Freedom In The Age Of Surveillance: Re- Examining Nozick’s Minimal State
- IJLLR Journal
- 1 hour ago
- 1 min read
Bhargav Naik, Bengaluru, Karnataka.
ABSTACT
This article examines the conflict between personal freedom and governmental monitoring in modern-day India. The paper critically investigates whether government systems like Aadhaar and facial- recognition technology comply with or transgress these boundaries, drawing on Robert Nozick's libertarian theory of the minimum state, whose only legal duty is to protect individuals from coercion, robbery, and fraud. Nozick's ideas of self-ownership, consent, and negative liberty are placed in the context of India's developing digital governance framework. It contends that although biometric technologies are said to improve efficiency and security, their coercive and opaque implementation frequently expands state authority beyond protective purposes, eroding autonomy and privacy.
The study also examines how technological exclusion, function creep, and mandatory data gathering undermine substantive freedom, especially for vulnerable groups. It draws the conclusion that India's surveillance architecture runs the risk of turning the protecting minimum state into an invasive maximal state based on legislative developments like K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India and the Digital Personal Data Protection Act (2023). In order to balance technological governance with Nozick's vision of a free, rights-respecting society, the research advocates for strong protections based on consent, proportionality, and data sovereignty.
