Dictionary:

autonomy

  (ô-tŏn'ə-mē)

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1. The condition or quality of being autonomous; independence.
2. 1. Self-government or the right of self-government; self-determination.
   2. Self-government with respect to local or internal affairs: granted autonomy to a national minority.
3. A self-governing state, community, or group.

[Greek autonomiā, from autonomos, self-ruling. See autonomous.]

noun

The condition of being politically free: freedom, independence, independency, liberty, self-government, sovereignty. See dependence/independence, free/unfree.

Definition: independence
Antonyms: dependence

The core idea of personal autonomy is to have personal rule of the self while remaining free from controlling interference by others. The autonomous person acts in accordance with a freely self-chosen and informed plan. A person of diminished autonomy, by contrast, is in at least some respects controlled by others or is incapable of deliberating or acting on the basis of his or her own plans. For example, institutionalized persons, such as prisoners or the mentally retarded, may have diminished autonomy.

In public health, the concept of autonomous decision making is related to informed consent. Virtually all medical and research codes of ethics now hold that physicians and researchers must obtain the informed consent of patients and research subjects before undertaking procedures. These consent measures have been designed to enable autonomous choice by patients and subjects, but they serve other purposes as well, including the protection of patients and subjects against harm and the encouragement of medical professionals to act responsibly in their interaction with patients and subjects.

There is growing international appreciation of the importance of ethical review of research involving human subjects. Ethical review committees carry the primary responsibility for ensuring that research is scientifically sound, and that informed consent is obtained from research subjects in ways that respect their autonomy and ensure an appropriate balance of risks and benefits.

While informed consent can be obtained in more advanced societies in ways that can be assessed by ethical review committees in terms of subjects being well informed and the consent being understood and responded to by the subject without coercion or intimidation, the situation may be different in developing countries. The informed consent process could be very different in a cultural situation in which the subject is illiterate and the process of seeking consent involves obtaining overall permission from community leadership in addition to individual consent from research subjects. In such situations the challenge is to respect local culture and its processes, while at the same time respecting the autonomous rights of each research subject.

(SEE ALSO: Cultural Appropriateness; Epidemiology; Informed Consent; Paternalism)

Bibliography

Beauchamp, T. L., and Childress, J. F. (1989). Principles of Biomedical Ethics, 3rd edition. New York: Oxford University Press.

Council of International Organizations for Medical Science (2000). Biomedical Research Ethics: Updating International Guidelines. Geneva: Author.

— JOHN H. BRYANT

Self-government. The term may be applied both to the individual person and to a group or an institution. An autonomous person is, fundamentally, one able to act according to his or her own direction—the prerequisite for rational human action, according to Kant. An autonomous institution is one able to regulate its own affairs. The relation between the self-government of a group and individual autonomy is complicated by the need to distinguish between the collective self-government of a group and the self-direction of an individual member of that group, as Rousseau's writings illustrate. Ideas about individual autonomy are closely linked to conceptions of freedom. For example, to act according to my own direction may (on some views of freedom) require access to resources I presently lack, in which case to provide me with them would enhance both my liberty and my autonomy. Further, this problem is connected to notions of the constitution of the self. For example, it may be held that I am not truly ‘self ’-governing if my action is driven by powerful phobias ‘I’ cannot regulate, any more than if my actions are determined by external circumstances beyond my control.

— Andrew Reeve

A basic psychological need to have a sense of choice and being the initiator of an action. See also self-determination theory.

Quotes:

"To be one's own master is to be the slave of self." - Natalie Clifford Barney

"If sex and creativity are often seen by dictators as subversive activities, it's because they lead to the knowledge that you own your own body (and with it your own voice), and that's the most revolutionary insight of all." - Erica Jong

"Self-determination has to mean that the leader is your individual gut, and heart, and mind or we're talking about power, again, and its rather well-known impurities. Who is really going to care whether you live or die and who is going to know the most intimate motivation for your laughter and your tears is the only person to be trusted to speak for you and to decide what you will or will not do." - June Jordan

"Self-determination, the autonomy of the individual, asserts itself in the right to race his automobile, to handle his power tools, to buy a gun, to communicate to mass audiences his opinion, no matter how ignorant, how aggressive, it may be." - Herbert Marcuse

"We prefer self-government with danger to servitude in tranquility." - Kwame Nkrumah

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Dansk (Danish)
n. - autonomi, selvstyre, uafhængighed

Nederlands (Dutch)
autonomie, autonome gemeenschap/staat, persoonlijke vrijheid, vrije wilsbeschikking

Français (French)
n. - autonomie

Deutsch (German)
n. - Autonomie, Selbständigkeit

Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - αυτονομία, αυτάρκεια

Italiano (Italian)
autonomia

Português (Portuguese)
n. - autonomia (f), independência (f)

Русский (Russian)
автономия

Español (Spanish)
n. - autonomía

Svenska (Swedish)
n. - självstyre

中文（简体） (Chinese (Simplified))
自治, 自治团体, 自治权, 有自主权的国家

中文（繁體） (Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 自治, 自治團體, 自治權, 有自主權的國家

한국어 (Korean)
n. - 자치[권, 단체], 자율[성]

日本語 (Japanese)
n. - 自治, 自治権, 自治体, 自律

العربيه (Arabic)
‏(الاسم) حكم ذاتي, استقلال‏

עברית (Hebrew)
n. - ‮הזכות לשלטון עצמי, חירות אישית, חירות הרצון, קהילה בעלת שלטון עצמי, אוטונומיה‬

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