How free are we?

“Freedom is a beautiful thing” the sapient Bush never tires of telling us. As a statement, few can argue with it. Whether, in reality, we are free is another issue. My argument is that in Western liberal democracies, our responsibilities, obligations and general anxieties of modern living far outweigh any freedoms we enjoy.

It is true that we can criticise, condemn and even ridicule the powers that be. If we are unhappy with the decisions of our leaders, we can vote them out. We have recourse to the courts, which are free of political influence. This much cannot be said of many countries. However, the freedom to criticise and debate is not of concern to the overwhelming majority of people. Even when it comes to voting, the trend in recent years has been ever declining turnouts. Blair’s ‘dictatorial majority’ is based on one of the lowest voter turnout ever.

When it comes to immediate concerns, our freedom and room for manoeuvre is in fact very limited. We are all slaves to the system. The multinational corporations employ thousands, but they can quite easily make thousands redundant. If we raise a murmur we are lectured about efficiency and flexibility, and even threatened with relocation to countries with cheaper labour markets. Government’s can further circumscribe our decision making powers, for example by raising taxes, forcing us to tighten our belts. To house our families, we take hefty mortgages for 25-30 years of our active lives. We live in constant worry about the vagaries of interest rates, which are influenced by factors wider than the interests of mortgage holders. When we drive, we need to be constantly alert against committing a minor traffic infraction, which could land us a heavy fine and rocketing insurance premiums. There are thousands of rules and regulations we could break.

I am not saying that we don’t need rules and regulations or that freedom in liberal democracies is not real. What I am saying is that living in modern, industrial and urban societies is not easy. For some people at least, the exigencies can be overwhelming. What else can explain the high rates of stress, anxiety and depression?