THE POLITICAL THOUGHT OF

JEAN JACQUES ROUSSEAU

 LIFE
The main actors in the drama of the
French Revolution were intoxicated by
Rousseau’s narcotic spell.

His influence on the French Revolution—one of the pivotal events in

history—validates the oft-quoted expression in political philosophy
that “ideas have consequences.”

In an effort to rescue humanity from a downward spiral of debasement, Rousseau exploded

the alienating patterns of modern life that he believed divided and corrupted, and enslaved
the human spirit.

To remedy this unfortunate condition, he prescribed an alternative vision of a

free, cooperative and virtuous society informed by man’s original freedom in
the state of nature.

His political project may be seen as an attempt to redeem fallen humanity, recapturing by
means of human artifice and the grace of an enlightened lawgiver something of the unity,
vigor, and freedom of its original condition in the state of nature.
 LIFE
Rousseau’s personal Young Rousseau
After his volatile father was
odyssey began in the Swiss received little formal
imprisoned for dueling, the
town of Geneva in 1712, education. Yet, he was
10 year old Rousseau was
where his mother died supreme autodidact
sent to live with a country
shortly after giving birth to who mastered a variety
minister and then his uncle.
him. of subjects.

1750 marked the turning point In 1728, at 16, he ran away

In 1762, he of Rousseau’s life and the from home to sojourn
published perhaps beginning of his celebrity. through Europe. This was
two of his greatest He won the prize of the Dijon the beginning of a lifelong
works, The Social Academy for his essay in wanderlust.
Contract and response to the question,
Emile. Both were “Has the restoration of the
condemned for sciences and arts tended to
their religious and purify morals?”
political
heterodoxy.
 ROUSSEAU’S GARDEN:
WORLDVIEW and HUMAN NATURE
Provides a narrative of Provides the descriptive
how man’s original cornerstone on which
freedom as a solitary, he builds his
naturally good, happy prescriptive edifice in
being was lost. the Social Contract

Tells how man was

transformed through a
Provides a secular gradual process of
version of the Bible’s socialization into a
account of man’s fall rapacious, miserable
from the Garden of and divided soul
Eden. Yet it modifies the trapped in a cycle of
biblical narrative in Naturalistic account of mutual exploitation,
significant ways. human reveals that man’s codependence, and
humanity is not fixed but domination.
rather is acquired
through the force of
historical circumstances.
 ROUSSEAU’S GARDEN:
WORLDVIEW and HUMAN NATURE
THREE
ORIGINAL
MAJOR
INNOCENCE
STAGES OF
AND
HISTORICAL
SOLITUDE
INDEVELOPMENT
STATE OF NATURE
Man’s original condition was marked by natural goodness,
self-sufficiency, radical freedom, and amoir de soi—the
sentiment of his own existence.

THE FALL—SOCIALITY AND PRIVATE

PROPERTY
The qualities of reason and amour propre (vanity or pride).
All vice stems from it. The prideful comparison of oneself to
others. Natural goodness and innocence are lost.

REDEMPTION AND LIBERATION—THE

GENERAL WILL
Man’s condition in a good society is marked by political
equality, civic, virtue, and the reconciliation of one’s
particular will with the general will.
 ROUSSEAU’S GARDEN:
WORLDVIEW and HUMAN NATURE
Rousseauto
Contrary emphasizes
Aristotle, Rousseau
that freedom,
deniesrather
that
FREEDOM OF than
logos
understanding,
or rational speech
is the defining
is an intrinsic
trait of
WILL characteristic
human nature. of human
Unlike anbeings.
animalRather,
whosehe
maintains
actions that
are governed
reason was entirely
acquired
by instinct,
at a much
later
humanstage
action
of human
is self-determining.
development.

CAPACITY OF
SELF-
PERCEPTION DISTINCTION
MAN

ANIMALS

Human
Unlike reasoning
an animal, differs
human from possess
beings that of ana free
animal
will only
that by
candegree, not in kind. with
act in cooperation It is not the
or in
faculty of reason,
opposition to their he contends,
drive that truly
of self-preservation.
distinguishes man from the animals.
 ROUSSEAU’S GARDEN:
WORLDVIEW and HUMAN NATURE

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 ROUSSEAU’S GARDEN:
WORLDVIEW and HUMAN NATURE
Human Nature
• Egocentric, vicious.
• “Man is a wolf to his fellow Man.”
• Reason is limited to calculation. The mind generates thoughts as scouts and spies to
HOBBES achieve one’s desire. Reason is thus the slave of one’s passions and desires.

• Rationally self-interested.
• Incapable of being an objective judge in conflict with others.

LOCKE

• Naturally good.
• Grounded in free will and pity.
• In state of innocence, human nature is motivated by sentiments of amour de soi and
pity. In society human nature is motivated by the sentiment of amour propre, which may
ROUSSEAU weaken natural pity.
 ROUSSEAU’S GARDEN:
WORLDVIEW and HUMAN NATURE
State of Nature
• Negative pole where life is nasty, brutish, and short.
• State of nature = state of war.

HOBBES

• “Inconveniences” in which there is no common judge who can resolve occasional

conflicts between individuals.

LOCKE

• Positive pole, at first characterized by benign self-preservation, peaceful, habitable.

• Later on, characterized by private property, inequality and war.

ROUSSEAU
 ROUSSEAU’S GARDEN:
WORLDVIEW and HUMAN NATURE
Consent
• Everyone surrenders absolute freedom to common power, which takes on the character
of an absolute sovereign.

HOBBES

• Surrender one’s right to judge in own case, but retain inalienable right to life, liberty
and property.

LOCKE

• Particular will must conform to general will.

• Obedience to a law one prescribes for oneself.

ROUSSEAU
 ROUSSEAU’S GARDEN:
WORLDVIEW and HUMAN NATURE
Rights
• Right to physical-preservation in which the state can never require an individual to put
his life in jeopardy involuntarily.

HOBBES

• Inalienable rights of life, liberty and property which cannot be surrendered or given up.

LOCKE

• Man born free and equal.

• Free will to direct the course of one’s own life.
• No inalienable right to property.
• Property may be regulated by general will.
ROUSSEAU
 ROUSSEAU’S GARDEN:
WORLDVIEW and HUMAN NATURE
Social Contract and Civil Society/State
• Absolute sovereign created with the aforementioned exception,

HOBBES

• Government establishes common judge whose rules are grounded in protection of

inalienable rights of life, liberty, and property.

LOCKE

• Enlightened lawgiver shepherds the establishment of the institutions of popular

government.
• Government executes general will.

ROUSSEAU
 ROUSSEAU’S GARDEN:
WORLDVIEW and HUMAN NATURE
Revolution
• No right to resist. However, if the sovereign is incapable of regulating conflict and
diminishing the fear of violent death, then the civil society will revert to the state of
nature and new social contract will be necessary.
HOBBES

• Right to revolution by majority judgment when inalienable rights are habitually

abridged.

LOCKE

• Popular sovereignty guided by an enlightened lawgiver in the early stages of formation

of an effective popular government.

ROUSSEAU
 THE FALL:
ROUSSEAU’S DIAGNOSIS

Man’s radical independence changed with the advent

of sociality and conjugal love.

Chances of natural disaster, the discovery of

agriculture and metallurgy hastened the Man’s fall proceeded step by step with his
permanent commingling of the species and social relations and his dependence on
the establishment of society. others. In exchanging solitude for sociality,
human beings lost their freedom, self-
sufficiency and natural goodness.

Maintains that this “hut stage” was the most pleasant and
happiest in the Garden because human beings enjoyed
some of the benefits of society while retaining much of
their original freedom and feeling.
 THE BIRTH OF CONVENTIONAL
INEQUALITY AND THE SWINDLE

ENTERED SOCIETY

MAN

INEQUALITY
 THE BIRTH OF CONVENTIONAL
INEQUALITY AND THE SWINDLE

NATURAL INEQUALITY

Refers to the innate differences between human beings in

the early state of nature that were not yet apparent due to
man’s solitary condition.

CONVENTIONAL INEQUALITY

Represents the many customs, laws, and practices of

society that sanction these differences in ability, strength,
and intellect among human beings.
 THE BOURGEOIS AND THE
CORRUPT SOCIETY

GARDEN,
KNOWLEDGE,
The FALL,
ARTS, and
ORIGINS OF
SCIENCE
INEQUALITY

Bring forth a new dawn of light for

humanity, thereby improving the
human condition both morally and
emotionally.
Spread garlands over
the chains of despotism “the people already accustomed to
and dependence. dependence, repose, and the
Addicted people to
conveniences of superfluous luxuries,
life, and already
and rendering
incapable of them decadent,
breaking soft and
their chains,
effeminate.
consented to let their servitude increase
in order to assure their tranquility.”
 ROUSSEAU’S
GOOD SOCIETY
THE SOCIAL CONTRACT:
ENABLING CONDITIONS

EMERGENCE OF
GOOD SOCIETY
Discourages the formation
of interest groups or
factions. Any groups that
Participatory mediate between the
democracy is the only state and citizens are
legitimate form of dangerous because they
association. For the inevitably become a
general will to be power in and of
The general will can be operative, citizens themselves, privileging
operative only in a must be self- their particular group
small territory. determining in voting interest to the common
directly on laws good of all.
themselves.
 Explain briefly the view of the three political
figures on the following factors affecting
human nature.
ROSSEAU HOBBES LOCKE

Human nature

State of nature

Consent

Rights

Social contract and

civil society