The Freedom of Future People

Datos Bibliográficos

ID6325667
AutoresAdam T Schmidt (0000-0002-2323-2838, Faculty of Philosophy University of Groningen Groningen the Netherlands, autor de correspondencia), Andreas T Schmidt
Año2025
Volumen53
Número2
Páginas197-214
Fecha de publicación2025-04-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaPhilosophy & Public Affairs (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0048-3915 • E-ISSN: 1088-4963
EditorialWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/papa.12283
OpenAlexW4408384112
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas1
Referencias citadas84

What happens to liberal political philosophy, if we consider not only the freedom of present but also future people? In this article, I explore the case for long‐term liberalism: freedom should be a central goal, and we should often be particularly concerned with effects on long‐term future distributions of freedom. I provide three arguments. First, liberals should be long‐term liberals: liberal arguments to value freedom give us reason to be (particularly) concerned with future freedom, including freedom in the far future. Second, longtermists should be liberals, particularly under conditions of empirical and moral uncertainty. Third, long‐term liberalism plausibly justifies some restrictions on the freedom of existing people to secure the freedom of future people, for example when mitigating climate change. At the same time, it likely avoids excessive trade‐offs: for both empirical and philosophical reasons, long‐term and near‐term freedom show significant convergence. Throughout I also highlight important practical implications, for example on longtermist institutional action, climate change, human extinction, demography, and global catastrophic risks

Political science · Climate Change and Geoengineering