Social Contract theory

**What is the Social contract device?**

* used to answer how we treat others
* Answers questions on power/authority
* “if were free, how can we explain/justify the power and constraint we find ourselves under?”
* '“What would happen if we have power in our own lives? And how much power should we be giving away?”
* Hobbes’ SCT looks at the pessimistic aspects of human nature
* qualitative instead of quantitative
* Social contract theorists differ in their answer but are united in their ideas that the only thing that could make the state and political obligation legimtiate is through consent of the governed, agreeing to it (HYPOTHETICAL)
*    whatever we would agree to ie give out consent to is what. Legtimate form of government is-

What is the state of nature

* An anarchical condition in which human behaviour is totally unrestrained by the rule of law
* not entirely anarchical is the sense that it is lawless, because he does concede there are natural laws and rights disseminating from these laws that are prevalent in the state of nature and which we do not entirely relinquish even once political absolutism is established
* Things as require much force, no knowledge of the face of the earth, no account of time, no arts, no letters, no society. And which is worst of all continual fear and danger of violent death
* can’t secure property (no mind and thine distinct), no arts, education, leisure, etc. 

No incentive to work- no protection of what we would attain (private property)

All of our time and energy would be spent on self-protection

No time for luxuries, art, education

 Constant threat of death

**Is the social contract device useful for thinking about politics?**

* SCT explains power/authority and its legitimacy
* It can be used to understand how we as a democracy agree to government instutions/how much we give up in exchange for protection within a SON
* Explicit vs implicit consent
* We almost always are implicitly consenting to govt intervention
* “What we agree to in a SON is what becomes legit

**Do you agree with Hobbes that humans are naturally self-interested and rational?**

* Would agree with the Hobbsian view of human nature
* We aren't ill intentioned/inherently selfish
* **We just prioritized self preservation**

**List and explain some things that Hobbes thinks can weaken or destroy the commonwealth.**

1\.     Sovereign with less than absolute power 

2\.     Private judgements of good and evil 

3\.     Freedom on conscience 

4\.     Religion 

5\.     The perception that the sovereign is subject to the law 

6\.     Natural property rights 

7\.     Division of power (legislative, executive, and judicial)

**What liberties do subjects retain in Hobbes’ commonwealth?**

1.  Subjects may always disobey a sovereign command to kill, wound, or mail themselves because they never forfeit their right to self preservation 

2\.     Subjects can never be compelled to incriminate themselves in the absence of a guaranteed pardon, for the same reason 

3\.     In all cases, liberty depends on the silence of the laws

\n **How is political community artificial and who is Hobbe’s Artificial Man?** 

* Hobbes argues that the political community is artificial and the solution is absolute authority.
* This is established by the artificial man
* form threats by punishing with absolute authority those who commit actions of wrong
* “We would put our freedom into the artificial man because the consequence of SoN is a threat to well being”

**According to Hobbes, why is it rational for humans to constantly strive for power**

* Power is centralized and absolute that it can stop all against all
* We require power to achieve what we desire
* Since we never stop desiring, we always need more power (to acquire new stuff and keep what we already have)

**In what sense are humans naturally equal and why does it matter for Hobbes argument**

* natural equality- all vulnerable bc natural law and natural right to all things including others body
* We are not equal in terms of skills and capabilities but we are all equally vulnerable to death
* t's really hard for any one individual to outperform death. It's basically the extent to which we're all equally vulnerable.
* This is important because it is why Hobbes thinks we would all contract with one another to get out of the state of nature
* If we could outwit/outlast everyone else, we wouldn't need laws to protect us

**Hobbes argues human life in a SON is solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short”. Why?**

* Resources are finite
* Scarcity leads to conflict but rationality would makes us want to escape the state of nature
* Results in a war of all against all because we are all motivated in the same way so we must assume out life goods are not secure and there is always a threat
* Not physical war but pyschological

**Hobbes suggests property, justice and injustice dont exist in a SON. Why?**

THERE IS NO Right or wrong in the state of nature there's no property either because there's no COMMON power to ensure the rule of law

* When you dont have an appropriate authority structure, you dont even have a dominion to your own body and can be used as a means to other people’s ends
* Property rights are through centralized authority
* natural equality- all vulnerable bc natural law and natural right to all things including others body

**Do we have natural rights outside the law? What are they if so?**

* humans have inviolable and inalienable right to do anything that in their estimation, is required in order from them stay alive

Hobbes 2 laws of nature PRISONER DILEMMA

§  __seek peace as long as you think others are going to__

be willng to lay down your right to all things

**Why does Hobbes think that people in SON would agree to absolute monarch instead of something else? iS THE MONARCHICAL preference necessary for his argument?**

For power to be best utilized it’s better to be concentrated in one person

\-   Monarchs power is indivisible

Monarchs can get advice from whoever they want.

\- Monarchies are more __efficient__. Than altnertives

\- In monarchies the private interests are the same with the public

\- No worse than the alternatives with respect to corruption or abuse of power.

\-o   Basically meaning, the goal of the monarch is to have strong “subjects” so their goals will coincide with the public. A strong society is good for the monarch, making public interest a goal of the monarch

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**In what sense is Hobbes’ state of nature a prisoner’s dilemma?**

* Everyone acting rationally in pursuit of their own self-interest results in a situation that is ultimately worse for everyone!


* As long as everyone has natural right to do what they think is necessary to survive, no one’s survival is secure
* Everyone acting relationally in pursuit of their own self interest in a situation that is ultimately worse for everyone
* They know collective action collaboration is good for everyone but its irrational
* The rational way to beat the prisoner dilemma is the social contract

**What kinds of rights, powers, privileges and immunities does the sovereign possess? What are the motivations for vesting him with such extensive authority?**

1. Soveirgns Authority is *exclusive*
2. Soveirgn’s Authority is unconditional
3. Sovereign may justly *destroy* anyone who opposes his decrees
4. Sovereign *cannot commit injustice* against his subjects because they have no rights against him
5. Sovereign *can never be justly put to do death or otherwise punished* by his subjects
6. Authority to *judge the rightful limits of freedom of expression (wheehr orally, or in written form- examine all books before published)*
7. Sovereign is the *creator and enforcer of the rules of property*
8. Authority to __*punish through any means*__ *he sees fit*

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We must confer all our power and strengthn upon one man

“submit their wills, everyone to his will, and their judgments, to his judgment” *Leviathan*

Does sovereign authority have any limits? Is it ever permissible to disobey the sovereign?  If so, when and why?

Thought the soveirgns authority is exclusive, unconditional, unlimited, may destroy anyone who opposes their decree, can not commit injustice against subjects bc they were not in contract with subjects, etc

Subjects may always disobey a sovereign command to kill, wound, or mail themselves, because they never forfeit their right to self-preservation

**How does Hobbes think we would solve the prisoner’s dilemma we face in the state of nature?**

* Succumbing to SCT
* placing power/authority in the artificial man

What is Political Theory and how does it differ from other sub-fields in Political Studies?

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* political scienc:e that is descriptive and explanatory concerns the study of how things are in fact, poltical theory is the science of how things ought to be


* political theory asks not how the world is (descriptive, empricial) but how the world ought to be? Normative
* dependent on interpersonal relationships

3 sources of conflict in son

competition - limited resource

diffidence - safety result in violence ie. pre emotive strikes

glory - aware of what other people think

What is political absolutism

NO PCRINIPELD LIMITS AGAINST to the states power/POLTIICAL AITHROITY

ALTENRTAIVE SUCKS- SO WE WOULD COSENT TO BE GOVERNED BY POTLICAL ABSOLUTE ARRANGENT TO ESCPAE STATE OF WAR

othing else will solve all against all /let us espcae state of nature

How is political community artificial, and who is Hobbes’ ‘Artificial Man’?

we all agree to create this artificial entity to act on our behalf, to end the war of all

this artificial person has.All of the state power, all of ecclesiastical power. And it's a complete fusion of undifferentiated power.

the state IS artificial man in the sense that it's not an entity of God.

 he means by natural- things created by God.

But in this case people create it, but then they also assume the power.

Hobbes says that “covenants, without the sword, are but words.”  What did he mean by this?

Need a sovereign to to punish breaches law and scare people into obeying.

•       Then we can escape the horrifying state of nature and its cooridniton problem

* Establish a commonwealth, which erects a power over everyone that is terrifying enough to make them fulfill their covenants with one another, particularly the covenant to lay down their natural rights to all things (which is what causes the war of all against all).

Hobbes on liberty

__liberty is an essentially negative notion that refers to the absence of impediment to our movement and action.__

__about being able to do stuff__.

o   Hobbs isn't concerned with whether you're following your rational dictate. He's concerned with whether you can do the stuff that you want to do *so that you can literally pursue your project*

focuses as it does exclusively on external impediments or constraints rather than capacity.

Hobbes natural rights

is the liberty each man hath, to use his power, as he will himself for the preservation of his own nature, that is to say, of his own life