The notion that freedom is a negative condition that is dependent for its existence upon an avoidance of restraint or an escape from it is therefore incomplete.

It is obvious that an absence of imposed restraint is implicit in a condition of freedom. If one individual is restrained or controlled by another individual, then he certainly is not free.

In this case, by implication, for freedom to exist, an agency or person willing and capable of imposing restraint would have to exist somewhere for a person to be able to avoid such agency or person, and thus be free.

This point would seem to be consistent with our earlier premise that freedom applies to an inter-human relationship. However, it begs the question as to whether freedom would be a useful or meaningful concept if a number of human beings lived in a given area, and there was neither an agency nor a person willing or able to impose restraints on any of the others.

And so, we must ask: If men and women acting as coercive governments ceased to exist, would freedom automatically follow? Or does freedom have some peculiar and positive characteristics of its own so that the removal of agencies of coercion and restraint (such as government) might be viewed as only a first step in the ideal attainment of human liberty?

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