Authority and State in the Light of Rousseau's Social Contract

In todays society, we are living in a so called democracy where in supposedly we the people have rights on almost every matter in our society, but what is happening really is a family controlled country where we are shown an illusion where we think we have our say but in reality is only for show. To further understand and hopefully cure this problem, let us look at what Rousseau tells us about the authority and state in his social contract. Before we go to the main point, I would like first to explain what Is this social contract and Rousseau’s state of nature. Rousseau’s social Contract, whose full title is The Social Contract or Principles of Political Right (1762) is an analysis of the contractual relationship to any legitimate government and the people which have articulated principles of justice and utility to reconcile the desire for happiness with the submission to the general wil (Rousseau: social contract 2014) Whereas his take on the state of nature where in he says that men are good, living in a relatively simple kind of life but was affected by his environment making him corrupt, In this period, we have our love for ourselves or amour de soi where in it is the interest we take in our own survival and comfort but then became conscious of our self worth or how people see us or amour propre. Moving on, during Rousseau’s time there are three ways on how to organize society which are; natural authority, right of the strongest, and slavery which did not sit well with Rousseau, according to him, justice can not be defined as “the right of the stronger.” If justice were so, the most powerful individuals will always be more accurate or the stronger individuals becoming more powerful (lecture on Rousseau 2019)

This is when he thought about how to find a form of association which will defend the person himself and the goods of each member with the collective force of all members and under each individual, while uniting himself with others he obeys no-one but himself, and remains free, and by thinking about this he came up with an answer, which is the social contract.

So how does this work if you unite yourself with others, how can someone be free then? The person will surely be subjected to laws and give up a part of his freedom. Rousseau tackles this obstacles by stating that the total alienation by each associate of himself and all his rights to the whole community as every individual gives himself absolutely, the conditions are therefore the same for all, and because they are the same for all, it is in no ones interest to cause trouble for others (Rousseau’s “Social Contract” 2010). This can be seen in, for example; if two people wanted to establish a relationship, maybe a romantic one, and one is very handsome or beautiful while the other is the manifestation of a monster from fairytales if they wanted to push through there relationship or if they wanted to break up, surely the better looking partner will have greater privilege and freedom than his partner, because the better one has a lot of options and can gain more with the break up than his partner who would have limited to none chance or options, but if both of them are committed and are very loyal to each other then the inequality lessens or disappears even, this is what Rousseau is talking about when he said that every individual gives himself absolutely to the general will.

This things gave birth to the general will, which states that a person should act according to the will of all. A man rationally acts according to the general will which is motivated by the love for self and pity for others or in short a persons values. This is where democracy comes to play, because in reaching a conclusion the general will or population must vote and each individual shall do so and in voting people can also choose to change their leaders if the leaders fail to provide the people’s needs. In here we can be assured that no one misbehaves because as mentioned earlier, the individuals don’t have the reason to because they are equals as citizens. As a result of the social contract, civil laws are decided by a majority vote of the representatives who are elected to represent the people, which here in our country are called governor’s, congressmen, senators, and the president including all elected government officials. The minority that opposes the will of the majority must accept all acts of the general will, and it can not refuse to submit to the general will, without violating the terms of the contract.

The social contract implies total and unconditional surrender by each individual of his own natural rights in order to obtain the rights associated with citizenship and if someone refuses to comply with the general will, he would actually be acting contrary to his own basic desires and that it would be proper to use force to attain his agreement with the general will. In this sense the government makes laws and regulations in favor of the general will. Basing upon this given statements, we can say that in order for us to attain a corruption less and equal society we must surrender ourselves to the general will and that we should all work together as one in attaining a certain goal in life.

The most important thing of all is that we should not let a flame fueled amore propre to destroy us, which as I have mentioned a while ago is the value we place ourselves on basis of receiving recognition from others, what would Rousseau think of forums like Facebook and Twitter? Has this tended to purify morals? One might say no. This “connectedness” has resulted in new forms of what Rousseau would undoubtedly describe as inflamed amore de propre as I stated earlier. We post pictures of ourselves, various thoughts we have, descriptions of various events that anger us, all the while looking to see how many “likes” we get. Trolling is common in online forums, with people not hesitating to say vicious things online that they would likely never say to someone’s face. Cyber bullying has become an all too common. We also observe the phenomena of people constructing online profiles in the hope of getting recognition and praise, even if the profile does not really resemble whom he or she really is. I think Rousseau would claim that all of this comes at the expense of virtue.

This inflated amore propre is what really causes problems for our society, because nowadays if one is rich from the start then he would surely keep that image for the rest of his life not caring on whether he is sacrificing others in order to maintain that image people know about him, this mentality is what people in the government have, because they want people to see them or to maintain what the people know of them they resort to a lot of “pakitang-tao” and deception, not caring about the fact that they are destroying a lot of lives because of there actions.

So the question is, on the whole, are we better, worse, or unchanged for all of the technological advances, heavy exposures, and fame hunting that allow for this new “interconnectedness”? And if we are worse, is there hope for us to make changes? Rousseau himself became increasingly pessimistic about curing the ills of amour propre. He ultimately retreated from society altogether, in sense returning to nature. I am less pessimistic, but I think Rousseau raised important questions for his contemporaries that are still very much worth thinking about for us even more than 300-years later.