Abstract
The paper aims to explain the importance of re-signifying the concept of freedom to guarantee environmental protection in contemporary democracies. To achieve this goal, it analyzes the development of the idea of freedom in ancient and modern societies, outlining a new concept of liberty, more updated and adequate to the contemporary scenario of accelerated environmental crisis and to the development of an Ecological State, ethically based on ecocentrism. The methodological approach is qualitative, pure and the source of research is bibliographical. Research findings show that freedom, in known western societies, changed from an ancient political and public freedom through modern private individual freedom, to later embrace equality in guaranteeing also groups’ freedoms. The study also verified that this current concept of liberty still strengthens the autonomy of human person, emptying the freedom of being and depleting finite natural resources. Hence, the research attests the need to incorporate in the concept of liberty an interspecies solidarity derived from the awareness of man’s biological nature included in the biotic complex as a whole, resulting in Bosselmann’s holistic concept of freedom, foundation stone of the Ecological State.
Keywords:
Liberty; Ecological State; Strong Sustainability; Ecocentrism