Freedom is a relational fight that must be renewed, not a possession

Evidence

In the face of this nature of our relations, freedom emerges as a continuous process of liberation, as a fight, not only for our independence, but also for the right, at every moment and of our own free will, to remain dependent. This fight must be renewed after every victory. Thus, the absence of relations, as a negative social behavior, is almost never a secure possession but an incessant release from ties which actually limit the autonomy of the individual or which ideally strive to do so. Freedom is not solipsistic existence but sociological action. It is not a condition limited to the single individual but a relationship, even though it is a relationship from the standpoint of the individual. — Georg Simmel, The Sociology of Georg Simmel, 3681

Categorization

• DEFINE: Simmel’s definition of freedom as sociological action, not solipsistic absence of relation — exactly the concept needed for the reader’s triad analysis.
• XREF: Connects to Simmel’s dyad/triad framework and to the reader’s Raskolnikov analysis — freedom as fight against ties parallels Raskolnikov’s attempted liberation from social bonds. — connects to: Freedom lies in refusing the prescribed choice between friend and enemy — Theodor W. Adorno, Minima Moralia: Reflections from…, 156; Freedom requires civic trust, not solitary defensive walls — Philip Pettit, Republicanism: A Theory of Freedom and…, 1192; Freedom originally meant friendship, not isolation — Byung-Chul Han, Psychopolitics: Neoliberalism and New…, 15
• DEEPTHINKING: Freedom as a continuous fight ‘for the right… to remain dependent’ is a genuinely paradigm-shifting inversion of freedom-from-relations; resists one-sentence summary.