One of the main ways that I believe Rousseau separates himself from the Locke and Hobbes is his distain for the social contract. Locke and Hobbes sort of seem to hold the contract among men. Rousseau, however, believes that it is an evil much like the rest of society. He may see certain aspects of life much like Hobbes, but this separate seems to be a strong one. Rousseau states on page 68, right before the end of Part One of the Discourse on Inequality, that “Without needlessly prolonging these details, anyone should see that, since the bonds of servitude are formed merely from the mutual dependence of men and the reciprocal needs that unite them, it is impossible to enslave a man without having first put him in the position of being incapable of doing without another. This being a situation that did not exist in the state of nature, it leaves each person free of the yoke, and renders pointless the law of the strongest.”
My question for the class, which I wish we could have theorized about more, is Rousseau arguing that the desire for power Hobbes argues all men have along with the contract between men comes with a propensity to put others in bonds? Is he merely stating that it has seemed the natural course of history has been for contracts among men to eventually escalate into something that resembles the slavery of others? Or is he saying neither of these things but something completely different?
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