The Freedom Paradox: Towards a Post-Secular Ethics (Allen & Unwin, 274pp) is a 2008 book by Professor Clive Hamilton

Clive Hamilton

Clive Charles Hamilton AM FRSA is an Australian public intellectual and Professor of Public Ethics at the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics and the Vice-Chancellor's Chair in Public Ethics at Charles Sturt University. He is the Founder and former Executive Director of the The...

. This is a philosophical book related to the nature and consequences of advanced consumer capitalism

Capitalism

Capitalism is an economic system that became dominant in the Western world following the demise of feudalism. There is no consensus on the precise definition nor on how the term should be used as a historical category...

. In the book Hamilton proposes a system of "post-secular ethics" that will serve as a challenge to the "moral malaise" occasioned by the "freedom of the marketplace". The book consists of five parts:

• In the first of these parts, Hamilton systematically works through the paradox of "unfreedom" to reveal the pathological structures ... that have subverted the promise of freedom heralded by the several revolutions of the twentieth century, of which economic liberalism
  Economic liberalism
  Economic liberalism is the ideological belief in giving all people economic freedom, and as such granting people with more basis to control their own lives and make their own mistakes. It is an economic philosophy that supports and promotes individual liberty and choice in economic matters and...
  
   is the most recent and enduring.
• In part two, Hamilton provides the metaphysical
  Metaphysics
  Metaphysics is a branch of philosophy concerned with explaining the fundamental nature of being and the world, although the term is not easily defined. Traditionally, metaphysics attempts to answer two basic questions in the broadest possible terms:...
  
   basis for his analysis - and for his resolution. The moral life has its basis in a conformity - a creative and vibrant conformity - with Schopenhauer's noumenon, a "metaphysical absolute" or "universal essence".
• In the final three parts, Hamilton anneals his ethics in the forge of his metaphysics, and provides several practical applications (to suicide, sex, non-human life, aesthetics, sociality, happiness).

The Freedom Paradox was launched in Canberra by Justice Michael Kirby on 5 August 2008.

Quotes

• "Freed from want, discrimination and oppression, we huddle together like sheep seeking one another's comfort after the fences have been taken down, habituated to the domesticated life and fearful of what lies beyond". (p. 218)

• "Depression characterises contemporary consumer society". (p. 223)