| The Social Contract (Penguin Classics) | 
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Avg. Customer Rating:   (based on 26 reviews)
Sales Rank: 194599
Category: Book
Author: Jean-jacques Rousseau
Publisher: Penguin Classics
Studio: Penguin Classics
Manufacturer: Penguin Classics
Label: Penguin Classics
Languages: French (Original Language), English (Unknown), English (Published)
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 192
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.4
Dimensions (in): 7.7 x 5 x 0.6
ISBN: 0140442014
Dewey Decimal Number: 320.01
EAN: 9780140442014
ASIN: 0140442014
Publication Date: June 30, 1968
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
"Man was born free, and he is everywhere in chains." These are the famous opening words of a treatise which, from the French Revolutionary terror to the Dictatorship of the Proletariat, has been interpreted as a blueprint for totalitarianism. But in "The Social Contract" Rousseau (1712-1778) was at pains to stress the connection between liberty and law, freedom and justice. Arguing that the ruler is the people's agent, not its master, he claimed that laws derived from the people's general will. Yet in preaching subservience to the impersonal state he came close to defining freedom as the recognition of necessity. Rousseau's powerful treatise expresses views on the rights, liberty and equality of all people. It remains a classic of political theory and one of the most influential works of abstract political thought in the Western tradition.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 21 more reviews...
A civil society, dream on my friend... September 25, 2008
When the Social Contract was published in 1762, Rousseau became a wanted man in France and Switzerland, but in 1794 after the French revolution, his remains were buried in Paris as an international hero.
In 1814, religious fundamentalists stole the remains of Voltaire and Jean-Jacques Rousseau and dumped them in a pit full of quicklime, a cruel burial reserved for individuals condemned by the church.
In the Social Contract, Rousseau postulates that a legitimate political authority in a civil society comes only from a social contract intended for their mutual preservation and agreed upon by all citizens (the sovereign). The sovereign that expresses the general will that aims at the common good has absolute authority over public matters. The state that is protecting citizens should follow laws of equality and liberty that are interestingly created by non-citizen lawgiver, and the state should also have a government to exercise executive power and daily business.
The social contract might sound very basic, utopia like and naive to many readers but considering the political nature of that time and the topics debated such as liberty, free will, and the state of nature, this work is absolutely a rebellious scream, which was much needed at the time.
Rousseau dreamed of a civil society, but given alone the way his remains were treated in 1814, it seems unlikely a civil society will ever exist. However, if we are not free in any way (or as Rousseau puts it: Man is born free, but he is everywhere in chains), we are still free to dream. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, a free spirit who dared to dream, though imperfectly, had the courage to speak up; and for that alone his dream should be praised.
 1984 Anyone? May 25, 2008
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
I picked up a copy of this book in a shop in Hong Kong with high expectations. I had heard of it but had not yet read it and was rather shocked to find an english language copy in a place like Hong Kong. It is very persuasive in some of it's arguments but is essentially little more than a book advocating totalitarian government systems and as I read it I couldn't help but wonder if the former Texas governer had a member of his staff read it to him sometime during his recent administration.
Aside from a few clever quotations and a few speechlike chapters this book is little more than a more elegant political pundit book. It proves little more than one Ann Coulter or Rush Limbaugh would reason if they had a stronger command of the English language. One difference would be that Rousseau believed, at least in some parts of the book, that religion weakened government.
 Collectivism Against Individuality January 22, 2008
5 out of 9 found this review helpful
The fallacy is in his assumption that individuals must forfeit all sovereignty to the state. The second specious argument is in the creation of a General Will. The third is that the general will will not do anything to harm any of the individuals within the collective.
The collectivist social contract was most assured well intentioned, but it's opposition to individualism has obviously anti-individualist consequences.
This is evident in his support of democratic censorship. If the general will is offended, then censorship is justified.
In his desire to create equality, he justifies both socialism and communism, and democracy in its purest form - majority rule.
A very odd book. September 6, 2007
0 out of 15 found this review helpful
I don't see how someone like Rousseau could ever write a book with "social" in the title. The woman lived alone on the island for over 16 years. She is clearly disturbed.
 Still a Timely Study on Liberty January 29, 2007
1 out of 9 found this review helpful
Immanuel Kant had one portrait hanging in his house in Konigsberg. The portrait was of Rousseau. What an honor, to be memorialized while alive by THE leading figure of the enlightenment!
Rousseau never coined the term 'noble savage'. This is a popular misunderstanding and outright lie. He was himself though, a seeming savage. He carried on love affairs, abandonded children, spoke of heresy, and so on.
But on to 'The Social Contract'. It is the houses, no matter how prettily and well built they be, that make up the town, but it is the citizen, gloriously free citizen who makes up the city.
So Rousseau to me ironically leaves the countryside behind and sets himself up in the city.
Here, man, at least enlightened man, democratically chooses his leaders and magistrates and allows them to rule by choice. This enlightened man is subject to the law and not to the magistrate, and Liberty, Sweet Liberty, is the penultimate Virtue of the now ennobled citizen.
Death is to be preferred to loss of it.
It can be won.
It cannot be won again.
Once you lose it, it's gone forever, this Liberty.
Timely indeed.
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