Civil society

How does inequality form from a society created to treat men equally? In Rousseau’s Discourse on the Origin of Inequality Rousseau describes society as a gathering of people who leave the state of nature, to achieve their common goal through the rule of the higher power. The state of nature allows men to live equally with one another, where there is no authority leader. However, when men decided to form a society they gave up their rights of freedom and handed it over to a person of authority.…

Stephen Crane questions man's fate in this world through naturalism. In "Maggie: A Girl of the Streets," Crane shows the helplessness of one's state in relation to poverty, and in "The Open Boat," Crane shows the helplessness of one's state in relation to nature. Crane emphasizes the essence that forces, such as poverty and nature, are not adversaries to man, but rather that they are simply forces that are apathetic towards man. "Maggie: A Girl of the Streets" can be a downer, but it is…

Encyclopedie, the "bible" of the Enlightenment. Rousseau was a creative writer and used everything from opera to novels and romances to explain his philosophy. He believed that human beings are inherently good, but are corrupted by the evils of society. He considered science, art and social institutions to be a part of what corrupts. He believed that the only way to get back to that goodness that…

“Human sensibility is the basis of the social contract,” says a key point from Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s On the Social Contract. Multiple times, Rousseau brings up the nature of human beings running on the assumption that both the people and its leader will do the right thing. He brings it up when it’s about governing, when it’s about places and statuses within a family, when it’s about slavery. That’s a lot of loaded topics, coming from a white man. Let’s see if it holds up. At first, Rousseau…

How is man described by Hobbes and Rousseau different in the State of Nature and how does it determine the nature of contract that the two write about? The debate regarding man’s natural state has been at the forefront of political philosophy for hundreds of years now. This is because a lot of philosophers have used their understanding of the natural state of man as a foundation to build their arguments on. Furthermore the understanding of man’s natural state has directly led to the formation…

people and their land. The idea of ownership is powerful especially in our society today; however, in the political society we live in, we have to give up some of our ownership to be truly protected. As Americans we have natural rights that protect us and give us power but there are still things that the government can do or say to take your rights away in order to protect the greater good. That is because a political society protects the community and makes decisions based off a community…

John Locke and Garrett Hardin, two men with boundless ideas that took society by storm. Locke’s ideas on property and Hardin’s tragedy of the limits of shared resources had people thinking: “Can we trust other human beings to engage in productive economic life without depriving each other of these very opportunities and harming the Earth?” Well to answer this question in short, sure! Hardin mentions “the commons” multiple times in his famous 1968 analysis. If you really think about it, the…

self-interest. The root of our self-interest stems from the set of value society places on possessions. With that said, humans cannot be trusted to be productive in society due to out innate behavior and greed John Locke, an optimist during the Glorious Revolution, anonymously published the Second Treatise of Government in 1698; an essay that defines human rationality. The “state of nature” mentioned in this essay is a fantasy society where there is no government, perfect equality, and freedom.…

specific to civilized men. By tracing the differences between natural men and civilized men, Rousseau is able to showcase the effects of division of labor. Division of labor requires human dependency, differentiation and specialization, and a civilized society— all are factors that contribute to the inequality among men. Rousseau begins his account by acknowledging two types of inequalities in the exordium: natural and moral. The discourse focuses on the moral, or political, inequality,…

revolution had a huge impact on society in the 18 century. There was solace found within society to question old ideas, theories, and convictions. Which brought about the Era of Enlightenment or The Age of Reason. This 18th Century era was monumental for scholars and philosophers like Thomas Hobbes, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and John Locke. Society began to use the scientific method and principles of reason rather than politics and religion to explain aspects of society. Thomas Hobbes is best…