|
|
IdentificationJean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) belongs to the philosophers of the Age of Enlightenment, in which he with his emphasis on nature and feelings represents a contrast to the rationalist Voltaire (1694-1778). He wrote about education in Émile (1762) and about politics in The Social Contract (1762), in which he with his focus on the people and the general will contributed to creating the ideological foundation for the French Revolution.
The 17th century was the time of the absolute monarch. In order to reduce the power of the old nobility, the king allied himself with the local business community. This alliance was called mercantilism and implied active support for trade and industry. The state established trading companies and factories, in Denmark for example at Raadvad, so that the country could export and accumulate gold – a sign of wealth at the time. Even if selected parts of the business community prospered in the incubator of the state, there were drawbacks, especially control exercised by the state. While France took the lead in terms of the alliance between royal power and the power of money, England was in the vanguard of the development of an independent business community. Since the Magna Carta (1215), the English Crown had been subject to severe limitations and could not exercise the same control of the economy as was the case in France. In the 18th century, an initial distinction was made between state and society, which gave rise to some linguistic problems. Even if the state is part of society, “society” was referred to as the “private spheres”, which were in the process of liberalising themselves from the control of the state, both the private business community and private life. The political idea that society is the work of the state was challenged by the liberal idea that the task of the state is to protect people’s life and property, which was the result of their private enterprise. Private “society” had ambitions of managing on its own. From having been all-powerful, the state was reduced to a service-providing body. But service for whom? Under absolute monarchs, the unity of the state found symbolic expression in the king’s body. A new symbol was now needed to give expression to the unity of society. Rousseau identified the problem and found a concise formulation: The people are the core of society. Even if Rousseau is known for glorifying nature, he also says that it is an unambiguous advantage to give up natural liberty, enter into a social contract and become a member of a society. Man dies as a natural person, but is resurrected as a social person, with greater liberty than before. When all rule on equal terms, all are equally free and nobody loses his liberty to others. Beyond each individual, a “public person” is created, a people as an expression of the general will. As a member of a people, each individual obtains liberty on equal terms with the other nationals. A problem arises here in that human beings are also private citizens and may have private interests that run counter to the common interest. If they themselves are unable to realise that their individual will is contrary to the general will, they must be “forced to be free”. This is an expression that lays itself open to abuse – and which has been abused every time a group has claimed to be the true representative of the unity of the people and has felt justified in silencing dissidents.
Rousseau has difficulty in explaining how the general will is to be translated into practical policy. He does not say how the general will is to be identified, nor does he set up democratic ground rules. He sees political parties as a reflection of division, not unity. As the general will is infallible, it is not up for discussion. Therefore, it remains a problem how the policy of the state can be decided upon by all citizens in a direct democracy where political opinions meet and private wills run counter to the general will. Rousseau ends up admitting that democracy is more a matter for gods than for human beings. “If then we discard from the social compact what is not of the essence, we shall find that it reduces itself to the following terms: Each of us puts his person and all his power in common under the supreme direction of the general will, and, in our corporate capacity, we receive each member as an indivisible part of the whole.” (…) “Let us draw up the whole account in terms easily
commensurable. What man loses by the social
contract is his natural liberty and an unlimited right
to everything he tries to get and succeeds in getting;
what he gains is civil liberty and the proprietorship
of all he possesses.”
|
|
|||
|
Top of the page |
This page is part of the electronic publication "The Danish Democracy Canon"