John Kavanaugh

John Kavanaugh (2005), on his book “Human Freedom”, tried to evaluate
freedom in the minds of Skinner, Sarte, and Maslow. The stands of the three people
are as follows: Skinner believes that “man is not free. All his present behaviour is
influenced by previous actions and has a motivational cause”. On the contrary,
Sarte believes “man is free and his identity is freedom itself”. He states that the
“man is the only source of ends, motives causes”. Lastly, Maslow stated that “Man
cannot be reduced to his historicity, to his environment, to determinism; nor can
man be totally divorced from them”. From these three statements, three types of
freedom were derived: Absolute determinism, Absolute freedom, and structural
freedom. But which of these three types of freedom is real and acceptable? Before
answering that question, let us first identify what is freedom, and what are these
three types of freedom.
John Kavanaugh gives no clear definition of freedom, however, he formulated
four preliminary considerations regarding freedom based on his experiences. These
are:
1. “Achieving a distance in reflection from blind necessity with respect to
external stimuli, environment, values, immediate objects, and present
needs;
2. achieving a distance from myself in self-reflection whereby I am able to see
myself in relation to present needs, past experiences, and future rewards;
and whereby I am able to question these relationships;
3. achieving a possession of myself in reflecting upon who I am and what my
potentialities might be-self-possession and;
4. being able to say something about my self-determination” – that is, to be
able to determine what I am (Kavanaugh, 2005).
Now, let’s try to briefly identify the three types of freedom. Skinner’s Total
determinism stems from the concept of determinism which is defined as a
philosophical theory holding that all events are inevitable consequences of
antecedent sufficient causes. It is often understood as denying the possibility of
free will. Sartre’s absolute freedom is the polar opposite of Skinner’s total
determinism. Unlike Skinner which emphasizes the past, upon one’s historicity, and
upon one’s environment as he believes that present behaviour is influenced by
previous actions and his motivational cause, Sartre emphasises the future the
ability to question and revolt, the phenomenon of distance and transcendence,
which quite overlaps with Kavanaughs concepts of freedom. The last type of
freedom would be Maslow’s Structured freedom. He believes that man cannot be
just free without a structure.
Out of the three types of freedom, what would be considered as real and
acceptable is the structural freedom which is proposed by Maslow. According to
Kavanaugh (2005), “total determinism omits the data of transcendence and
questioning or tries to reduce it to “external forces” while Absolute freedom ignores
man’s history and structure or tries to wish it out of existence”. Structured freedom
however, can be considered as the real and acceptable type of freedom involves
both the two extreme types, and more like a mixture of these two types. “if man is
free, his freedom will involve both realms of his experience, and any interpretation
of man must be able to integrate both realms” (kavanaugh, 2005).
According to kavanaugh (2005), “structure is not only compatible with
freedom, but also t is fundamental to all human growth, evolution, and process.
Freedom is exercised only within the structure of one’s humanity and one’s
historicity; and it is the vehicle by which one can remain faithful to one’s humanity
and history”. Therefore there is freedom in structure.
Let’s take for example a king’s servant. Whenever a king gives an order, the
servant is free to not choose to obey the king. However, since it is instilled in his
mind that a king must be revered (a cultural structure), he will obviously choose to
obey him. The servant (man) is free and he has the freedom to choose. However
his choices are limited by the cultural fact that kings should always be obeyed. This
is the same with structured freedom, Data which we have obtained from history,
literature, and personal communications greatly affect our decision, but despite it,
we are still free.
Structural freedom is also ever present in us and in our country. Each one of
us is a structure which consists of different values and norms shared by me and the
world. For example, all our movements and deeds in our countries abide with laws
and norms of the country. A person, knowing full well that laws are made to be
followed and not following them will result to them getting imprisoned. So they try
to not cause so much trouble. Now, let’s put ourselves in a law breakers
perspective. Why did he choose to break the law? It may be because this person
has some financial problems yet can’t find a decent way to earn money which led
them to steal. This means that each person, whether good or bad, is his own
structure. Because we are all human we always tend to question anything ( which
gives rise to the structure of being human). According to Kavanaugh “The fact of
being human will give rise to structures, values, and demands which will not
militate against my freedom, but which will actually make freedom possible and
enhance it”.
I personally chose structured freedom out of the other two as the most
realistic and acceptable type of freedom because I can see it work in my life. I
believe that I am a structure, and my whole life project is a structure, which
consists of ideas, values, and norms which I share with my family and as well as
my friends. The human being a person who always questions, give rise to
structures which shape our humanity and values. These values are then shared to
other people and then become norms. It’s these structures which shape not only
my life but also our world.
In conclusion Out of the three types of freedom, Structure freedom would be
the most real and acceptable. Its basis is the act of questioning which is due to the
structure of being human. These give rise to data, norms, and values. These
structures, coupled with our freedom of choice which we have primarily
experienced, plays a very important role in our production of our own life project.
References: Kavanaugh, J.F. (2005). Human Freedom. Retrieved on February

1 2016 at: http://tamawogadfly.blogspot.com/2005/07/human-freedom-john-
kavanaugh.html

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John Kavanaugh (2005), on his book “Human Freedom”, tried to evaluate

References: Kavanaugh, J.F. (2005). Human Freedom. Retrieved on February

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