I think that Julio Huato may make part of my point:  when he says "   
to say choice is to say constrained choice", what I wonder is, so,   
why don't economists say that?  Instead, many of them say 'choice.'   
(As he points out, it was Marx who talked about constrained choice.)  
  
The connotations of each phrase are, I think, very different, and I   
think that at least some economists go easily from "choice" to "free   
choice" to "freedom," and to thinking that as long as we have a   
choice (between, e.g., being a housewife or working for wages that   
will not pay for the child care) we are free.  (I have had a few   
conversations with economists that have gone in that direction [I do   
not know how typical these economists were].  Needless to say, such   
an approach leaves many in political science simply stunned and   
dumbfounded.   We think that we study, among other things, power, and   
sometimes have a difficult time seeing where power [other than gov't   
coercion] exists in some current economic theories.)  
  
If we were always thinking about constrained choices, I suspect that   
the move even to choice, much less to free choice or to freedom,   
would be more difficult (although Hobbes himself demonstrates that   
you can do it!)  
  
Peter G. Stillman