We know there is no such thing as absolute freedom.

We know it is relative because one’s freedom is subject to the other person’s liberty.

But even partial involuntary servitude is a diminution of one’s right to lead a full life and the pursuit of happiness which are guaranteed under the Constitution.

By this yardstick, the country is partially free in the exercise by its citizens of their political rights and civil liberties.  

For the second straight year, the Philippines maintained its status as a partly free country in an annual survey of political rights and civil liberties in 195 countries around the world, according to a Washington-based non-government organization.

In the Freedom in the World 2012 report of Freedom House, it  received a score of 3 in both political rights and civil liberties and was grouped among 60 partly free countries, home to 1,497,442,500 people, or 22 percent of the world’s population.

One point represents the most free and seven the least free country.

Published since 1972, the report examines the ability of individuals to exercise their political and civil rights around the world and assigns each country a status of free, partly free or not free based on their scores in key democracy indicators.

An earlier Freedom House report said never since the restoration of democracy in 1986 have civil liberties been so severely abused in the Philippines as during the nine-year rule of former president Gloria Arroyo, now held in hospital custody on charges of election fraud.

The report, Countries at the Crossroads 2011, covers the period from April 2007 through December 2010 and analyzes the performance of 35 countries – including the Philippines – in the spheres of government accountability, civil liberties, rule of law, and anti-corruption and transparency.

The latest report covering all of last year said political uprisings that swept across the Arab world represented the most significant challenge to authoritarian rule since the collapse of Soviet communism.

It said oppressive rulers have been put on notice that their actions would not be tolerated forever.

“The year of Arab uprisings has reminded the world that ordinary people want freedom even in societies where such aspirations have been written off as futile,” a major broadsheet quoted the report said.

Tunisia experienced one of the largest single-year improvements in the history of the Freedom in the World report, rising from among the worst-performing Middle Eastern countries to achieve electoral democracy status and scores that place it roughly alongside such partly free countries as Colombia, and Philippines, the report said.

The number of countries designated by Freedom in the World as free last year remained unchanged at 87, representing 45 percent of the world’s 195 polities and 3,016,566,100 people or 43 percent of the global population.

Forty-eight countries were deemed to be not free including China, Cambodia, and Vietnam.