Liberty of the individual and Sovereignty of the State are two poles of Political Science and Philosophy, around which most of their problems revolve. One of these problems is: How to organise the State so that its sovereignty is preserved without destroying the liberty of the individual.
This problem leads us to a still greater problem, that of the relation between the State and the individual. Broadly speaking, these problems are solved in two ways, either by regarding the State as the end and the individual as a means to this end, or by regarding the individual’s life, liberty and happiness as the end and the State as a means to them.
The former view is that of Idealism and of such modem theories as Socialism and Fascism, while the latter is that of Individualism. In order to understand these problems and theories, we must know what is liberty, its various kinds and its relations to sovereignty, law and authority of the State.