Summary political philosophy Jean-Jacques Rousseau
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Course
History of Political Philosophy
Institution
Universiteit Leiden (UL)
This is an English summary of the lectures of the course 'history of political philosophy' at the University of Leiden. The summary contains the substance covered in the lectures and quotes from the mandatory literature. This summary is about the philosopher Jean-Jaques Rousseau.
This is an Engli...
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History of Political Philosophy
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Jean-Jaques Rousseau
1712-1778
Backgroundstory
- Citizen of geneva
- Heyday of the enlightenment
- Vilivied philosopher
- Critical about the contemporary society and politics
‘Only democracy can make us truly free’
Contra ‘divine right’
things have already progressed compared to locke and hobbes
Rousseau doesn’t have to argue about the divine right theory anymore
Diagnosis: discourse on inequality
Diagnosis (discourses)
- Account of human nature and speculative history as a basis for
- Criticism of inequality and oppression
Remedy: (theoretically: doesn’t make a ‘blueprint’) redeeming the possibility of. Virtuous/
legitimate social life
- Collective self-government (general will) as the new ground of authority and
citizenship (social contract)
- Education of personal autonomy (emilie)
Rousseau’s critique of society
Central insight
- Man is by nature free, equal and good
- but is corrupted by society
o Morally: civilization corrupts the virutues: society creates people of poor
quality, alienated from their humanity, incapable of meaningful self-
realization
o Politically: authority as a mask for oppression and exploitation
State of nature
People have lost their authentic human beings
We need ‘to separate what is original from what is artificial in the present
nature of man, and to have a proper understanding of a state which no
longer exists, which perhaps never existed, which probably never will exist,
and yet about which it is necessary to have accurate notion in order to
judge our own present state
, Why in the long run the objects of our needs and our pleasures change, why as original man
gradually vanishes. Society no longer offers to the eyes of the wise man anything but an
assemblage of artificial men and factitious passions which are the product of all these new
relationships and have no true foundation in nature.
Savage man and civilized man differ so much in their inmost heart and inclinations that what
constitutes the supreme happiness of the one would reduce the other to despair
so far philosophers and theologians have not understood human nature: they
have treated as natural what is actually social
Methodological problem: how to escape the theorist’s own social and
historical context?
Other philosophers ‘reading back into nature ideas which were
acquired in society’
Hobbes ‘wrongly injected in to the savage man’s concern for
self-preservation the need to satisfy a multitude of passions which are the
product of society and which have made laws necessary
Rousseau clary sees the problem, though it remains unlcear
how he resolves this
Human Nature
state of nature: original goodness, liberty and Contrasts with society
equality - Social virtue/ vice, cultivated in
- Natural goodness in a kind of pre-moral community (amour proper)
sense (good-natured) - Mutual dependence, exploitation,
- Natural liberty as independence and oppression
freedom from constraint - Inequality (wealth, status, power)
- Equality: descriptive and normative (lack
of moral distinction)
Natural drives:
- Self-preservation (amour de soi-meme) - Drive for esteem in the eyes of others:
- - Compassion (pitié) distinction and superiority
(Amour proper)
The savage lives within himself: socialble man always outside himself, is capable of
living only in the opinion of others and so to speak, derives the sentiment of his own
existence solely from their judgment
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