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Presents the two basic principles of my analysis of freedom and unfreedom (the F Postulate and the U Postulate). It then explains the general aspiration of my book: the construction of a theory of socio-political freedom that leads to the conclusion that such freedom is measurable in principle. Indicates that the task of measuring each person’s overall freedom includes an evaluative component, but that it is primarily a matter of gauging the extent of each person’s physical latitude.

Delineates the principal ideas that make up my theory of freedom as negative liberty. Raises a number of challenges to positive-liberty theories and to the civic-republican conception of freedom, with sustained criticisms of the work of Quentin Skinner and Philip Pettit. It likewise objects to moralized conceptions of particular freedoms and unfreedoms. It pays particular attention to the ways in which such freedoms and unfreedoms exist over time.

Begins with a few methodological reflections that expand on some of the observations in the opening chapter. It then tackles a host of difficulties relating to the existence of particular freedoms and unfreedoms. Among the topics addressed are the range of the contents of particular freedoms and unfreedoms (i.e. the range of the occurrences and states to which freedoms and unfreedoms can pertain), the counterfactual dimension of liberty (i.e. the fact that each person's freedoms and unfreedoms are determined partly by potential events that could have occurred but that do not actually materialize), the existence of freedoms that pertain to the undergoing of irresistible processes or states, the distinction between the value of doing X and the value of being free to do X, the degree to which doctrines of metaphysical or natural determinism can be reconciled with socio-political liberty, and the freedom-curtailing effects of certain psychological incapacities.

The U Postulate, which specifies the necessary and sufficient conditions for the existence of any particular unfreedom, requires us to distinguish between the constraints on the freedom of any person P that are due partly to other people's actions and the constraints on the freedom of P that are due solely to natural forces and to P's own conduct. One's fleshing out of that basic distinction must consist in the elaboration of criteria that will enable the attribution of causal responsibility for freedom-impairing states of affairs. Those criteria separate unfreedoms from mere inabilities, and thereby significantly influence one's calculations of people's levels of overall liberty. Comes up with a comprehensively applicable test for the ascription of causal responsibility.

Shifts the focus from particular freedoms and unfreedoms to the enterprise of gauging people's levels of overall liberty. In order to ascertain such a level for each person P, we have to ascertain every combination of conjunctively exercisable freedoms that is available to P (in other words, every combination made up of freedoms that can be exercised together by P either simultaneously or sequentially). We likewise have to ascertain every combination of opportunities that are not conjunctively exercisable by P and that lack conjunctive exercisability because of some action(s) by some other person(s). A key portion of the chapter explains how the elements in each combination are to be individuated, so that every combination can be expressed numerically. Moreover, the second half of the chapter argues that the level of anyone's overall liberty is determined in part by evaluative considerations, which can themselves be expressed numerically.

This chapter examines whether Greek civilization was based on slavery. The silence of classicists on the subject is not surprising. The discussion here is limited to Anglo-American scholarship, in an attempt to achieve a manageable focus, though a great deal of the last half-century's work on ancient Greek slavery has been written in French and German. Slavery may cover very different types of unfreedom, such as the chattel slave system of Athens and the helotage that was the predominant form of servitude practised by Sparta. Whether slaves, especially chattel slaves, are to be seen principally as living property or as socially dead outsiders evokes further levels of definition, which are also contested.

This chapter evaluates the other end of the social spectrum — the people at the lower ranks of Scottish society who experienced unfreedom and servility in the period between roughly 1100 and the middle years of the fourteenth century. It explores the ways in which the changing economic, political, and social landscapes that marked the ‘Anglo-Norman era’ in Scotland affected people of low social rank, especially native Gaels. It argues that the conditions which transformed the social and legal status of a broad spectrum of the indigenous population in Ireland after 1171 were in many respects similar to those which affected peasants in the course of the ‘Normanisation’ of Scotland. It applies the methodologies and findings of Irish historians to Scottish charter texts in an effort to detect the otherwise muted voices of the tillers of the soil.

This chapter broadens discourse on marronage through exploration into a late modern maroon movement: Rastafari. Rastafari speech acts inform its interpretation of freedom and the evolving disposition of its members towards the state. The chapter begins with reflection on Peter Tosh’s lyrical commentary on flight, temporality, and revolution. Elucidation of Tosh’s lament on the inability of masses globally to understand marronage and acknowledge a singular philosophical worldview shaping orders of unfreedom precedes the brief overview of core Rastafari tenets. The description of Rastafari livity (way of life) includes explanation of its unique political language and preoccupations: Babylon, Zion, dread, love, reasoning reparations, repatriation, unfreedom, and freedom. The chapter argues globalization and doctrinal transformations among branches of Rastafari in Jamaica, the Caribbean, and across the world have led to shifts in Rastafari beliefs on the nature of flight (physical and spiritual), itself representation of debates on flight addressed throughout the book. For these reasons, it asserts that the ongoing benefits and challenges of Rastafari present us with a rubric to appreciate freedom’s meaning and why marronage still matters.

Slaves were another group which posed particular challenges for missionaries, which they discussed at length, debating the impact of unfreedom on man’s soul. Bonded labour and slavery were extremely widespread in early modern Southeast Asia, and Portuguese Melaka continued to be an important regional trading port for chattel slaves from all over the world. Chapter IX explores ministries to slaves throughout the region, considering the tensions and problems such activities could excite. It also uncovers the neglected issue of the missionaries’ own use of, and trade in, slaves, which became a distinctive feature of several Southeast Asian missions.

This chapter introduces the concern of the book with unfreedom and class rule in contemporary American capitalism as seen in the digital realm. Class struggle is the first and last force shaping developments in communication. Computers are built using commodity chains and a labour process, both organized by the supremacy of a private property rights regime. Subsequently, as data and code are central to almost every facet of contemporary life, capitalist ideology with its conceptions of suitable social relations are reflected in the uses and programming. It is thus appropriate to worry about when, as opposed to whether, automated decision-making algorithms and their ilk will be used by corporations to optimize for profit at the expense of people. Capitalism is not about 'markets' or even private property per se. Rather it is a political order that consolidates decision-making power over the use, circulation and consumption of resources in a wealthy minority in ways that are opaque. As communication is a component of class formation it is also inflected by the structural antagonisms and contradictions inherent in capitalist societies. The chapter focuses on the results of systems, relationships and structure as they move in history along with the concepts and methods required to achieve that aim.

This chapter analyses the legal treatment of sex work, and specifically prostitution, from the perspective of Marxist feminism. Here, the work of sex work must be understood in its wider structural context of gendered and racialized capitalism. The chapter argues that sex work should be understood as work. Furthermore, the features of ‘unfreedom’ associated with sex work do not vitiate its identity as a form of work, and therefore as an activity that warrants the application of protective norms of labour law. This marks an important distinction from the previous chapter’s taxonomy of commercial sex work. In fact, this chapter argues that all work under capitalism is structurally coupled with exploitation and alienation (unfreedom) that ebbs and flows according to the balance of class forces. Given this structural coupling, it is problematic to use the exploitation and alienation in sex work as a basis for excluding it from the domain of personal work relations and for barring sex workers from worker protective laws.

Among the world’s liberal elites today, a received view answers all five of the questions put by this book, arguing that systematic injustice is, essentially, persecution by a government; that there are no global social injustices; that individuals have a strong reason to challenge injustices only if they perpetrated or were victimized by them; that the individuals made unfree by systematic injustice are only its direct victims; and that the ultimate harm done by oppression is the unjust denial, to the oppressed, of the ability to live as free and equal citizens. Against this, the book’s introduction presents the theory of “Unfreedom for All,” which argues that oppressions are also institutional structures that privilege one group and unjustly harm another; that global systematic injustices of, say, race, gender, and poverty do exist; that all are harmed by oppressions because all are made unfree by them; and that this should be everyone’s main reason for joining in solidarity against them.