Rousseau

Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) will be the final of the so-called social contract theorists we look at. Like Hobbes and Locke, Rousseau uses similar concepts in his political philosophy like the state of nature and social contract, however Rousseau takes his philosophy in radically different directions than the other two.

For example, in his idea of the state of nature, human nature is much more flexible and malleable than either Hobbes or Locke had theorized. Both had assumed human nature was fixed, static, unchanging, or to put it another way eternal. Hobbes assumed that humans were greedy, vicious, and egotistical by nature. Locke had a less pessimistic view, assuming that people were capable of recognizing differences between right and wrong, and co-existing peacefully, at least up until a certain point, but still assuming that their behavior and thus their nature was more or less the same. Rousseau, on the other hand, argued that humans were fundamentally shaped by the kind of environment that they lived in. If they were greedy, selfish, and vicious (which he did not seem to dispute), it was not because of some internal quality of human nature, but because they were product of a society that made them that way. In other words, if you wanted to "fix" people you had to fix society. The major motivation behind Rousseau's philosophy is to create a better society, and therefore create better people.

What is it about society that makes people this way? For Rousseau, the major corrupting aspect of society was the existence of property and the inequalities that property ownership brought with it. He says, for example in one his earlier writings, known as the Discourse on Inequality from 1755:

The first person who, having enclosed a plot of land, took it into his head to say this is mine and found people simple enough to believe him was the true founder of civil society. What crimes, wars, murders, what miseries and horrors would the human race have been spared, had some one pulled up the stakes or filled in the ditch and cried out to his fellow men: "Do not listen to this imposter. You are lost if you forget that the fruits of the earth belong to all and the earth to no one!”

 If you go back to Locke, the importance of property, and the protection of property ownership is absolutely central to his political philosophy. For Locke, property is a natural right that arises when people in his phrase "mix" their labor with the natural environment. This mixing of labor with natural objects is what gives people a right to own property, a right that exists prior to the existence of government, and thus property rights are not simply something given by the government. Ownership of property entails inequalities in holdings of property, something which Locke accepts as a natural consequences of some people being more industrious than others. It is interesting that in Locke's vie the pre-political phase of society is quite complex, not only do people recognize basic morals and rights but you even have agriculture, industry, and a system of economic classes that all comes about before the introduction of government.

Rousseau strongly rejects Locke's acceptance of inequality. For Rousseau, people who claim to own aspects of nature is arbitrary and is a claim that is only enforced by power and coercion and not through any kind of natural right. There are of course reasonable objections one can make with Locke's conception of things. For one, it is unclear how mixing your labor really gives you any kind of ownership. This becomes even more ambiguous if you have workers or servants who are doing the actual physical labor, yet Locke accepts this as the natural progression of property ownership. Locke's mixing metaphor was also used to justify colonialism since the land appropriated by colonialists was put to more use, supposedly, than by the indigenous peoples who populated these lands. 

Even if you accept some level of inequality, and in fact Rousseau did to some extent, there is also the fundamental question of how much inequality a society can tolerate. In contemporary American society, simply put, the wealth gap has never been greater than it is now, even greater than it was during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the era of the "robber barons," what Mark Twain had called the "gilded age," at least, according to the research done by economists like Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez, as shown in the graph below. This chart depicts the concentration of income among the top 10 percent of income earners. The more income is concentrated, the more unequal society. The pattern that emerges from this is quite clear, high levels of inequality in the early 20th century, then much less so during the middle part of the century, until roughly the 1980s when incomes again become much more concentrated continuing into the present, even exceeding levels in the early 20th century.

As far as I can tell, I am not an economist, but the response of most critics is to rationalize this kind of inequality rather than deny it, which leads me to think this claim is on a solid empirical footing. Even if you claim these numbers are exaggerated, as some do, you are still conceding that the level of inequality since mid-century has increased, and I should remind people that the U.S. was hardly an egalitarian utopia circa 1960s, inequality still existed, poverty still existed, classes still existed, it was just at a more "manageable" level than it is now. I would also argue that most attempts to rationalize this fall flat, since it is practically self-evidently that such a high level of inequality is dangerous and totally incompatible with democratic forms of government which is frankly becoming more and more obvious. Certainly theorists like Rousseau, and even more so Karl Marx, would argue that the wealthy have not really earned this wealth, it is wealth created by the collective efforts of workers (either in the US or in countries that American corporations have outsourced to) which is then appropriated by the owners by virtue of their social position and the coercive power this gives them over the workers (with of course the full backing of the powers of the state). This is at least one aspect in which Rousseau may still be relevant in contemporary political debates

Rousseau's name also tends to come up in discussions of education, and is commonly read by people who are training to become teachers. Rousseau assumed that civilization had a corrupting influence on people, and as such he favored what he called a "natural education." His approach to this education is detailed in a novel he wrote called Emile. In the story, the title character Emile is literally raised in what we would call the "wild," away from the corrupting influences of society. At the end of the story, Emile rejoins society so it is not clear what the value of this natural education is if you inevitably had to put it aside and learn the ways of society. Nonetheless, these themes continue to appear in popular culture and literature. For example, the corrupting influences of society is a major theme in the novel Fight Club which was later adapted into a movie starring Brad Pitt and Ed Norton. The idea of a natural education is depicted in the movie Captain Fantastic which also features the characters (in this case a whole family) inevitably leaving nature and joining society. These views have led many to assume that Rousseau favors a so-called primitive or natural existence, but in fact Rousseau argues that such people are incomplete or not fully developed. His intention is merely to draw attention to the way in which society as it exists now corrupts people, but his ultimate objective, as mentioned, is to find a way to create a better society and thus better people. This is the intention behind his most important book The Social Contract.

One of the central themes of the book is the nature of freedom or what it means to be free. As he says in the famous opening to the book "man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains," in other words if we are born free how do we end up living in a society where we accept the unequal, coercive relationships that exist in society? As already discussed, in Rousseau's view this is because property brings into existence coercive hierarchies of power which persist across generations. If that is the case, then what would it mean to be free? For Rousseau, freedom means actually having a stake, or participating in the affairs of society. In this regard, Rousseau is identified with a radical notion of democracy where every citizen would play a role in creating the laws in what he calls the Assembly. Rousseau is known for his fondness for ancient Greek city-states like Athens and Sparta, and for the Republic of Geneva (a city) in Switzerland, where he was born (though he is usually thought of as French) even though he later fled Geneva due to its repressiveness and lived a kind of state-less existence through most of his life. 

Geneva, circa 18th century

What they all have in common is their small size in comparison to modern states or even cities like New York. This of course brings to light a major contradiction in Rousseau's thinking. How would it be possible for all citizens to really play a role in making laws? Granted, he does separate what we would call the legislative and executive branches of government, and does believe a kind of representative government would have to carry out the day to day tasks of government, he does insist the people as a whole playing the legislative role. To put this in contemporary terms, imagine if the citizens as a whole played the role of Congress, there would be no Congress but there would still be a Presidency and an executive branch of government. If you think this is workable then you might be drawn to Rousseau's philosophy, however many people feel this is not a workable system.

This is the only way however, for society to express what he calls the general will, one of the most important concepts in his philosophy. The general will can be thought of as the best interest of society as whole, in contrast to individual wills of people who tend only to think of themselves. For Rousseau, a good society is one where the general will is able to express itself, and where the citizens are taught to think in terms of the general will. Since there is a contrast between the general will and the individual wills of people it is not clear how Rousseau expects people to act on the basis of the general will since he acknowledge the influence of the individual will on each person. This leads to one of the more chilling passages, where Rousseau says that people must be "forced to be free." At first glance this seems like a paradox, how can you force someone to be free? For Rousseau, people are only free to the extent they are free to play a role in the larger society, and thus act on the basis of the general will, so forcing them to be free means forcing them to suppress their individual wills in favor of the general will. 

At this point it should be clear it it was not already that the role of individual rights are minimized in Rousseau's philosophy. Rousseau's ideal are perfect citizens who think only of the needs of society as a whole. Many have argued that this makes Rousseau into a kind of precursor for societies like the Soviet Union, or even fascism. Rousseau attempts to deal with these problems, but arguably his solutions are not persuasive. He argues that since people are after all a part of society, if they acted in the best interests of society they would also be acting in their own best interests. However, we have now seen many examples or experiments this kind of political philosophy and they have not turned out well, even in the French Revolution which was much closer to Rousseau's own time period.

This awkward position also leads Rousseau into making some other strange arguments. For example, he emphasizes an almost mystical figure he calls the Legislator, who would instruct the people how to make good laws, but would have no political authority, and would then depart, once his role was played. It is not clear who Rousseau has in mind to play this role, except for possibly religious figures like Moses, or perhaps even himself.

Ultimately, Rosseau's importance may lie in his emphasis on the importance of political ethics or what people would call civic virtue, and as a representative of the tradition of political philosophy known as communitarianism, named for its emphasis on the community. Most political theorists today strive for some kind of synthesis between communitarianism and liberalism (with its strong emphasis on individual rights). For all the problems associated with Rousseau's own thinking, his critique of the corrupting influences of (liberal) society are still very persuasive today, and as mentioned still regularly find expression in many aspects of culture. Assuming American political culture is strongly influenced by Lockean philosophy, there are many aspects to criticize, especially the massive inequality (which Locke accepted) and the dysfunctional aspects of American culture which manifests in American society in many different ways some of which we have already covered in previous classes. If American society is strongly unbalanced in favor of liberalism, then ideas like Rousseau's or other so called communitarians could help in trying to rebalance culture. However, these debates over political culture can also conceal the extent to which these problems are not located primarily in the realm of culture, but really in the economic sphere which is where the distribution of resources takes place.

For the assignment, choose a quote from Rousseau.

Next class will be the midterm. The midterm will be posted on Blackboard and be made up of four short answer questions. I will post the questions shortly to give you extra time to prepare for the exam. Answers should be between 1-3 paragraphs long. These are not full length essay questions, but they should definitely be more than a one sentence. Obviously, they should be in your own words. You can use quotes but only use quotes from the assigned reading materials or interviews. There is no time limit for the exam, but it should be completed by the end of the day. Any questions let me know.