Rousseau The Social Contract

  1. What is the author’s central question of the text? Is there explicit text giving a concise statement of this question? What is it?

Jean Rousseau's central question is how political authority is morally justified if individuals have the right to naturally exist freely. In the first chapter Rousseau states, "How did this change come about? I do not know. What can make it legitimate?" Rousseau takes into account how force can play a role in the implementation of political authority and compares how would it wouldn't be morally justified given human's natural rights.

  1. What is the author’s thesis? Is there an explicit sentence capturing it? What is it?

Society can exist under laws and regulations only if social contract arises voluntarily through experience and not by force.

  • "“The problem is to find a form of association which will defend and protect with the whole common force the person and goods of each associate, and in which each, while uniting himself with all, may still obey himself alone, and remain as free as before.” This is the fundamental problem of which the Social Contract provides the solution."

  • "Each of us puts his person and all his power in common under the supreme direction of the general will, and, in our corporate capacity, we receive each member as an indivisible part of the whole."

Rousseau is able to capture the relationship between a political body and social contract (how a society must come together to mutually agree to a sovereignty).

  1. What is the big-picture structure of the argument?

Rousseau's big-picture structure of his argument is the opposition to the idea that social contract is formed by force and slavery, and rather created through mutual/voluntary conditions. He explains that slavery and force don't create an obligation to obey because we have the "right" not to do so. Rousseau also explains that social contract can preserve individual freedom such as moral and civil liberty, while still remaining obedient to the law.

  1. Are any central terms/concepts that the author uses key to the argument?

Rousseau uses terms like natural and civil liberty to describe the limitations of physical and lawful powers/rights, general will to describe the best interest of the people not just individuals (private), and legitimacy to describe how authority can be morally justified.

  1. I think one of the most interesting topics explained by Rousseau is his idea of humans not having any obligation to obey laws simply because we do not have to listen to force. 

  • "If we must obey perforce, there is no need to obey because we ought; and if we are not forced to obey, we are under no obligation to do so."

  • "If this means yield to force, it is a good precept, but superfluous: I can answer for its never being violated."

  1. Questions

  • How do we as a society ensure that everyone's needs are being met if we continue to use terms/ideology such as "general will"?

  • How is Rousseau's idea on "forced to be free" different from natural freedom/liberty?

Jean Jacques Rousseau

  • "Every philosophical argument boils down to John Locke vs. Jacques Rousseau"- John Goldberg

  • "Man is born free; and everywhere he is in chains"

  • "One thinks himself the master of others, and still remains a greater slave than they. How did this change come about? I do not know. What can make it legitimate? That question I think I can answer."

Rational Consent (Social Contract Theory)

When to Choose

  • Hypothetical, idealized circumstances of choice

State of Nature

  • Noble Savage

    • All needs satisfied by nature->

    • Competition & inequality->

    • Cruelty & revenge->

      • Why would problems arise if all our needs are met (we have lots of wants and there becomes inequality)

      • People want more than they need

      • World is not big enough to give us what we want even if it can give us what we need

      • Ex. Mean Girls

  • Lockean Contract

    • Punishment, morality->

      • People who are cruel to others

    • Happiness->

      • Initially

    • Metallurgy, agriculture->

      • Until…

      • Hunter-gatherer stage (some people have better skills)

      • People develop tools

Discourse on the Origin of Inequality

  • "The first man who, having fenced in a piece of land 'This is mine', & found people naïve enough to believe him, was the true founder of civil society."

  • "From how many crimes, wars, & murders, from how many horrors & misfortunes might not any one have saved mankind, by pulling up the stakes, or filling up the ditch, & crying to his fellows."

  • "Beware of listening to this imposter; you are undone if you once forget that the fruits of the earth belong to us all, & the earth itself to nobody."

    • We can go with Locke's conception if we never developed agriculture (if we never tried to determine who owns what land)

  • Private Property

    • Labor, injury, slavery, misery->

      • People become mistreated when we become dependent

    • Greater inequality->

    • Deception, hypocrisy- you must try to appear something->other than what you are

      • You have an incentive to appear as what you're not

  • Basic themes

    • Human nature is plastic

      • Can be molded, changed, agriculture ruined it (how they appear vs. how they really are)

    • Bad systems make bad people

      • Ruined human nature

    • Good systems make good people

      • Give people an incentive to be authentic

  • "On, the human species is divided into so many herds of cattle, each with its ruler, who keeps guard over them for the purpose of devouring them."

  • Hobbesian Contract

    • Strong dominate weak->

    • War->

    • Rich dominate poor->

      • The rich become richer, the poor become poorer

    • "…a few gorge themselves on luxuries while the multitude lack necessities."

      • The fall of mankind

      • First we succeed off what we can do, then we become unauthentic

How to Choose

  • Rational criteria for choice

  • "The strongest is never strong enough to be always the master, unless he transforms strength into right, & obedience into duty."

    • Leads to a highly unstable situation

    • Perpetual conflict

    • Only way out is the following…

  • "Let us then admit that force does not create right, & that we are obliged to obey only legitimate powers."

    • Wealth does not make right

  • "But the social order is a sacred right which is the basis of all other rights. Nevertheless, this right does not come from nature, & must therefore be founded on conventions."

    • In the state of nature there is just conflict

    • The strong are trying to push around the weak (rich vs. poor)

    • We don’t have a natural right

    • We have to give up something in exchange for it (not for free)/how is this possible? (social contract provides a solution)/ I want something for nothing/ (I don’t want limitations on my freedom)

Regress Problem

  • Good laws require god legislators

  • Good legislators result from good systems…

  • Education: good people require good teachers

  • Good teachers learn from good teachers…

 

What to Choose

  • Principles, institutions, government that would be chosen

  • "…the total alienation of each associate, together with all his rights, to the whole community…"

  • We surrender everything-- we're all in

  • We get everything back

  • We gain right to our fair share of the fruits of cooperation

  • Force-> right

  • Possession-> property

  • "Finally, each man, in giving himself to all gives himself to nobody; and as there is no associate over whom he does not acquire the same right as he yields others over himself, he gains an equivalent for everything he loses, and an increase of force for the preservation of what he has."

Absolute Power

  • All rights-and liberty, equality, security-derive from the state

  • You surrender everything to the community

  • The community decides what is of use to it

  • "Each of us puts his person and all his power in common under the supreme direction of the general will, &, in our corporate capacity, we receive each member as an indivisible part of the whole."

    • Will of the community (the best) (may not actually be what people would vote for)

General Will

  • The common good

    • Some people vote on personal ideas

  • The will of the people

  • People willing the common good

Absolute Power

  • How should the state allocate property?

  • According to the general will, that is, the common good, the general welfare

  • And what will that imply

  • “Tolerate neither rich men nor beggars.”

    • Nobody should be too poor nor rich

  • Beggars are a source of social instability

    • We want to solve conflict

    • They're helping but not benefiting

  • They do not benefit from the social contract

    • Because they're not benefiting they do not have an obligation to obey or consent to the social contract

    • Illegitimate

  • They thus have no reason to consent to it

  • Government authority over them would be illegitimate

  • There should be no rich, for

  • They can manipulate the political process

  • Leading the people’s will as expressed in elections to diverge from the general will

    • Engage in their own propaganda