What Is It Like To Be an Addict? Understanding Substance Abuse, by Owen Flanagan, Oxford University Press, 320 pages, $24.99
Addiction is a problem that defenders of liberty need to face, for if citizens cannot control their appetites, the state may be inclined to take over the job for them. Freedom depends on self-command supported by a fragile web of norms and relationships that lets us keep our own lives in order and get along with one another. Addiction is the acute case of the appetites run amok, as they often do when unfettered by such constraints as wealth, religion, and community.
Owen Flanagan's new book, What Is It Like To Be an Addict?, should be welcomed by anyone concerned with these issues. Despite its modest size, this is a work of large ambition and broad range informed not just by the author's long career as a prominent philosopher but by his many years as a desperately addicted abuser of alcohol and sedatives.
