Emancipation
Liberation from restraint or legal disability.
Emancipation generally means the liberation of a person from slavery, indentured servitude, guardianship, or other restraints or legal disabilities imposed by a social system or legal code. Emancipation and liberation are often used synonyms; however, scholars have differentiated among the two. In a legal sense, emancipation is an act by which a person who was once under the authority of another is set free from that authority. More broadly, the term is used to refer to the acquisition of economic, social, and political rights and equality, often for a specifically disenfranchised group.
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Lore & Background
Among others, Karl Marx discussed political emancipation in his 1844 essay 'On the Jewish Question,' although often in addition to (or in contrast with) the term 'human emancipation.' One writer summarized Marx's views of political emancipation in this work as entailing 'equal status of individual citizens in relation to the state, equality before the law, regardless of religion, property, or other "private" characteristics of individual people.'
Reader's Guide
The term emancipation derives from the Latin ēmancĭpo/ēmancĭpatio (the act of liberating a child from parental authority), which in turn stems from ē manu capere (capture from someone else's hand).
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