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Comparing Thomas Hobbes, John Locke And Jean-Jacques Rousseau

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If people gather together to create a government and set laws, would the individual views on the ideal government be generally the same? Philosophers all believe in different theories as to why and how people come together to build government creating the “Social Contract Theory”. The social contract can be defined as a theory that instigates humans coming together to create political communities and set terms to live together in coexistence (LEC WEEK 2TH). There are three philosophers discussed in the course, Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, that are considered social contrast theorists. John Locke and Jean-Jacques Rousseau are both social contract theorists and when their views on the social contract are different.
To start, the two philosophers view of the social contract differs. John Locke’s social contract theory was widely known for believing in the protection of property. According to the philosopher, a pre political society men could live peacefully with no civil authority (Shabani & Deveaux, …show more content…

The natural rights that Locke believes in cannot be written down or debated which in Rousseau’s eyes deems the natural rights system fraud (V. Burke, Dr, Lecture, September 28, 2016). The philosopher does not see liberty as a right, like Locke, but a natural state that is a natural type of freedom (Burke, 2016). On the September 28th lecture Dr. Burke stated that, “In order to have rights you need common authority to institute the rights” (2016). That statement can be applied to Rousseau’s denunciation of natural rights opposed to Locke’s belief because Rousseau says that authority is needed while Locke opposes that idea (2016). This ideology can be explained by the general will because people want to have the common interest of liberty and property (Shabani & Deveaux, 2014, p. 140). Therefore, Rousseau believes authority can only provide the rights Locke describes as natural

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