First, Locke argued that natural rights such as life, liberty, and property existed in the state of nature and could never be taken away by individuals or even voluntarily abandoned. These rights were “inalienable” (impossible to give up). Locke also disagreed with Hobbes on the social contract. For him, it was not only an agreement between the people, but between him and the sovereign (preferably a king). These views in Krito and the Republic may seem contradictory at first glance: in the first dialogue, Socrates uses a social contract argument to show why it is right to stay in prison, while in the second dialogue, he rejects the social contract as the source of justice. However, these two views are compatible. From Socrates` point of view, a righteous person is someone who, among other things, recognizes his obligation to the state by obeying its laws. The state is the most morally and politically fundamental entity and, as such, deserves our utmost loyalty and respect. Especially men know this and act accordingly.
However, justice is not limited to obeying the laws in exchange for the obedience of others. Justice is the state of a well-regulated soul, and therefore the just man will necessarily also be the happy man. Justice is therefore more than mere mutual obedience to the law, as Glaucon suggests, but it nevertheless includes obedience to the state and the laws that support it. Although Plato may have been the first philosopher to offer an account of the argument at the heart of social contract theory, Socrates ultimately rejects the idea that the social contract is the original source of justice. Thomas Hobbes by John Michael Wright, c. 1669-1670, National Portrait Gallery, London Hobbes is one of the founders of modern political philosophy and political science. He has also contributed to a variety of other fields, including history, geometry, gas physics, theology, ethics, and general philosophy. These two principles are linked in a certain order. The first principle, to distribute civil liberties as much as possible with respect for equality, takes precedence over the second principle, which distributes social and economic goods. In other words, we cannot choose to give up some of our civil liberties in favor of greater economic gain. Rather, we must meet the requirements of the first principle before moving on to the second.
According to Rawls, this serial order of principles expresses a fundamental rational preference for certain types of goods, i.e. those embodied in civil liberties, over other types of goods, i.e., economic benefits. Rousseau`s striking assertion that man “must be compelled to be free”[15] must be understood as follows: since indivisible and inalienable popular sovereignty decides what is good for the whole, an individual, if he falls back into his ordinary egoism and does not obey the law, will be forced to listen to what was decided when the people acted as a collectivity (as citizens). Thus, law, insofar as it is created by the people acting as a body, is not a restriction of individual freedom, but rather its expression. Thus, from Mills` perspective, racism is not just an unfortunate coincidence of Western democratic and political ideals. It is not that we have a perfectly designed and, unfortunately, poorly implemented political system. One of the reasons we continue to think that the problem of race in the West is relatively superficial, that it does not go all the way, is the influence that the idealized social contract has on our imagination. We continue to believe, according to Mills, in the myths that social contract theory tells us – that all are equal, that all are treated equally before the law, that the Founding Fathers championed equality and freedom for all, etc. Thus, one of the real goals of social contract theory is to hide the real political reality from view – some people are granted the rights and freedoms of full persons, and others are treated as sub-persons.
The racial contract shapes the structure of our political systems and lays the foundation for the ongoing racial oppression of non-whites. So we can`t respond by simply including more non-whites in the mix of our political institutions, representation, etc. Instead, we need to review our policies in general from the point of view of the race contract and start where we are, knowing full well how our society has been affected by the systematic exclusion of certain individuals from the realm of politics and treaty. This “naturalized” feature of the race contract, that is, it tells a story about who we really are and what`s in our history, is better, according to Mills, because it promises to allow us to one day live up to the norms and values that are at the heart of Western political traditions. The theory of an implicit social contract states that by remaining in territory controlled by a society that normally has a government, people give their consent to join that society and be governed by its government, if any. It is this consent that gives legitimacy to such a government. The central assertion of social contract theory is that law and political order are not natural, but human creations. The social contract and the political order it creates are only the means to an end – for the benefit of the individuals concerned – and are legitimate only to the extent that they fulfill their part of the agreement. Hobbes argued that the government is not a party to the original treaty and that citizens are not obliged to submit to the government if it is too weak to act effectively to suppress factionalism and civil unrest.
According to other social contract theorists, if the government does not guarantee their natural rights (Locke) or serve the best interests of society (called by Rousseau “general will”), citizens can withdraw their obligation of obedience or change leadership through elections or other means, including, if necessary, violence. Locke believed that natural rights were inalienable and that, therefore, the reign of God replaced governmental authority, while Rousseau believed that democracy (self-government) was the best way to ensure prosperity while preserving individual freedom within the framework of the rule of law. The Lockean concept of the social contract was invoked in the United States Declaration of Independence. Social contract theories were relegated to the background in the 19th century in favor of utilitarianism, Hegelianism and Marxism; they were revived in the 20th century, notably in the form of a thought experiment by John Rawls. [5] Patriarchal control over women is found in at least three paradigmatic contemporary contracts: the marriage contract, the prostitution contract, and the surrogacy contract. Each of these treaties deals with the control of women by men or the control of a particular man over a particular woman in general. Under the terms of the marriage contract, a husband is granted the right of sexual access in most states in the United States, which prohibits the legal category of marital rape. Prostitution is a typical example of Pateman`s claim that modern patriarchy requires equal access from men to women, especially sexual access, access to their bodies.
And surrogacy can be understood as more of the same, albeit in terms of access to women`s reproductive abilities. All these examples show that the contract is the means by which women are dominated and controlled. The Treaty is not the path to freedom and equality. Rather, it is a means, perhaps the most fundamental, by which patriarchy is maintained. According to this argument, morality, politics, society, and everything that comes with what Hobbes calls a “comfortable life” are purely conventional. Before the establishment of the basic social contract whereby people agree to live together, and the embodiment contract of a ruler with absolute authority, nothing is immoral or unjust – anything goes. However, after the conclusion of these contracts, society becomes possible and people can be expected to keep their promises, cooperate with each other, etc. The social contract is the most fundamental source of all that is good and what we depend on for a good life. We have the choice to abide by the terms of the contract or to return to the state of nature that Hobbes claims no sane person could prefer. John Locke`s conception of the social contract differed from Hobbes` in several fundamental ways, retaining only the central idea that people in a state of nature would voluntarily come together to form a state. Locke believed that individuals in a state of nature would be morally obligated by natural law not to injure each other in their lives or property.