Abstract

This chapter develops three themes involving the issue of free will necessary to an understanding of Vygotsky's work. They are: (1) his distinctive idea of freedom understood as self‐determination; (2) the distinction between this idea of freedom and a common‐sense concept of free will; and (3) arising from these, the issue of determinism and determinist readings of Marx. For Spinoza, truth is necessary to freedom and the two are inextricably linked. The chapter discusses the elements of Spinoza's philosophy relevant to Vygotsky's approach. It addresses the issue of determinism in relation to attempts to provide a causal account of mind and will. To be free for Spinoza is to be a cause of oneself. Freedom is found in necessity but in a necessity that human beings mediate as their own rather than one that remains uncompromisingly external.