From Obedience to Freedom VI

Spinoza, or the Art of Remaining Free

“The end of the State is not to transform rational human beings into beasts or automatons, but to enable their minds and bodies to perform their functions in safety, and to allow them to exercise free reason. The true end of the State is therefore freedom.”— Baruch Spinoza

At the conclusion of this inquiry, one truth becomes unmistakably clear. From the earliest cities of antiquity to the digital democracies of the twenty-first century, every form of political power has sought to solve the same problem: how can obedience be secured without having to rely constantly on force? The answers have varied across the ages. Some invoked God, others History, still others the Revolution, the Nation, race, security, or the will of the people.

The means have changed, symbols have evolved, technologies have advanced, yet the underlying logic has remained remarkably constant: a government is most stable when it succeeds in convincing its citizens that its authority is natural, necessary, or beyond dispute.

Yet this journey through history also reveals another truth—less conspicuous, but infinitely more fruitful. The societies that have preserved civil peace most enduringly are not those that achieved the greatest degree of obedience. They are those that gradually replaced fear with trust, arbitrariness with the rule of law, and submission to an individual with obedience to rules that were freely debated and applied equally to all. Humanity's true political evolution may not lie in the transition from monarchy to democracy, or from religion to secularism, but in the slow transformation of legitimacy itself: it ceases to rest upon an imposed truth and comes instead to rest upon justice.

It is here that Spinoza's thought sheds new light on our entire reflection. Contrary to a common misconception, he did not dream of a society without a state, without laws, or without authority. He understood that no human community can endure without shared rules. But he argued that a truly strong state is not one that inspires fear. It is one that enables its citizens to exercise their reason freely. When institutions are just, when justice is independent, and when everyone can express their ideas without fearing persecution, obedience changes its very nature. It is no longer submission to power; it becomes adherence to a legal order recognized as legitimate.

This distinction is fundamental. Throughout this book, we have examined how governments employ the sacred, collective memory, ideology, fear, propaganda, education, rewards, or the designation of an enemy in order to secure obedience. All these mechanisms exploit a deeply human characteristic: we are creatures of passion as much as of reason. We need hope, a sense of belonging, and meaning in the hardships we endure. Political power naturally speaks to these emotions. It would be an illusion to believe that any society could eliminate them.

But these passions can be directed in two very different ways. They can be used to imprison individuals in fear, mistrust, or absolute certainty. They can also serve a political community in which people accept the law because it protects the weak and the powerful alike. The difference does not lie in the emotions themselves; it lies in the institutions that channel them.

This perspective also invites us to view religions from a different angle. Throughout history, they have at times served to legitimize political authority, yet they have also inspired movements of resistance, solidarity, and reform. Once we move beyond their theological differences and distinctive narratives, we discover that they often converge on a remarkably similar set of ethical principles: the rejection of gratuitous killing, the pursuit of justice, compassion for the vulnerable, the sanctity of one's word, the duty of charity or solidarity, and the restraint of vengeance. These principles do not belong exclusively to any one religion; they are equally present in the great philosophical traditions.

The Enlightenment did not invent these values. Rather, it gave them a different foundation. Where religious traditions grounded them in divine will, Enlightenment philosophers sought to justify them through reason, experience, and the universality of the human condition. Justice does not become less valuable once it is no longer considered sacred; it simply becomes accessible to everyone, regardless of belief. Charity itself gradually evolves into solidarity, social protection, and fundamental rights. What was once regarded as an individual moral duty increasingly becomes a collective responsibility embodied in public institutions.

Perhaps this is where the true maturation of human societies lies. They do not move from religion to atheism, nor from authority to disorder. They slowly move from obedience rooted in belief to cooperation founded upon trust. The more citizens know that justice will be the same for everyone, that freedoms will be protected, and that those who govern will themselves be subject to the law, the less necessary it becomes to secure obedience through fear, myth, or propaganda.

This evolution is never permanently guaranteed. Economic crises, wars, terrorism, pandemics, and technological upheavals often revive the desire for stronger, faster governments, less constrained by procedures or institutional checks. History shows, however, that it is precisely in such moments of vulnerability that institutions must resist the temptation to sacrifice liberty in the name of efficiency. An independent judiciary, a free press, autonomous universities, and an active civil society do not slow democracy; they prevent it from sliding into the dangerous confusion between authority and infallibility.

No society will ever entirely escape the manufacture of obedience. Collective narratives, symbols, commemorations, and shared passions will always exist because they respond to deeply human needs. The question, therefore, is not whether they should disappear. It is whether these forces remain subject to reason, public debate, and the rule of law, or whether they become instruments of a power that recognizes no limits.

True political progress does not consist in producing ever more obedient citizens. It consists in educating women and men who obey the law because they judge it to be just, yet who are equally capable of challenging it whenever it ceases to uphold the principles from which it derives its legitimacy. A democracy does not ask for loyal subjects; it requires responsible citizens.

Perhaps this is Spinoza's most enduring lesson for our own time. A state is not great because it is feared. It is great when its citizens no longer need to fear their rulers in order to respect the law. Justice then replaces fear, trust replaces submission, and reason becomes the common language of a society that no longer needs to manufacture obedience because it has learned how to cultivate freedom.