Full Idea
All societies should celebrate individual agency as an essential freedom, but agency is different from placing individual self-interest at the centre of our moral universe.
Gist of Idea
Societies should celebrate individual agency, but not mere self-interest
Source
Will Hutton (This Time No Mistakes [2024], 1)
Book Reference
Cochrane,Tom: 'The Aesthetic Value of the World' [OUP 2021], p.7
A Reaction
He likes the word 'agency' in politics. Saying that freedom needs agency sounds tautological, but I presume we can be free to be lethargic, whereas what he celebrates is active initiative. Sensible self-interest is also social.