With images of joyful Iraqis celebrating freedom crowding the newspapers, this is a good time to think about freedom. Just what is this precious thing?

     Few people think of freedom in very similar terms. To some, it is about political rights: the right to assemble, to free speech, to participate in government (vote, run for office), etc. To others, it's all about property rights: to do with one's land, possessions, or body as one sees fit. To others, freedom means freedom from hunger, or health fears, or other woes. To a few, freedom means total freedom to do anything – in some cases limited only by other people's freedom – and in other cases limited only by the individual's will and ability to exercise power.

     To Iraqis dancing in the streets, the meaning seems crystal clear: not to live in terror under the rule of a tyrant. As Fox News reported:

"Emboldened by the sight of U.S. troops taking control of the capital, they not only dared to loot but also to celebrate Saddam's fall, to vandalize his image and to call him a criminal – offenses that just days or weeks ago could have brought arrest, imprisonment, torture, even death at the hands of the secret police."

     In western culture, philosophers have staked out two basic ways of thinking about freedom. The older kind, associated with what is called "liberal" thinking (everywhere except in the U.S.) focuses on the political issues (of which property rights are a subset). In this view, you are free, if you can't be tossed in jail for expressing unpopular opinions, or criticizing government officials, or trying to take part in government yourself, or engaging in commerce, or pretty much doing as you please, so long as you don't hurt anyone.

     Your rights, in this paradigm, do not guarantee you particular things or outcomes, but simply that you will not be molested as you go about your business. This definition of freedom seems to be what's on the minds of the Iraqis we see celebrating Saddam Hussein's downfall.

     A newer, "progressive" idea of freedom, is that of "freedom from want." Many influential social thinkers in the 19th and 20th centuries thought that political freedom was not enough. They advocated freedom from the "tyranny of necessity." In this view, a person too hungry to work, or too poor to feed his or her family, is not really free. A rich person, in contrast, seems "free" to do many things that a poor person is unable to do. Freedom from hunger, freedom from disease, etc. necessitate a positive right to certain Important Things, such as food, shelter, and health care (not to mention clothing, books, and radio and TV entertainment, in some places).

     "Positive rights" promise people things they want. This has made the progressive view very popular, and has led to the unfortunate practice of calling the other rights (those essentially relating to not being the slave of a tyrant) "negative rights."

     Defenders of the liberal tradition of freedom charge that the so-called positive rights are really a negation of freedom. A right to Important Things necessitates a right to force other people to provide them, and coercion, especially organized society-wide coercion, is the antithesis of freedom. They often point to the experiences of Cuba and the Soviet Union as examples of how curtailing political freedom to attain freedom from material want achieves neither.

     Defenders of the progressive view point out that many a member of the world's destitute masses would gladly trade their theoretical right to build a factory, or a space ship, for a guarantee of food for themselves and their family. In such dire straits it's hard to even think about the principles of political freedom. Most end up selling themselves into one kind of servitude or another. Progressives argue that such circumstances make a mockery of freedom – and that it is only after basic needs are met that other kinds of freedom become important. People holding this view often point to the Scandinavian social democracies as examples of how more people in a society can attain meaningful levels of personal freedom, once their basic needs have been assured.

     Current events in Iraq, a country devastated by years of impoverishing sanctions and despotic rule, suggest that progressives may have been wrong, or, at least, not completely right, about how important political freedom is to people, even in dire straits. As William Safire observes:

"Like newly freed Parisians tossing flowers at allied tanks; like newly freed Germans tearing down the Berlin wall; like newly freed Russians pulling down the statue of the hated secret police chief in Dzerzinsky Square, the newly freed Iraqis toppled the figure of their tyrant and ground their shoes into the face of Saddam Hussein."

     The joy such people are expressing is not joy at the prospect of freedom to have Important Things (power), but the bubbling over of the human spirit which accompanies liberal freedom (liberty).

     Be that as it may, many free-marketeers recognize the importance of freeing the world's huddled masses from poverty. They believe that is exactly what the Statue of Liberty promises, and further believe that these two poles don't have to be opposites.

     Material well-being improves quickly in places where liberal values flourish, enabling more and more of the people affected to exercise their freedom in the material world. It is not true that without a government-Procrustes to force equality, the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. In places where people are free to think and do as they please, so long as they don't hurt others, people seek to improve their lots – and most do, whether rich or poor. This is the most powerful and undeniable lesson America's immigrants have shown the world – and it's just as true today, though less visible in America.

     This is why so many Americans below the "poverty line" eat regularly, have TVs, have places to live, etc. This is why free-marketeers believe that the freedom of the liberal tradition and the rights it entails are a better path to a world less full of misery. The alternative is the coercive machinery of the state, employed by progressives.

     Now we may be witnessing a new Iraqi freedom. What form will it take?

     Will Iraq get a new government of its own? If so, will that government subject itself to the constraints of a bill of "negative" rights that keeps it from coercing its people? Or will it empower itself to attempt to provide for the people through a bill of "positive" rights? Or will Iraq simply be governed by military governors, who allow whatever rights and freedoms they deem wise?

     One thing is certain: an opportunity for social engineering, possibly with popular backing, has presented itself. Whether they were in favor of "Operation Iraqi Freedom" or against it, it is likely that many advocates of differing freedom theories will find the temptation to experiment irresistible. As theories are put into practice, the world will have an opportunity to learn something about the true meaning of freedom.