Despite his sound reasoning and accurate writing, Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860) didn’t succeed in making his ideas on freedom popular. In particular, his theory of the will wasn’t taken seriously by other philosophers and fell into oblivion at the beginning of the twentieth century. According to Schopenhauer, civilised society should grant legal protection to life, liberty and property. However, laws do not have the power to remove biological limits on freedom. I’m referring to the limits imposed by the will (“life force”) and by the human lifespan. In his work “The world as will and representation”(1818), Schopenhauer exposed at length the deep influence of the will on human freedom. The will prompts people towards pleasure, reproduction, wealth accumulation and success, generating one desire upon another. The will drives people to seek more and more, without ever achieving fulfilment. Schopenhauer observed the pattern repeat itself a million times. Thus, he acknowledged the influence of the will as a fact of life to be taken into account. Schopenhauer outlined his philosophy of freedom not only in his major works, but also in the brief essays contained in his “Parerga and Paralipomena” (1851). Those essays give precise strategies to minimize the negative influence of the will. They can help readers keep trouble at bay and maximise happiness. Why did other philosophers fail to embrace Schopenhauer’s views on freedom? The major reason for their rejection is that Schopenhauer disagreed with any kind of absolutist thinking. I find in Schopenhauer a defender of individual freedom focused on maximising happiness through personal responsibility. Karl Marx (1818-1883) took the opposite path and regarded freedom as a purely socioeconomic concept. He wrote essays on the material conditions of human existence, class struggle, historical materialism and communism, but overlooked the key role played by personal responsibility on happiness. According to Marx, capitalism leads to the alienation of the individual from his work because employment leads to severe exploitation; freedom is limited, he argued, because employees are subjected to oppressive conditions. Schopenhauer had not regarded a capitalistic society as evil and oppressive. In fact, he pointed out that industrial societies offer chances of success, wealth accumulation and mobility. In previous historical periods, those chances had been scarce. Here is the link to the original article: https://johnvespasian.com/critique-of-schopenhauers-ideas-on-freedom/

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