On reading Amy Gutmann’s (1987) Democratic Education again, we are confronted by the way in which the emotion of freedom comes up as a precondition for human engagement. Being unfree and constrained can never be a defence for plausible human actions as humans are meant to be free in the first place. Humans are free in the sense that they can think and make choices, whether in relation to where they live, what they eat or whom they choose to marry or where to work. Within an educational setting, humans can choose where they wish to study, what they wish to pursue, what to read and, if they continue in the academic realm, in which discipline they wish to specialise. They are free because they do not merely decide in advance which knowledge interests they endeavour to pursue, but also how they wish to do it. Their choices and procedures to embark on educational research, for instance, are corroborated and enhanced by the capacities to exercise their freedoms. In this way, humans are unique and their freedoms are unconstrained.

Yet, as reminded by Gutmann (1987), to enact one’s freedom does not happen independently from the exercise of freedom by others, which in turn constrains their freedom as they do things in collaboration with others. Individuals might not always agree with each other but momentarily seek agreement for the sake of formulating a point of view, and, at a later stage, might even be persuaded by the very idea or understanding with which they might have been troubled previously. Consequently, their exercise of freedom is both autonomous and interdependent: autonomous freedom is exercised through individual human agency; and interdependent human freedom is practised in relation with others. Interdependence with others somewhat inhibits individuals’ freedom, especially if they initially needed to be persuaded. But, their intersubjective agreement does not imply that, as a collective, they are now constrained. As we co-author this book, we are both provoked by our independence of thought as autonomous humans; concurrently, we are also informed by one another’s understandings as we collectively embark on shaping our thoughts in union for the purposes of producing a lucid and coherent argument in the book. In short, we remain autonomously and collectively unconstrained. This brings us to a discussion of autonomous freedom and deliberative freedom.

In this section, we do not want to expound further on the distinction Isaiah Berlin makes between positive and negative freedom as such analyses are replete in the literature in and about philosophy and philosophy of education. Suffice to say that Berlin (1969) identifies positive freedom as freedom exercised autonomously by the individual—a way of acting with self-determination to realise his or her aspirations, unhindered by the freedom of others. Negative freedom on the other hand is freedom which, when exercised, negates the freedoms of others as it considers the exercise of freedom in the absence of interference by others. In sum, while positive freedom or liberty is a form of autonomous action whereby an individual exerts him- or herself in the pursuit of independent judgements, negative freedom is a form of autonomous action unhindered by external constraints.

Autonomous freedom in the way we shall expound seems to resonate with an understanding of positive freedom. And, perhaps it does, as the exercise of individual liberty is at stake in both positive and autonomous freedoms. However, our elucidation of this concept of autonomous freedom relates to the exercise of individual freedom unconstrained by the interference of others. In Berlin’s explication of positive freedom, there is a possibility for others to encroach on the individual freedoms of people. In other words, individuals exercise their freedom, but not necessarily unconstrained by the acts of others. Autonomous freedom, we hold, is a freedom exercised by individuals unhampered by the freedom of others. Thus, when individuals exercise their freedom to leave their country of origin for the purposes of making their life elsewhere, or when a student disagrees with a teacher, they exercise individual freedoms. This is so on the basis that their freedoms are unhampered by the freedom of others. In other words, migrants leave their country of origin irrespective of the impingement of others to prevent them from doing so. Or, a student challenges a teacher on his or her views, without being constrained by the teacher to do so. If the latter happens, unlike positive freedom, unconstrained human action ensues. Such a view of autonomous freedom offers a different dimension to democratic education in the sense that such a form of education cannot exist if the individual freedoms of people are curtailed or encroached upon by others. Positive freedom happens with the possibility that one’s individual liberty can be constrained even in the wake of exercising one’s self-determination in the realisation of one’s aspirations.

Of course, the question can be asked whether autonomous freedom is at all possible and whether it is not possible for others to leave one’s freedom to one’s self. It might be that the possibility exists for others to interrupt an individual’s exercise of his or her autonomous freedom, but this is not what happens when autonomous action becomes manifest. It could be argued, for example, that the perceived freedom of a migrant to leave his or her home was, in fact, not motivated by an autonomous freedom, but rather by particular conditions of strife, threat or hunger, which forced the migrant to make that decision. But, then, of course, the argument stands that the migrant still exercised his or her freedom to stay or leave and was neither forced to stay nor forced to leave. Autonomous action is, therefore, only possible if others constrain the exercise of their individual freedoms. And, the latter in itself brings into consideration the idea that autonomous freedom per se is an impossibility, as it requires of others to limit their freedoms. This makes autonomous freedom an exercise of conditionality as it happens only when others restrain their actions or exercise freedom. It would seem that even within perceived acts of autonomous action, such as deciding to migrate, are affected by particular conditions or constraints, which might at first not be evident, these conditions are present, nevertheless. We are confronted, therefore, with the idea of an unconstrained or autonomous freedom, which might in itself be a misnomer because while individuals possess the capacity to take autonomous actions, individuals exist within particular contexts and conditions, which cannot be discounted from whatever action is taken. Considering that autonomous freedom is not in its entirety possible, as the freedoms of others would always be there to interrupt what seems to be autonomous, we now turn to a discussion of deliberative freedom.

What we have been doing thus far is to show that the exercise of autonomous freedom in its entirety might not be possible as there are limits to what an individual does or can do. For example, a teacher might claim that he or she is a deeply religious person whose life, in all respects, is lived in relation to the doctrines of that particular religion. He or she might wish to take this affinity into his or her classroom and his or her teaching—possibly through adopting certain practices in relation to discipline, or refusing to discuss certain topics, for example. A teacher might assert that since his or her religious identity is constitutive of his or her professional identity as a teacher, he or she should not be expected to discount that characteristic of him- or herself and that he or she is exercising his or her individual right to express him- or herself as such. He or she might also insist that he or she be respected for his or her particular religious views and identity and that others should not interfere in his or her right to do so—since this is his or her religious freedom. However, the mere expectation that others should not interfere with such teacher’s right to assert his or her religious identity in his or her class is an expectation of non-interference, and hence, an infringement or constraint on others not to act. The scenario, which unfolds is one, which makes the teacher’s right to exercise his or her religious freedom conditionally upon the non-interference of others. And, if such a conditionality manifests, the teacher’s autonomous freedom can no longer be an independent one unhampered by what others do. In this instance, a teacher’s autonomous freedom to express his or her religious views seems to be dependent upon the will of others not to interfere. Considering that autonomous freedom is dependent on the conditionality that others should not interfere, freedom can no longer be autonomous, as autonomy in itself demands the non-interference of others, who, in this case, seem to exercise an interference of passivity. That is, they do not interfere; yet, they do so passively or inadvertently. Now, if an understanding of autonomous freedom is not possible, which kind of freedom is possible?

For us, the exercise of freedom is not an act of singularity whereby an individual simply does as he or she pleases, or says what he or she wants to say. The exercise of freedo...