Some Modern Applications

Abstract

The problem that Rousseau set out to solve by his political theory was set up, as we saw on pp. 70–2, as a consequence of certain beliefs about human nature. Man is, Rousseau thought, essentially self-interested and capable of self-improvement; furthermore it is essential to his happiness that he should be free. These features of his nature lead to conflict and thus to the need for organised society; but they also impose conditions that must be satisfied if any society is to be legitimate. These conditions are that the society must promote the individual interest of every member, and that it must not subject him to anyone’s will. Rousseau believed that these conditions were met wherever society and its laws were based on the social contract he describes. Reference to the terms of the social contract does not, however, supply a unique solution for every situation of conflict or potential conflict, but only for those situations in which the question ‘What specific policy does the general will require?’ has a unique true answer. As we saw in the last section of Chapter 7, there is a large class of situations — viz. those in which the people have a genuinely open choice about some constitutional issue — in which this question cannot be uniquely answered.