Jean Jacques Rousseau: The Social Contract

Jean Jacques Rousseau was a Swiss born philosopher. His father was an educated watchmaker. His mother died at childbirth and his father was exiled from Geneva. He had a hard time living with his mother's family. At the age of 16, he fled Geneva and went to France. Paris was culturally very different from Geneva. He suffered from deep isolation and his life was very unstable. He was involved in many strange affairs with women. However, he met a woman named Mme de Warens who was 10 years older than him and helped him shape his life in many ways. She was an intelligent woman, who loved adventure and had a unique taste and energy. She introduced Rousseau to the intellectual world. At the age of 30, he met another man named Denis Diderot. Rousseau and Denis later became successful in a group of intellectuals. Rousseau became a …show more content…
He also wrote music. He was friends with many thinkers and wrote a couple of books, including The Social Contract. He was in many ways an influential philosopher of his time.
Rousseau was living in an age when inequality was a prevalent problem. The face of economic conditions was changing. The ways of earning money was shifting, manufacturing was evolving, and colonialism was becoming competitive. The changes in socio economic conditions caused inequalities especially in France. The social surroundings may have led Rousseau to think of ways to improve the lives of human beings. Therefore he wrote on the types of education and government required that would make humans equal. He wrote The Social Contract in the year 1762 which was a benign time for political writing in the history of France. In the 18th century, the common perception was that society has gone