The term "liberty" is morally valued and frequently used by political leaders in a positive sense. Conversely, its opposites—such as oppression, imprisonment, and slavery—are viewed as undesirable and morally wrong. In its simplest sense, liberty means the freedom to do as one wishes or act as one chooses.
Thus, liberty implies the absence of restrictions. However, few people are willing to support the complete removal of all restrictions on the individual. As R. H. Tawney famously noted, "The freedom of the pike is death to the minnows."
When liberty is interpreted merely as the total absence of restraints, it disregards the interests of others. In such a scenario, one person's liberty becomes another person's constraint or oppression.
The removal of all restrictions transforms individual liberty into "license," which represents the abuse of freedom. This is the point where freedom becomes excessive. Therefore, we can view liberty in a positive sense when it includes reasonable restraints to secure the freedom of others. On the other hand, it becomes license (in a negative sense) when it becomes oppressive and morally corrupt.
There is a major ideological controversy regarding the exact point where liberty turns into license, a topic debated by many schools of thought. Some thinkers advocate for minimal restraints, while others demand more restrictions on individual liberty. Interestingly, in the late twentieth century, both socialists and liberals found themselves attracted to "libertarianism." Ultimately, freedom must be regulated so that no one can use their freedom to destroy the freedom of others.
Right-wing libertarians, such as Robert Nozick and Milton Friedman, view freedom through an economic lens and advocate for the greatest possible freedom of choice in the marketplace. They focus heavily on an employer's ability to set wages, determine working conditions, and make hiring decisions. Conversely, socialists view such behavior as license, arguing that the absolute freedom of the employer results in the oppression of the workers. Fundamentalist socialists may go even further, portraying all forms of private property as license, arguing that it inevitably leads to the exploitation of the poor and the propertyless.
In short, liberty means acting within one's rights, whereas license means acting beyond them. A key thinker who distinguished between liberty and license was J.S. Mill. He believed that individual freedom is the foundational basis for moral self-development and that individuals should enjoy the greatest possible realm of liberty.
In his essay On Liberty (1859), Mill proposed a clear distinction between "self-regarding" actions and "other-regarding" actions. He argued that an individual should exercise sovereign control over their own body and life. According to Mill, the only justification for restricting an individual's freedom is to prevent "harm to others."
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