A Critique of Philip Pettit's Neo-Republican Conception of Political Freedom

The aim of this article is a reconstruction and critique of the conception of political freedom as understood in contemporary instrumental republicanism represented primarily by Philip Pettit. Instrumental republicanism endows political freedom with a merely instrumental value, serving as a means to achieving non-domination which, on republican assumptions, is of chief importance. From the claim that the value of political freedom is merely instrumental follows a significant limitation of its scope (since outcomes of political freedom are potentially dominating). In this article I claim that Pettit's arguments are vulnerable to two main objections. First, a significantly limited scope of political freedom does not foster non-domination. Second, having focused on the merely instrumental value of political freedom, Pettit does not acknowledge the deeper dimension of political freedom as a democratic value.