Abstract

Recent events have only reinforced the fact that the value of freedom occupies a pre-eminent, but also paradoxical, role in modern societies. Nowhere have the ambiguities and ambivalences of this leading concept been more fully explored than in recent analyses by György Márkus and Axel Honneth. The following paper brings these two theorists together, examining Márkus’s claims for the perplexity that overtakes an investigation of modern freedom against the background of Honneth’s most recent magnum opus. This contrast will provide mutual illumination, allowing us to appreciate both the commonalities and differences in approach and conclusion, but also allowing us to critically contest some of Márkus’s most startling conclusions.