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Full Idea
The least evil society is that in which the general run of men are most often obliged to think while acting, have the most opportunities for exercising control over collective life as a whole, and enjoy the greatest amount of independence.
Gist of Idea
In the least evil societies people can think, control community life, and be autonomous
Source
Simone Weil (Reflections on Liberty and Social Oppression [1934], p.97)
Book Ref
Weil,Simone: 'Oppression and Liberty' [Routledge 1955], p.97
A Reaction
So Simone Weil was a liberal. How do you stop the most dynamic thinkers, social controllers, and exercisers of their own independence from coming to dominate the others? Only liberal institutions, such as the law and education, can do this.
| 5575 | An obvious idea is a constitution based on maximum mutual freedom for citizens [Kant] |
| 21080 | Actions are right if the maxim respects universal mutual freedoms [Kant] |
| 21055 | Our aim is a constitution which combines maximum freedom with strong restraint [Kant] |
| 21056 | The vitality of business needs maximum freedom (while avoiding harm to others) [Kant] |
| 22797 | In modern states an individual's actions should be their choice [Hegel] |
| 7217 | The main argument for freedom is that interference with it is usually misguided [Mill] |
| 18662 | Liberal freedom is the right to be separate, and ignores the union of man with man [Marx] |
| 23051 | Equality also implies liberty, because equality must be of opportunity as well as possessions [Green,TH] |
| 23869 | In the least evil societies people can think, control community life, and be autonomous [Weil] |
| 18632 | Liberalism tends to give priority to basic liberties [Kymlicka] |
| 23084 | Are egalitarians too coercive, or not egalitarian enough, or lax over morality? [Kekes] |
| 21049 | Liberal freedom was a response to assigned destinies like caste and class [Sandel] |
| 22596 | No government, or the whole nation, can control an individual beyond legitimate scope [Dunt] |