Sydney Ideas and Gleebooks present

Clive Hamilton The Freedom Paradox
6:30pm Tuesday 12 August
Venue: Eastern Avenue Auditorium
Bookings: Seymour Online Box Office: 9351 7940

Why is it that, despite the wealth and freedom enjoyed by most citizens of rich countries, we do not appear to be the contented, fulfilled individuals we were promised we would become? Have prosperity and the liberation movements failed us?

In his important new book, Clive Hamilton argues that the beginnings of an answer to these questions can be found in the idea of “inner freedom”, defined as the extent to which we are guided by our own considered will rather than momentary impulse or circumstance. Because it promotes superficiality and sets out deliberately to make us the slaves of our passions, modern marketing culture is antithetical to inner freedom.

But the roots go deeper than the attractions of consumerism and endless choice. The source of true freedom must be found beyond the cultural, political and social philosophies that provide the bedrock of contemporary western thought.

Moral relativism and the belief that freedom means freedom to do as we please have created widespread anxiety and uncertainty about what it takes to lead a meaningful life. The philosophers need to find an explanation for the popular sense that there are moral absolutes. In this lecture, Clive Hamilton makes the provocative claim that only an ethics that considers humans to be more than rational animals can reclaim morality from both conservative dogma and post-modern indifference.

Clive Hamilton is well known in Australia as a public intellectual and for his contributions to public policy debate. He was the Founder and for 14 years the Executive Director of The Australia Institute, a public interest think tank. His extensive publications include writings on overconsumption, the effects of commercialisation, welfare policy and climate change policy. He is the bestselling author of Growth Fetish, co-author of Affluenza, co-editor of Silencing Dissent, and his new book is Freedom Paradox: Towards a post-secular ethics. He was recently appointed Professor of Public Ethics at the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics CAPPE a joint centre of the Australian National University, Charles Sturt University and the University of Melbourne.

Co-Presented by Gleebooks