T 1290.pdf - Pondicherry University DSpace Portal

wider community offering new options. The American findsstrangers and comes to know them through expanding voluntaryassociations which transcend parochial interests and increasehis Freedom OF action.Thus, 'liberty1 also offers the potential for overcomingthe alienation, isolation and divisions created by the verysocial detachment that 1s a condition for liberty. Asindividuals seek to extend thelr llberty for the sake ofpersonal advantage, people of dissimilar origins gain theabllity to act together under dissimilar conditions. Ethnicassociations could never act as a constraint upon individualoptions in a society of people in constant motlon. A person whosought upward soclal mobllity found that hls chances In lifedepended upon the moblllty to move outside the ethnic limits.The original purpose of group-llfe was to shelter the exposedindividual and the continued existence of group life hingedupon its increasing the power of the individual member. Thefree American, then, was an individual who wished to expand hiscapacity for actlon by increasing the number of choicesavailable to hlm. He sought the company of others, but underterms that would release and not bind him. When this conditionof group attachment was not fulfilled, people would be willingto move outside group boundaries to act together withoutsiders. The values and attitudes that were spawned in the