The Business of Liberty: Freedom and Information in Ethics, Politics, and Law, by Boudewijn de Bruin. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2022. 240 pp.

Abstract

The Business of Liberty is an ambitious book that aims to defend a novel account of what makes freedom valuable. It then uses that theory of liberty to shed light on issues in business ethics, business regulation, freedom of speech, and additional related topics. Philosophical discussions about liberty often follow a particular format. First, the author defends a conception of what liberty is. For instance, one might argue that liberty consists of noninterference, nondomination, the positive ability to achieve one’s goals, self-mastery, or something else. Second, the author articulates why liberty is valuable and defends claims about what kinds of protection it ought to have, if any. For instance, one might try to settle whether people have a right to that liberty or discuss how strong that right is. Third, the author defends claims about how governments or other institutions ought to respond to that liberty. For instance, one might argue that liberty requires a liberal democratic state—or forbids the state entirely. DeBruinwisely avoids the first question. Hemight in fact be comfortable, as I am, with saying that liberty refers to a variety of related things, each of which is valuable. However, he instead states that his goal is to provide an answer to the second question (what makes liberty valuable/under what conditions is it valuable?), an answer that he argues one must adopt almost regardless of which conception of liberty one defends. He argues that mere liberty, on its own, has little value unless certain conditions are met. What matters instead is that people have what he calls known freedom and acknowledged freedom. A person has known freedom, per de Bruin, to the “extent that they have knowledge concerning their choice situation” (80), including what their choices are, what options are possible but excluded or blocked for various reasons, and what the possible outcomes of these choices are. They have acknowledged freedom when their known freedom is common knowledge and institutionalized, that is, when others acknowledge that the person is free and will act to preserve, protect, and