Hannah Arendt's Freedom And Social Contract Of Rousseau

Arendt’s Freedom and Social Contract of Rousseau
Freedom has been defined in many different ways by many different theorists. People in our modern world usually think of freedom as the ability to do what you want and to be treated as an equal to other people. In other words, these people are strong believers that everyone has free will. Not only to do what we want, but to be able to think and speak what we feel as well, without limitation. But the philosopher Hannah Arendt views this idea of freedom differently. The term “liberum arbitrium” is a Latin term that translates to “free will.” But Arendt rejects the notion of free will and to her, it also doesn’t mean the freedom to choose possible outcomes. Arendt rejects these ideas of freedom …show more content…
Society probably changed quite a bit in the 200 years since Rousseau and philosophical and societal views of the world without a doubt would have changed quite a bit. Arendt doesn’t believe in a free will at all, and Rousseau believes in free will only to an extent. Arendt believes that freedom exists from birth and that it is more about new beginnings. Rousseau, on the other hand, believes that each human has free will and can do what they want, unless it conflicts with the general will. Arendt is all about doing something unexpected and so is Rousseau. Rousseau believes that people can do the unexpected and are allowed to follow Arendt’s idea of freedom as well, as long as they consider the general will also. The fact that unexpectedness ties in to the both of the definitions is really the only similarity Arendt’s definition has with Rousseau’s multi-definitional definition. Time clearly changed the view of how freedom was seen by the people of society, and it will continue to over the next thousands of years. But just because they may seem obsolete, now that a new idea of freedom exists, does that mean they hold any less