, does not refer to adverse circumstances of any kind, but only to oppression by other people who force one to follow their will instead of his own. People are free to the extent that they are not at the mercy of another person’s will. By discovering, adopting and adhering to rules and traditions that are the result of evolving values and institutions, people with different ideals, skills or convictions are enabled to live together. Values and institutions emerge spontaneously, self-organized and are subject to selection. Only the most successful traditions and institutions will endure and prevail. Thus individual freedom requires groups or societies that submit to rules. In other words, personal freedom can only be maximized if limits are placed on the actions of the individual where these limits lead to the destruction or obstruction of the freedom of fellow members. In order to protect the concept of individual freedom, Hayek suggests the acceptance and enforcement of restrictive rules. Kant’s Categorical Imperative comes to mind here. In other words, Hayek’s book runs counter to the prevailing philosophies about the role of government interventions into social and economic matters.
Modern liberalism
The Constitution of Liberty is a massive, far ranging restatement of the philosophy and the principles of modern Liberalism. Encyclopedic in scope it is disclosing a staggering and unrivaled scholarship. Hayek defines here the nature and conditions of freedom as not merely one particular value but the source and stipulation of most mortal values. Moreover Hayek examines the legal framework required to support a liberal society. For him the Rule of Law strictly requires the equal treatment of all under the law, including the ruling class. He also analyses the economic institutions necessary to advance a humane, livable society with the minimum of coercion by men on men. His magnum opus shows that society is a complex phenomenon, far beyond the capability of any single mind to understand and therefore impossible to comprehend let alone to plan. For him individual freedom is needed if it is to advance and be sustained, and any attempt to inhibit freedom will rob any spontaneously developing social order of its unique ability to overcome new challenges and problems.
For Hayek the essential point in any discussion of freedom is not what kind of freedom an individual wants to exercise. Rather, what kind of freedom someone needs to be useful to his fellows or to the society at large. It is for this reason that any freedom for the unknown person must be granted to everyone. The distinction between a free and an unfree society thus is that in the former each individual has a legally recognized and protected private sphere clearly separate from the public sphere, and a private person cannot be ordered about arbitrarily but is expected to obey those rules that are equally applicable to all. Therefore the demand for a maximization of freedom, in the sense that one can do whatever one wants means that our freedom can only be maximized if limits are placed on individual actions where these could lead to the destruction or obstruction of the freedom of other members of society. Due to the fact, that any unrestricted freedom of action will lead to absurd conclusions and untenable claims, the concept of individual freedom thus must be protected by the necessary introduction and application of restrictive rules. In other words, Hayek’s argument for liberty is not pointed against the powerful tool of any kind of organization. However, he strongly rejects only all exclusive or monopolistic organizations and their use of coercion to prevent others from faring better.
Freedom or Liberty
One of the most seminal parts in Hayek’s The Constitution of Liberty is his distinction between two theories of Freedom or Liberty (he uses these terms interchangeably). Hayek describes the Scottish tradition of Hume, Smith or Ferguson as empirical or anti-rationalist that finds the essence of individual freedom in spontaneity and the absence of any coercion. Hayek describes the other tradition as rationalist that is predominantly typified by the French Enlightenment, especially by Rousseau and the Physiocrats but also by the English Utilitarians. This tradition believes freedom to be and attained solely in the pursuit of an absolute collective purpose. In other words, the Scottish tradition conceives of reason as acting within a framework of institutions and certain prevailing moral rules and is the result of an unconscious evolutionary experiment. It thus leads to true liberty. The other theory however, conceives of an independent antecedent human reason that invented these institution or at least by a fiction sanctioned them, and by which they can be judged as a whole. The one leads to true freedom and the other can easily turn into its opposite.
For Hayek individual freedom is crucial to Western civilization and forms the foundation of its achievements. A successful civilization is not the product of a development planned by men. This success arises spontaneously, as the result of the self-organization of many individual efforts into an effective whole. Without a widespread realization of the ideal of freedom, the progress and prosperity we have achieved thus far would not have been possible.
F.A. von Hayek was born 126 years ago in Fin-de-Siecle Vienna on May 8, 1899. Arguably still the most comprehensive collection of his most important and influential works is The Essence of Hayek (Stanford University Press, 1984).
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