A book launch and conversation with Professor Annelien de Dijn, author of the new book Freedom: An Unruly History.
Is the Western idea of freedom fundamentally anti-democratic?
The political theorist – and former ISRF Mid-Career Fellow – Annelien de Dijn argues that it has become so, but need not be. De Dijn brings today’s limited concept of freedom back to life by immersing it in a 2500-year panorama of intellectual and political conflict.
Freedom inspires important questions: Why has freedom often been hostile to government and public services? Why has freedom so often defined itself through the domination of women and racial others? As authoritarian regimes spread around the world, can we be optimistic about democratizing freedom in the coming years?