Part 2: SOCIETY John Locke 16321704

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Part 2 SOCIETYJohn Locke (1632-1704)

• Social Contract Theory

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What is Social Contract Theory?

• The view that our moral and political obligations
  stem from, or are justified by, a contract, or
  agreement, which we have all entered into.

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• For example, I should not steal from you, because
  we have agreed not to do that.
• And, the government can tax my income, and forbid
  me to use drugs because I have agreed to abide by
  this system.

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Aims

• Social Contract Theory aims to provide
  justification for our obligations - to answer the
  question Why should I be moral/obey the laws of
  the state?
• Some versions of it also try to provide an
  explanation of how social/political institutions
  came to be.

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Key Features

• It always involves claiming some difference
  between a pre-contract state (often called the
  state of nature) and a post-contract state (a
  social, or political state)
• Some theorists make historical claims for the
  state of nature, others treat it purely as a
  hypothesis, or even as a simple thought
  experiment.

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First Question

• What Contract?
• Surely I have never entered into such a
  contract. So how could it be binding on me?
• And even if my ancestors had entered into it,
  what would that have to do with me?
• Well look at some answers to these, and other
  questions, over the next few lectures.

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Key Theorists

• Thomas HOBBES (1588-1679)
• The first important modern contract theorist. He
  famously characterised the state of nature as a
  war of every man against every man and as
  providing a life which is solitary, poor, nasty,
  brutish and short.
• Leviathan (1651)

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• John Locke
• more soon

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• Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778)
• Unlike Hobbes, saw the state of nature as a time
  of care-free happiness for men, which has been
  replaced by all the evils of social life. Man
  was born free and he is everywhere in chains.
• The Social Contract (1762).

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• John Rawls (1921-2002)
• Was responsible for reviving contract theory -
  with a strong Kantian flavour - in the late 20th
  century.
• More, later in the course

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John Locke - background

• Lived during a time of great political upheaval
  in England - Civil War, Revolution, and
  religious conflict.
• Like Hobbes, he was concerned to provide a
  justification for government that did not depend
  on the Divine Right of Kings.

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• He argued that just and legitimate government
  must be exercised for the welfare, and with the
  consent, of the citizens and that citizens have
  the right (in the law of nature) to rebel against
  an unjust monarch.
• As a result, his ideas were influential for the
  leaders of the American Revolution of 1776.

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The Basics

• 1. In the state of nature, man was free and was
  only subject to the Law of Nature.
• 2. But this condition had the disadvantage that
  his property was at risk - and could lead to a
  state of war.
• 3. So, men come together to live in society in
  which they give up a part of their freedom in
  return for greater security.

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• Next time, well look at this in more detail,
  using the extracts from the Second Treatise of
  his Two Treatises on Government (1690).
• But, for now, just note the opening words, which
  frame his overall aim here To understand
  political power right