UGFH1000N In Dialogue with Humanity
Jean-Jacques Rousseau,
Of The Social Contract, or
the Principles of Political Right (1762)
1. Rousseau’s ideas of the good life and good society:
1.1 Rousseau’s idea of a good life: a life that is self-sufficient and thus free (Book I: 8);
but self-sufficiency is impossible once we leave the state of nature and enter the civil
society; in the civil state, men are free insofar as they obey the laws they prescribe for
themselves and do not act on mere appetites (Book I: 58)
1.2. Rousseau’s idea of good society (the main concern in Social Contract): a society
where each citizen realizes his nature as free by living together as equals
Free in the sense that they obey only the laws they prescribe for themselves;
natural inequality is replaced by equality of legal rights (Book II: 21); governed
on the basis of their “common good”, which must give equal weight to each
citizen’s interests; material inequality is not too great (Book II: 71)
“THE PASSAGE from the state of nature to the civil state produces a very remarkable
change in man, by substituting justice for instinct in his conduct, and giving his actions
the morality they had formerly lacked. Then only, when the voice of duty takes the place
of physical impulses and right of appetite, does man, who so far had considered only
himself, find that he is forced to act on different principles, and to consult his reason
before listening to his inclinations. Although, in this state, he deprives himself of some
advantages which he got from nature, he gains in return others so great, his faculties are
so stimulated and developed, his ideas so extended, his feelings so ennobled, and his
whole soul so uplifted, that, did not the abuses of this new condition often degrade him
below that which he left, he would be bound to bless continually the happy moment
which took him from it for ever, and, instead of a stupid and unimaginative animal, made
him an intelligent being and a man.”
“We might, over and above all this, add, to what man acquires in the civil state, moral
liberty, which alone makes him truly master of himself; for the mere impulse of appetite
is slavery, while obedience to a law which we prescribe to ourselves is liberty.”
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UGFH1000N In Dialogue with Humanity
2. Rousseau’s basic question in the Social Contract:
2.1 How to reconcile freedom with social interdependence? Or What can make the
State legitimate?
“Man is born free; and everywhere he is in chains… What can make it legitimate? That
question I think I can answer.” (Book I: 5; cf. 40)
Man is born free: not that man is free at birth but that man is born to freedom—
man is capable of willing and choosing
In chains: (1) authoritatively imposed rules; (2) in a society marked by profound
differences in power and advantages, some people are subject to the decisions of
others
2.2 The question that he claims he could not answer: how did the transition from the
state of nature to the civil state come about? (But he did provide such an account in
Discourse on the Origin of Inequality [1755])
2.3 What makes such chains legitimate? Rousseau’s answer: chains are legitimate
insofar as they bind us to the general will
2.3.1 Human beings must unite to survive (Book I: 38)
2.3.2 They can unite to be ruled by a master, or they can unite to exercise together
the general will
2.3.3 Only the latter avoids personal dependence—the general will comes from all
and applies to all (Book I: 42, 44-46)
The powers of society are not alien powers if each citizen gives his person and all his
powers to the sovereign and the resulting laws follow the general will
2.4 Rousseau’s idea of one’s relationship to society
2.4.1 Alienation (Book I: 59, 64): each individual voluntarily alienates his
freedom to society in the act of agreement—the social compact—by which the
civil state is formed (to accept the authority of someone else even when he
disagrees) (Cf. Book II: 16)
2.4.2 Participation: each citizens participates as a member of the sovereign in
law-making-- For him to consider the general will as his own, he must see it as
emanating from himself and not from some alien source (Book II: 40)
2.4.3 Identification: each citizen identifies himself with the society; to see oneself
as a part of the social whole; and to surrender one’s private will to the general will
when they conflict (Book I:46)—Roussau’s ideal citizen
2.5 The objective conditions for an ideal state: Book II: 68; e.g. the island of Corsica
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UGFH1000N In Dialogue with Humanity
3. From Social Contract to Popular Sovereignty: Some concepts that
call for special attention:
3.1 The Social Contract
3.1.1 What is social contract: An agreement, or “compact”, that establishes the State (or
political order) in which each person gives up his natural liberty and possessions in
exchange for protection, civil liberty and the right to property. (Book I: 20, 24, 40-41, 46,
57, 59-60; Book II: 1, 23, 61-62)
“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.”
3.1.2 How to make a social contract?
“the total alienation of each associate together with all of his rights to the entire
community.” (Book I: VI, 6)
Three principles:
- “for first of all, since each person gives himself whole and entire, the condition is
equal for everyone; and since the condition is equal for everyone, no one has an
interest in making it burdensome for the others.”
- “since the alienation is made without reservation, the union is as perfect as
possible, and no associate has anything further to demand.”
- “in giving himself to all, each person gives himself to no one. And since there is
no associate over whom he does not acquire the same right that he would grant
others over himself, he gains the equivalent of everything he losses, along with
a greater amount of force preserve what he has.”
3.1.3 How to run a social compact:
“Each of us places his person and all his power in common under the supreme
direction of the general will, and as one, we receive each member as an indivisible part
of the whole.”
3.2 The General Will
3.2.1 What is general will: The general will is the will of the sovereign that aims always
at the common good, which gives equal weight to the good of each citizen, i.e. it is a
shared understanding of the common good and a shared recognition of the authority of
such good
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UGFH1000N In Dialogue with Humanity
3.2.1.1 It differs from the will of all, which is the mere aggregation of individual
wills
3.2.1.2 Cannot be directed to any particular individual or object
3.2.1.3 Discovered through informed deliberations of the people when no
fractions arise, or when there are many roughly equal fractions (Book II: 12-13);
citizens come closest to discovering the general will when they are motivated by
their concern for the common good in making political judgments or giving
political arguments to one another
3.2.1.4 What constitutes the common good? Rousseau provides no explicit answer;
but genuine acts of the general will must treat each citizen as equals
3.2.2 How to make a general will: “There is often a great deal of difference between the
will of all and the general will; the latter considers only the common interest, while the
former takes private interest into account, and is no more than a sum of particular wills:
but take away from these same wills the pluses and minuses that cancel one another,
1 and the general will remains as the sum of the differences.”
3.2.3 the principle of governing:
“The common element in these different interests is what forms the social tie; and, were
there no point of agreement between them all, no society could exist. It is solely on the
basis of this common interest that every society should be governed.”
3.3 The Sovereign
3.3.1 What is sovereign: A ruling, law-making body of society; formed by the social
contract, a public person, body politic (as metaphor), the people; not simply a collection
of individuals in a given territory; it requires a certain level of civic unity or identity—the
general will.
“the social compact gives the body politic absolute power over all its members also; and
it is this power which, under the direction of the general will, bears, as I have said, the
name of Sovereignty.” ≥popular sovereignty
3.3.2 Characteristics of sovereignty:
Active: the sovereign has a will – the general will—through which it enacts law
but does not decide how the law applies in specific cases; sovereignty is
inalienable, i.e. cannot be represented except by himself; indivisible, i.e. no
division of power; different from the government, magistracy, or the majority; the
greatest power to command
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UGFH1000N In Dialogue with Humanity
Since sovereign is a ruling, law-making body of society, then what is law?
3.4 The Law and the Legislator
3.4.1 what is law: “when the whole people decrees for the whole people, it is considering
only itself; and if a relation is then formed, it is between two aspects of the entire object,
without there being any division of the whole. In that case the matter about which the
decree is made is, like the decreeing will, general. This act is what I call a law.”
≥laws must conform to the general will
3.4.2 the principle of making a law: no one individual or subordinate group of citizens
should be given preference over the rest: “ When I say that the object of laws is always
general, I mean that law considers subjects en masse and actions in the abstract, and
never a particular person or action. Thus the law may indeed decree that there shall be
privileges, but cannot confer them on anybody by name.”
3.4.3 Who makes the law?
“Laws are, properly speaking, only the conditions of civil association. The people, being
subject to the laws, ought to be their author: the conditions of the society ought to be
regulated solely by those who come together to form it.”
3.4.4 A system of legislation helps to making law:
A superior intelligence which can recommend the rules best suited to the nation, impartial,
independent of the people, and visionary; standing above all citizens; he does not
legislate himself (that power rests solely in the sovereign) but he puts the laws he
proposes to the free vote of the people (Book II: 41-42)
The legislator must not involve in the day-to-day government activities (Book II: 44-47);
may take advantage of religious authority to persuade the “common herd”—in the past
(Book II: 49-51)
5. Some Controversies
5.1 The problems of consent
Can a hypothetical contract really legitimize the state? Historical consent; tacit consent;
hypothetical consent
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UGFH1000N In Dialogue with Humanity
The social contract is only a theoretical construct; and the fact that the laws are
expressions of the general will is more important in justifying our political obligation
5.2 Unconstrained sovereignty and individual rights: “being forced to be free”?
Sovereignty is supreme (Book I: 49-50; Book II: 16-18); the person who does not identify
himself with the general will but rather with his private will can be forced to be free
Berlin’s critique of Rousseau’s conception of freedom in “the Two Concepts of Liberty”
5.2.1 Rousseau does not think that people need to be protected from the general
will itself, for the general will always aims at the common good; but they need to
be protected from the judgments of the majority, which are only imperfect
judgments (Book II: 10); the government is subject to the Sovereign
5.2.2 Citizens cannot impose on others burdens that they themselves are unwilling
to bear (Book II: 18)
5.2.3 Protection of individual independence is likely to be among the basic
interests of each citizen, which is constitutive of the common good
5.3 How do we discover the general will?
Actual voting or deliberations do not guarantee the right results
Ideally, in making legislative judgment, each person takes up the role of a
citizen—base his reasoning on his own judgment of the common good—and give
priority to his commitment to the common good, not his private interests
The Legislator may play a role in persuading citizens, and proposing laws
