According to H. L. A. Hart, "if there are any moral rights at all, it follows that there is at least one natural right, the equal right of all men to be free." 1 This idea that there is a general right to freedom -a right to freedom simpliciter rather than merely rights to freedom in specific areas such as speech and association -is traditionally linked to the view that limiting an individual's freedom is justifiable on only one condition -namely, that doing so prevents him from injuring or coercing others. On the other hand, those who reject (at least implicitly) the notion of a right to freedom simpliciter tend to allow a much broader range of limitations on individual freedom, including restrictions based on paternalistic or moralistic grounds.
Despite their differences, these views regarding the specific kinds of grounds on which individual freedom might be justifiability restricted do have an important feature in common. They both presuppose that there exists a general presumption against restricting individual freedom -that such restrictions require some sort of justification. Those who believe in a right to freedom simpliciter regard it as providing the only adequate explanatory basis for this general presumption. I will argue here, however, that depending on how it is interpreted, either there is no such thing as a right to freedom simpliciter, or there are much better ways to serve the primary purposes for which this right has traditionally been intended. I should note too that in addressing these issues, I will ignore certain questions which occupy Hart -for example, questions regarding whether the right to freedom simpliciter is a natural right or whether it is held equally by everyone .2 I.
Let us begin by attempting to understand what it means to claim that there is a right to freedom. In doing so it will be helpful to distinguish between rights which can be exercised (and in particular, rights to perform actions of certain