Jean-Jacques Rousseau's On The Social Contract

When a group of individuals come together to live and work together for their own self-preservation, they sign intangible contracts know as social contracts which, in a sense, are agreements they make to live as a society. Jean-Jacques Rousseau talks about these ideas in Book II of On the Social Contract. These aren't so much simple things such as how food is attained or who will provide a certain service to the community. They are agreements that are at the root of their ability to cooperate and work with each other. While this branches to show a rather in-depth look at how groups organize into societies a focus will be leant to law and a person's role in society. In the mind or Rousseau, the type of society one enters through social contract
is not to preserve freedoms but rather, one that requires give and take between and individual and society for the overall protection of society. Evidence to support this can be found by examining life as granted by the state, punishment for transgressions both petty and against the good of the group, and the role of individual freedom. In examining the relationship between the individual and society attention is first drawn to live as granted by the state. When people come together to live in a society they do so, in part, for protection, and in some scenarios, this results in people having to sacrifice their own lives. Rousseau says, "Whoever wishes to preserve his life at the expense of others should also give it up for them when necessary" (Rousseau 2011, 176). People do not tend to want to die yet part of allowing others to go off and fight for you means that you should be willing to fight for them if necessary. It is thanks to others that one gets to live in peace so it is only natural that they should be willing to do the same. A slightly more modern area that could be looked at here is the use of conscription or the draft in the United States. In the U.S., the military is initially filled through voluntary means. People who choose to do this are willingly risking their lives for the protection of others in society. When at war, though, the volunteers may not amount to enough forces such as in the Civil War, World Wars I & II, and Vietnam among others, and, thus, the U.S. called upon men between 18 and 25 to serve their country or society who had protected them. This is what Rousseau is getting at and that is that part of living in a society includes being able to step up and be willing to sacrifice yourself for the preservation of others. Rousseau does, however, make the point that one agrees to this idea simply because it makes sense too and not because they expect to lose their life they just worry about guaranteeing it (Rousseau 2011, 177). This is true in the case of a person who is following the rules of society. But what is the relationship between the state and an individual's right to live there if they aren't following the rules/laws set by the society? Should an individual choose to rebel against this society he immediately becomes no longer part of it and consequently it is it the best interest of the state for its own preservation to "kill the vanquished" this individual (Rousseau 2011, 177). Secondly, aside from the life granted to an individual by the state, attention is turned towards punishment for one's transgressions. When a person has committed an act and remains a danger to the greater society, the society has a right to put this wrongdoer to death for their actions. A society should not however continuously slaughter those who commit foul acts as to make an example as this is a sign of a weak government. Rousseau does have a similarity to another political philosopher, John Locke. Both touch on the role of pardons in a government or society. Locke believed that the right to grant pardons was something that fell within the prerogative of the sovereign and for Rousseau, this power falls to the sovereign as well and they both agree there lacks a specific situation to claim when pardons are worthwhile (Rousseau 2011, 177). Rousseau does believe that an overuse of this power could lead to any one given transgression ceasing to be a transgression at all (Rousseau 2011, 178). Therefore, it is the duty of the sovereign to pardon carefully if at all. For Rousseau "In a well governed state, there are few punishments" (Rousseau 2011, 178). This is because in a "well governed state" the common good is the basis of the law and therefore, the people would only be violating the law if they wanted to hurt the good of their society in which case there is punishment by death for those. Otherwise, crime should be minuscule if everyone is working for the betterment of each other. There is indeed a third point to be made in regards to give and take the relationship between individual and society and that is paradox created by two of Rousseau's ideas which is that individuals are absolutely subjects yet are also free, and so the idea to examine is the role of individual freedom.
Chapter 6 talks about the role of law in this society however, at the end of chapter 5 Rousseau in reference to the tough moral decisions to made, "Let us leave these questions to be discussed by a just man who has not done wrong and who himself never needed pardon" (Rousseau 2011, 178). This seems to imply that God will ultimately play a role in law. Then in Chapter 6, Rousseau does just that saying, "All justice comes from God; he alone is its source" (Rousseau 2011, 178). This tells the reader that God will be the basis of law and therefore one can draw that basic religious ideas in regards to law such as not killing will be enforced by law. Rousseau later says that laws are acts of the general will (Rousseau 2011, 179). Laws will be made for the good of the society, not an individual. Which could lead to the problem of self-interest or general unknowing of what is right by the public, which is why by the end of the chapter Rousseau is calling for a legislature to deal with the law (Rousseau 2011, 180). In chapter 5 and above the ability to live as granted by the society was mentioned. In this sense, then one owes their ability to survive in society to the society or in
other words, an individual is a subject to the society. However, the rules which govern the basis of society are ones created by the common people and God for the good of society. While an individual is subject to a society, they are free in the sense that their own good and freedom is what makes up the entire rules of the society making it a society that fits is citizens wishes and desires for living. Rousseau describes the very basic beginnings of an early government and his own idea of a social contract, which is and unwritten agreement that individuals must agree to in order to live together and form a society.
The very root of this is founded in a give-take relationship between the needs and wants of the individual and the needs and wants of the society in its entirety. The foundation of this idea is the society's granting an individual the right to live there and as a result, some things are expected in return, such as a willingness to defend it and to not fight against it. Punishment in the society should really be saved for bad acts and because the common good of people is the root of rules and law, no petty crimes should, in theory, exist. Bringing all this together is the notion that an individual is a subject of society, but society is formulated around the desired and necessary freedoms of the public good, and therefore, an individual can be free and subject. All of these relations to keep the society happy and running well rely on an individual giving up something of theirs in order to get the benefit of living in a
society.