Rousseau Vs. Hobbes: Legitimacy Of The Social Contract

For Fisher, the inability of the state government to control the rapid rise of crime, nor extend aid to those citizens unable to afford signifies a break in the social contract. The legitimacy of the sovereign for Hobbes remains, “as long as and no longer than the power lasts by which he is able to protect them,” (Hobbes 298) suggesting that the philosopher would agree that the Mexican Government’s inability to defend their underprivileged citizens warrants a break in the social contract, allowing individuals to seek defense by any means necessary. Hobbes original description of a war of all against all resounds in, “organized self defense groups,” (Fisher 2) who themselves have been, “tempted into drug trafficking, kidnapping or extortion” (Fisher 2). Hobbes philosophy echoes Fishers claim that the
social contract has been broken and given the aforementioned turmoil ongoing throughout Mexico, the debate now focuses on Rousseau’s principles maintaining the social contract. The compromisation and growing inequality of general security among Mexican citizens, a commodity the social contract ensures, uproots the social order despite the Mexican government retaining autonomy among the international community. Rousseau’s central belief surrounding the extent to which individuals should remain obligated to the social contract parallels Hobbes in that, “the fundamental compact, substitutes a moral and legitimate equality to whatever physical inequality nature may have been able to impose upon men.” (Rousseau 474). The civil liberty man achieves by forfeiting his natural right to do as he pleases legitimizes man’s claim to his property and ensures through the active protection of the sovereign, security against threats both domestic and abroad. In the poorest areas of Mexico’s cities where, “there is no presence of the state,” (Fisher 4) the government's inability to mobilize the necessary forms of relief as to educate and aid the most disadvantaged of society reflects an unreciprocal contract, making the social contract itself broken in the eyes of Rousseau. Despite both Hobbes and Rousseau professing philosophy which qualifies the unrest in Mexico as having fractured the social contract, their remains prior to their conclusion, discourse surrounding the dichotomy between private and public individual that may clarify the use of Private Security among Mexican elite.
These claims that the social contract has been broken, as applied to the social contract thinkers, should not be perceived as a condemnation to the right of private security.
On the contrary Rousseau claims, that “each individual, as a man, have a private will contrary to or different from the general will of that he has as a citizen,” (Rousseau 472) illuminating the liberty to arm and defend oneself so long as the private will follows the agreements made clear by the sovereign under the social contract. While Fisher claims that, “private security has become a central part of criminality itself, (Fisher 3) Hobbes would contend that, “subjects to a monarch cannot without his leave cast off monarchy and return to a disunited multitude,” (Hobbes 279). Hobbes view outlines a clear distinction among private security acting wholly under the authority of the larger sovereign and the appropriation of sovereign to that individual or conglomeration which the security serves. Given these claims, both philosophers understand the role of private security as completely legitimate insofar that their actions and contractor are wholly liable to the will and sword of the
commonwealth. Starting from extremely different perspectives regarding the nature by which man enters civil society, both Thomas Hobbes and Jean-Jacques Rousseau construct the framework for a social contract in which man forfeits the ability to act upon his own will, and guarantees security under the premise that they newly formed citizenry obey the law and order which the sovereign establishes upon seizing power. Upon analysis of the inequitable nature of Security in Mexico, both authors would agree that upon private individuals assuming their own legitimacy in direct opposition to the rules established by the Mexican state, the social contract has severed and the people of Mexico should either flee or take the necessary precaution to ensure their survival. Despite Hobbes and Rousseau agreeing that the current situation in Mexico relfects the breaking of the social contract, they would counter Max Fishers claim that all “private” security serves to undermine the existing socio-political order. We must remember that by entering civil society, we are free to act according to our own will so long as our actions do not interfere with the liberty of another man. Our personal will ultimately must adhere to the will promulgated by the system of governance we live in so long as the sovereign retains the ability to defend its citizens from threats both domestic and abroad