The Social Contract by Jean-Jacques Rousseau
by Loyal Books
January 2, 2024 11:00 am
The Social Contract outlines Rousseau’s views on political justice, explaining how a just and legitimate state is to be founded, organized and administered. Rousseau sets forth, in his characteristically brazen and iconoclastic manner, the case for direct democracy, while simultaneously casting every other form of government as illegitimate and tantamount to slavery. Often hailed as a revolutionary document which sparked the French Revolution, The Social Contract serves both to inculcate dissatisfaction with actually-existing governments and to allow its readers to envision and desire a radically different form of political and social organization. (Summary by Eric Jonas)
Recent Episodes
1-01 – Subject of the First Book
11 months ago00:00/00:001-04 – Slavery
11 months ago00:00/00:003-01 – Government in General
11 months ago00:00/00:003-06 – Monarchy
11 months ago00:00/00:003-08 – That every form of government is not fit for every country
11 months ago00:00/00:003-16 – That the Institution of the Government is not a contract
11 months ago00:00/00:004-04 – The Roman Comitia
11 months ago00:00/00:004-08 – Civil Religion
11 months ago00:00/00:00