PHIL 2345 Rousseau

1. PHIL 2345Rousseau Social Contract, Books I-2

2. Two kinds of social contracts: 1. Unjust (the norm): exploitation wears cloak of legitimacy (DOI); 2. Just ones: the “Social Contract”; each freely obeys himself in following the general will.

3. What does this picture illustrate?

4. We enable our own oppression: “Citizens let themselves be oppressed only so far as they are swept up by blind ambition and…come to hold Domination dearer than independence, and consent to bear chains so that they might impose chains in turn” [II.51].

5. The final word on inequality • “…it is manifestly against the Law of Nature, however defined, that...a handful of people abound in superfluities while the starving multitude lacks necessities” (DOI, II.58).

6. On the Social Contract Book 1

7. The Political Association • Necessitated by “obstacles that interfere with [men’s] preservation” (1.6 [1]); • Each surrenders natural powers (freedom, right to act as judge, jury and executioner); • No associate to be exploited or forced to obey others; • He obligates and obeys only himself! • A moral and collective body is formed.

8. Supremacy of sovereign will:no residual rights vs US Bill of Rights • ‘…total alienation of each associate with all of his rights to the whole community’ (I.6.6); • Union is perfect; no rights left over, as that would leave each a judge in his own case (I.6.7); • ‘…each, by giving himself to all, gives himself to no one’ (1.6.8); • ‘Each of us puts his person and his full power in common under the supreme direction of the general will; and in a body we receive eacy member as an indivisible part of the whole’ (I.6.9)

9. The two-fold relation (I.7) • ‘a reciprocal engagement b/w the public and private individuals’; • ‘each individual, by contracting…with himself’ is • member of the Sovereign toward private individuals; • Member of the State toward the Sovereign.

10. Tennis Court Oath, Versailles 1789

11. Transformation of Man • Passage from S of N to civil state “produces a most remarkable change in man” (I.8.1): • The new, moral man (inspiration for Kant) • Free from appetite, self-interest: autonomous: lit. one gives the law to oneself; • Natural liberty is exchanged for morality, duty, i.e. general will (common good); • Reason prevails over inclination (recall Aristotle). • Advantages of civil state far outweigh S of N: all life possibilities are expanded!

12. State, Sovereign, or Power • Each is to receive in return: • no greater burden than is imposed on anyone else; • Membership in a perfect union; • “Each by giving himself to all, gives himself to no one…one gains the equivalent of all one loses, and more force to preserve what one has” (1.6 [8]). • One’s person and power are under “general will”; • Each member an indivisible part of whole, “a moral and collective body” (1.6 [10]).

13. Sovereign, cont. • Cannot be obligated by any law it may not break, e.g. a Bill of Rights; • Sovereign may not alienate part of itself, or do anything else that detracts from SC; • No need for citizens’ rights to be guaranteed since Sovereign could never want to hurt part of itself: • “The Sovereign, by the mere fact that it is, is always everything that it ought to be” (1.7.5) .

14. On the Social Contract Book 2

15. The Social Pact/Sovereign • An “advantageous exchange” (II.4.10) • But not permanent: • Even Sparta and Roman republic perished (III.11.1) • Usurpations by gov’t may destroy it (III.10.6) • Unique feature of Rousseau’s SC: • Each contracts only w/ himself: • Contracts to obey the universal moral law he prescribes to himself (Kant follows this); • Obeying only himself, remains as free as before.

16. Freedom Two Freedoms (Sir Isaiah Berlin): Ancient: people’s freedom to rule itself Modern: freedom from restraint Rousseau tries to reconcile them. Equality Sufficient that one man cannot buy another (SC 2.11); Against law of nature for many to starve while few live in luxury (DOI)! Book 2: two major principles

17. Rousseau’s two principles • First: “…the greatest good of all consists in….Freedom, because any individual dependence is that much force taken away from the State; • Second: “…equality because freedom cannot subsist without it.” • “as for wealth, no citizen should be so very rich that he can buy another, • And none so poor that he is compelled to sell himself…” (Social Contract, 2.11).

18. The General Will (‘GW’):as standard and decision • Common good; public utility—a standard; • Also a collective decision: • Not your private interest or sum of private or partial interests of some citizens. • Constrains you as citizen: • you may not do anything that goes against it, or • you become an enemy of the Sovereign (1.7.8); • But see II.5 on the death penalty.

19. Death Penalty (II.5) • enemy of the Sovereign is “forced to be free” (1.7.8); • “…it is in order not to become the victim of an assassin that one consents to die if one becomes an assassin oneself”; • “Besides every evil-doer who attacks social rights becomes a rebel and a traitor to the fatherland by his crimes, by violating its laws he ceases to be a member of it, and even enters into war with it. Then the preservation of the State is incompatible with his own, one of the two has to perish, and when the guilty man is put to death it is less as a citizen than as an enemy.”

20. Qualifications to Death penalty • “…frequent harsh punishments are always a sign of weakness of laziness in the Government. • “There is not a single wicked man who could not be made good for something.. One only has the right to put to death, even as an example, someone who cannot be preserved without danger.”

21. How the GW may err • “…the general will is always upright…but it does not follow…that the people’s deliberations are always equally upright”; • “One always wants one’s good, but one does not always see it” (II.3.1); • “By itself the people always wills the good, but by itself it does not always see it”; • The general will is always upright, but the judgment which guides it is not always enlightened” (II.6.10).

22. Will of all vs general will (II.3.2) • Will of all does NOT = general will! • GW = common interest • But GW can be derived from “sum of small [private] differences”: • “…if, from these same wills, one takes away the pluses and the minuses which cancel each other out, what is left as the sums of the differences is the general will” (II.3.2).

23. Assumptions behind GW • Perfect information • No political parties, ‘PACs’, lobbies, factions: • “no partial society in the State, and every citizen state[s] only his own opinion” (II.3.4). • Example: “troops of peasants seen attending to affairs of State under an oak tree and always acting wisely” (IV.1.1).

24. Question • Rousseau believes that the ideal political situation is one in which each one of us express our own opinion. • However, suppose there are 100 people with 100 opinions, how can we make these 100 opinions become one ‘general’ will? It is as if 100 men are talking 100 different languages, how can we make the ground and achieve the ‘general’ point that everyone can accept? • If we were still in ancient Greece, Rousseau’s idea seemsplausible as that society was less complicated thantoday. But how about a modern society which emphasizes efficiency? • Is such a voting system plausible today? The difference is, inancient Greece, people can discuss until they reach a decision andthey never hurry. However, our modern society just can't slow down. It seems unaffordable for us to spend so much time on voting or figuring out what the general will is.

25. Enforcement of GW—Totalitarian? • Each has a particular will (private interest) as individual; • And general will as citizen; • As an individual he may not want to give what is required by general will/Sovereign; • Hence S. needs to enforce compliance: • “whoever refuses to obey the general will shall be constrained to do so by the entire body”; • “he shall be forced to be free” (1.7.8).

26. Question: • Rousseau asserts that anyone who does not obey the general will should be compelled to do so by the community. Does this imply that Rousseau supports tyanny and disregards individual rights? • When a person enters the social contract, he gives up his natural freedom (the ability to do anything one wants which is to be found in the SON) in exchange for civil freedom. Is Rousseau giving a higher priority to civil freedom than to natural freedom?

27. Public Utility Limitation (II.4.3) • “It is agreed that each man alienates by the social pact only that portion of his power, his goods, his freedom, which it is important for the community to be able to use, but it should also be agreed to that the Sovereign is alone judge of that importance.”

28. Why is GW “indestructible” (IV.1)?