The Social Contract By Jean-Jacques Rousseau

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“The Social Contract” written by Jean-Jacques Rousseau, is Rousseau’s solution to a lawful authority. He uses this agreement to help people band together to form societies. The societies are also known as the “sovereign” within the Social Contract. The sovereign, all the citizens working together, has authority within the state, and its interest is for the common good of the community because absolute monarchs do not know how to pursue the common good on their own. In other words, they, the citizens, lose their physical freedoms but gain civil freedoms. Rousseau explains a few benefits within the Social Contract including: equality for all, freedom, and civil liberties. Within the Social Contract, Rousseau’s beliefs about liberty contrast those …show more content…
Modern liberty, also known as individual liberty, states that people have the rights to: be subjected to the laws, express their own opinion, choose their own profession, dispose of property, associate with other individuals, profess their religion, and exercise some influence on the administration of the government. The concept of modern liberty comes from the understanding of liberty from an Englishman, Frenchman and American. Ancient liberty is known as the collective liberty, which “consisted in carrying out collectively but directly many parts of the over-all functions of government” (Constant, 2). It consists of contemplating over war and peace, forming alliances with other nations, voting laws, examining government officials acts and punishing if needed, and no importance was given to individuals. “Among the ancients, therefore, the individual is nearly always sovereign in public affairs but a slave in all his private relations” (Constant, 2). The best description of the difference between modern and ancient liberty is as follows, “the aim of the ancients was to share social power among the citizens of a single country […] The aim of the moderns is to be secure in their private benefits” (Constant, 6). The ideas of Constant are a combination of both Rousseau and Hobbes. Rousseau’s ideas are more consistent with the ancient liberty, whereas Hobbes’s thoughts are parallel to modern
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