Answer To: The essay is a Political Theory essay for the program Political Science. This is the question that...
Dr. Vidhya answered on Nov 12 2021
4
Introduction
It is implied that within the premises of the nation and its states, constitutional democracy is a way of organizing ties between government and individuals. It is basically defined by the adoption of a written or unwritten constitution that serves as a higher law and guarantees certain human rights even against governmental powers that, according to historical and logical consensus, citizens should not be prevented from following their rights of living with freedom, expressing their ideas or voting to choose the democratic representative of their choice. In the constellation of fundamental rights, freedom of expression is undoubtedly the brightest star. It is tempting to see this standoff as a question of whether freedom of speech should be given priority over other political principles (Alexendar, 47; Delgado & Stefanic, 220; Beerbohm, 34).
The US Supreme Court has taken clear stand over the perceptions that are against the freedom of expression as the violation of the First Amendment. However, heated debates keep taking place over the morality and ethics of the freedom of speech on political grounds. In this paper, I argue in favor of freedom of speech as the necessary element in democracy because it brings to light the perspectives of people about the political governance; it is essential to grant freedom of speech because at political level, it is necessary for the governing bodies to understand how the electoral body, the public, perceives their works and it expresses views with or without biases.
Freedom of Expression: Conflicting Ideologies
At first, it is significant to note here that freedom of expression may be characterized as the concept that people must have the right to express their ideas in written or in oral, symbolic movements or pictures, on any forum and on a variety of topics, from politics to religion, from economy to history, without fear of censorship or retribution or suffering (Alexander, 47; Delgado & Stefanic, 220; Beerbohm, 34). Despite what this expansive notion might imply, however, freedom of expression is not perceived as something that can give full authority to say anything in any context to people. It is constitutionally implied that freedom of expression or right to free speech is granted by law; however, this is likely possible that this right to expression may become embarrassing to others in a politically governed society. This right has the dimension of having biased included in the work of politically chosen government because in no other forms of ruling—whether it is autocracy, bureaucracy or any other form of ruling—that accept fully the choice that people can make over the freedom of expression (Alexander, 47; Delgado & Stefanic, 220; Beerbohm, 34).
Additionally, to justify the above approach of biases included, there are debates over whether or not; freedom of speech is a positive political sign that projects the democratic governance as strongly structured in any nation (Alexander, 47; Delgado & Stefanic, 220; Beerbohm, 34). In case of judging the relevance of the freedom of speech, first of all, if this was really a case of unavoidable moral conflict that could only be resolved by balancing, the issue of intensity with which the arguments in favor of freedom of speech should be made depend on the intuitional diversity of people, as to the differential weights of the related values. Rather than proposing ad hoc balancing, a satisfactory resolution of this conflict should seek to do more; it should at least try to establish a consistent and well-supported theoretical stance that can provide specific normative guidance.
Secondly, the perception of balance does not fully address the actual debate, and more fundamentally, it implies that the true supporters of free expression are those who support the idea of hate speech, while those who are against it are more like hostile to free speech, or at least comfortable with violating it for the sake of other principles. The main debate, however, is not whether we can compromise freedom of expression in order to root out hateful attitudes and the myriad evils they produce. Rather, it is about whether controversial speeches are protected by the legal and political right to freedom of speech, or whether it falls beyond the scope of security of that right instead (Alexander, 47; Delgado & Stefanic, 220; Beerbohm, 34).
Further, the theoretical definition of the freedom of speech is closely aligned with what is mentioned above about balancing the moral conflicts in a society where the right to speech is granted by law. Any invocation of the word freedom of expression may refer to any of a number of definitions. One is the moral right to freedom of speech, a basic moral obligation for agents to be able to express themselves and engage with others. On the part of other agents, this right produces correlative negative duties (Alexander, 47; Delgado & Stefanic, 220; Beerbohm, 34).
Moreover, it also imposes proactive obligations on the part of the state to protect those negative responsibilities. It includes...