WHAT IS FREE SPEECH?

Speaking our minds—sometimes at a price.

“The essential purpose of free speech, declared Cato, was to prevent tyranny and bondage.” Dabhoiwala, a Princeton historian, references the Roman philosopher’s assertion as part of a brilliantly incisive argument about the ways in which free speech has been used—not just to liberate but also to put in bondage. Freedom went hand in hand with slavery for centuries, and this book traces the history of an ideal together with its contradictions. It begins with Greek and Roman antiquity, moves through the middle ages, and arrives in the 20th century to offer a powerful rewriting of the place of words and wills in the exercise of power. Toleration fought against censorship. Secularism contested with religion. Voices of color strained against the crack of white whips. Whether in the time of 18th-century merchants, 19th-century reformers, 20th-century revolutionaries, or 21st-century democracies, free speech remains about “the principled attempt to address the central problems of media ownership, profit and the public good.” We need, the author argues, a social understanding of expression: “Current western theories of free speech, with their focus on individual rights, and their relative neglect of the public good and the realities of the media landscape, are poorly equipped to address the problem” of advancing truth in public discourse. Are there “collective rights?” Should media be unchecked? Does one defame another with thoughtless words? We need to balance “the rights and profits of speakers, publishers and corporations against their responsibilities—towards their users, audiences and the public as a whole,” writes Dabhoiwala. “The history of free speech matters” as we try to balance public with private interests and individual expression with audience response in an increasingly virulent digital world in which anything goes.

An enlightening and field-defining history about the right to speak and the social consequences of its exercise.