Politics and the Social Contract:
Hobbes and Rousseau
Clark Wolf
Iowa State University
jwcwolf@iastate.edu
Argument for Analysis
Fairness requires that people should own
the products of their own labor. But if you
hire me to produce goods, then my labor
produces goods that belong to you. So it’s
unfair for you to hire me to produce goods.
Argument for Analysis
Fairness requires that people should own the
products of their own labor. But ownership of
labor also means that we should have the right
and the ability to ‘alienate’ or sell our labor to
others whenever we regard it as advantageous
to do so. When I sell you my labor, you are the
owner of the labor, so you should also be the
owner of the product made through that labor.
Argument for Analysis
Hobbes believed that people in the state of nature would be
selfish and violent. But he believed this only because the
people he saw around him were selfish and violent. The people
around him weren’t in a state of nature– they were corrupted by
exposure to modern society. In a real state of nature, people
would not acquire the passions that lead to selfishness and
violence, and they would have a natural disposition to be
compassionate toward others. But while people in a state of
nature are compassionate, people who have grown up in
modern society and who are then turned out into the state of
nature really may behave selfishly and violently. Hobbes
mistake was to imagine what people as he knew them would do
in the absence of state coercion. He should have gone further,
to imagine how people would be essentially different if they
grew up in circumstances of freedom.
NOTICE:
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Those who would like to re-take midterm or Quiz may do
so on Friday between 12:00 and 3:00. Catt Hall 407.
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If you can’t make it then, see me!
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Anyone may re-take these exams. The new grade will
not replace the old, but will be taken into account in your
final grade for the course.
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FINAL EXAM: 11 December 12:00-2:00
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No Surprises
Study session:
Argument for Analysis
Since people have fundamentally equal
rights and abilities, radically unequal
distribution of wealth and goods is
fundamentally unjust. But where political
institutions protect rights to private
property, radical inequalities are sure to
arise. Since the right to property leads to
injustice, property rights are unjust.
Argument for Analysis
If property rights can arise without the
violation of anyone’s rights, then property
rights are permissible. If property rights
are required for implementation of Natural
Law, then property rights are required by
justice. But the protection of property
rights leads to radical inequalities. It
follows that radical inequalities are
sometimes consistent with justice.
Argument for Analysis
Locke argues that we can gain property in land by
“mixing our labor” with it, as long as we don’t
appropriate more than we can use without waste, and
as long as we leave “enough and as good” for others.
But Locke’s theory can’t justify existing property rights:
the world is finite, and the human population of the
earth is large. At this point, there is no land left to
appropriate. So previous appropriation cannot have
left “enough and as good” in the common, so it must
have violated the ‘enough and as good’ requirement.
So on Locke’s view, existing property rights in land are
illegitimate.
Argument for Analysis
1) Locke specifies that legitimate appropriation
must leave ‘enough and as good’ for others.
2) At present there is no land left in a common.
3) previous appropriation did not leave “enough
and as good” in the common.
4)Previous appropriation was unjustified.
5) on Locke’s view, existing property rights in
land are illegitimate.
Argument for Analysis
The political theories of Hobbes and Locke
are irrelevant. Hobbes and Locke both
describe civil government as arising from
a pre-social state of nature, where society
is unorganized and has no strucuture. But
people have never lived in such a state, so
we can’t learn anything about real
societies by looking at such an artificial
construct.
1) Hobbes and Locke both describe civil government
as arising from a pre-social state of nature, where
society is unorganized and has no structure.
3) But people have never lived in such a state, so
4) we can’t learn anything about real societies by
looking at such an artificial construct.
5) [IP] If we can’t learn anything about real societies
from the works of a political theorist, then that
theorist’s work is irrelevant.
6) The political theories of Hobbes and Locke are
irrelevant.
Two kinds of answer:
1) People really are (or have been) in a ‘state of nature.’
2) Conceiving of political institutions on the model of a
contract can still inform us about their essential
properties.
Argument for Analysis:
Soujourner Truth, Women's Convention in Akron, Ohio, 1851:
“Well, children, where there is so much racket there must be something out of kilter. I think that
'twixt the negroes of the South and the women at the North, all talking about rights, the white
men will be in a fix pretty soon. But what's all this here talking about?
That man over there says that women need to be helped into carriages, and lifted over ditches,
and to have the best place everywhere. Nobody ever helps me into carriages, or over mudpuddles, or gives me any best place! And ain't I a woman? Look at me! Look at my arm! I have
ploughed and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And ain't I a
woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a man - when I could get it - and bear the
lash as well! And ain't I a woman? I have borne thirteen children, and seen most all sold off to
slavery, and when I cried out with my mother's grief, none but Jesus heard me! And ain't I a
woman?
Then they talk about this thing in the head; what's this they call it? [member of audience
whispers, "intellect"] That's it, honey. What's that got to do with women's rights or negroes'
rights? If my cup won't hold but a pint, and yours holds a quart, wouldn't you be mean not to let
me have my little half measure full?
Then that little man in black there, he says women can't have as much rights as men, 'cause
Christ wasn't a woman! Where did your Christ come from? Where did your Christ come from?
From God and a woman! Man had nothing to do with Him.
If the first woman God ever made was strong enough to turn the world upside down all alone,
these women together ought to be able to turn it back , and get it right side up again! And now
they is asking to do it, the men better let them.
Obliged to you for hearing me, and now old Sojourner ain't got nothing more to say.”
Argument for Analysis

Either I’ll stay on campus between
classes, or I’ll go home. If I go home, my
roommate will distract me and I won’t get
my Philosophy reading done. But if I stay
on campus, I won’t have anyplace quiet to
work, so I won’t be able to get my
philosophy reading done. I guess I won’t
get my reading done!
Argument for Analysis
1) Either I’ll stay on campus between classes, or
I’ll go home.
2) If I go home, my roommate will distract me
and I won’t get my Philosophy reading done.
3) But if I stay on campus, I won’t have anyplace
quiet to work, so I won’t be able to get my
philosophy reading done.
4) I won’t get my reading done!
Dilemma
1) Either C or H
2) If H then D & ~P
3) if C then ~W and ~P.
4) ~P
Argument for Analysis
If we arm campus police, then there will be more
guns on campus because the campus police will
bring them. But if we don’t arm campus police,
then the criminals will bring more guns to
campus. So no matter what we do, there will be
more guns on campus.
If there are guns on campus, it’s better that they
be in the hands of the police than in the hands
of the criminals. So we should arm the police.
Argument for Analysis
There can be no such thing as justice unless
there are institutions to punish people who break
their promises and contracts. Justice involves the
rational requirement that people should keep
their promises and abide by the contracts to
which they freely agree. But unless there are
public institutions that will punish people who
break promises and contracts, it is not rational for
people keep them. Since requirements of justice
must be requirements of reason (rationality), it
isn’t ‘just’ to keep contracts where there is no
punishment, it’s just irrational and foolish.
Argument for Analysis
1) Justice involves the rational requirement that people
should keep their promises and abide by the contracts to
which they freely agree.
2) But unless there are public institutions that will punish
people who break promises and contracts, it is not
rational for people keep them.
3) Since requirements of justice must be requirements of
reason (rationality), it isn’t ‘just’ to keep contracts where
there is no punishment, it’s just irrational and foolish.
4) There can be no such thing as justice unless there are
institutions to punish people who break their promises
and contracts
Argument for Analysis
Terms like ‘good’ and ‘beautiful’ essentially refer to the
attitudes of the person who uses them: to say that
something is beautiful is to say that one likes looking at
it; to say that something is good is to say that one
appproves of it. Since different people find different
things beautiful and good, such terms change their
meaning when they are used by different people. But
reasoning requires terms that have a stable meaning:
proper reasoning cannot be done with terms that have
a different meaning for different speakers. Ethics is the
philosophy of ‘good,’ just as aesthetics is the
philosophy of ‘beauty.’ It follows that there can be no
reasoning in ethics or aesthetics.
Argument for Analysis
1) Ethics is the philosophy of ‘good,’ just as aesthetics
is the philosophy of ‘beauty.’
2) To say that something is beautiful is to say that one
likes looking at it; to say that something is good is to
say that one approves of it.
3) Since different people find different things beautiful
and good, such terms change their meaning when they
are used by different people.
4) Reasoning requires terms that have a stable
meaning
5) Therefore, there can be no reasoning in ethics or
aesthetics.
ROUSSEAU
1) Is social inequality natural or artificial? [In Rousseau's work, this
seems to be a question about the justification of inequality: Are vast
inequalities justified by the law of nature or are they unjustifiable and
horrible?]
2) What social circumstances make it possible for some people to
subjugate and enslave others?
3) What features of human beings are natural, and what features are
social accretions? And how can we tell?
4) When we look around the world, we see people oppressing one
another and perpetrating unspeakable violence on one another. What
makes people capable of such brutality? What must a person believe
or desire in order to have the ability to brutalize other human beings?
PROPERTY, EQUALITY, AND
DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE

The Problem of Distributive Justice:How
should the burdens and benefits of social
organization be distributed?

Egalitarianism: These goods (and bads) should
be distributed equally. People should not be
treated differently unless there are good
justifying reasons for unequal treatment.
PROPERTY, EQUALITY, AND
DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE
Rousseau: "...since inequality is practically non-existent in the
SON, it derives its force and growth from the development of
our faculties and the progress of the human mind, and
eventually becomes stable and legitimate through the
etablishment of property and laws. Moreover, it follows that
moral inequality, authorized by positive right alone, is contrary
to natural right whenever it is not combined in the same
proportion with physical inequality" a distinction that is sufficient
to determine what one should think in this regard about the sort
of inequality that reigns among all civilized people, for it is
obviously contrary to the law of nature, however it be defined,
for a child to command an old man, for an imbecile to lead a
wise man, and for a handful of people to gorge themselves on
superfluities while the starving multitude lacks basic
necessities."
PROPERTY, EQUALITY, AND
DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE

Propertarianism: (Locke) Give to each person what she or he is
entitled to. People own whatever they legitimately acquire.
Acquisition is either creation, original appropriation, or transfer from
another legitimate owner.

What considerations support property rights (Lockean or
otherwise)? The notion that people are entitled to things they've
made with their own efforts is ancient, and has roots in widely
divergent social traditions. It may not be "natural" in the sense that
Locke thinks: the laws of Acquisition don't seem to be objective
universal truths like the laws of physics or mathematics. But they
may be natural in the sense that it's easy to understand how people
could come to feel proprietary. Where laborers have been forced to
work without gaining any entitlement to the fruits of their labor, they
have often resented their situation as unjust.
PROPERTY, EQUALITY, AND
DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE

What considerations support egalitarianism? The notion that
social institutions should treat people equally also has an ancient
history, and once again the idea has sprung up in widely different
societies around the world. Oddly enough, equality seems most
likely to be articulated as an ideal in societies that are most
flagrantly inegalitarian.
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Question: Are these conceptions of justice "natural?" What would it
mean for a conception of justice to be "natural?"
Perhaps not in the sense Locke implies. But it may be that common
properties of human beings and common features of the human
condition lead people to develop notions of property and equality,
and to regard these notions as a kind of ideal.
PROPERTY, EQUALITY, AND
DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE
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PROBLEM: These two conceptions of distributive justice are not
compatible. Where property rights are guarded, ineqalities will
eventually arise. Over time, inequalities will become more
pronounced, until eventually some are extravagantly wealthy while
others are destitute. [Or so argues Rousseau. Was he wrong?]
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Locke's Solution: Property rights are clearly OK (they're part of
Natural Law). So if property rights generate inequalities, then some
inequalities must be OK. As long as no one's rights are violated,
there's no limit to the extent of justified inequalities.
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Rousseau's Solution: Extreme Inequalities are pernicious,
oppressive, and clearly can't be justified as part of the "Natural"
order of things. If property rights are sure to generate these
inequalities, then property rights must be illegitimate (un-natural).
Rousseau’s Conjectural History
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1) "Natural Man" (Sprung from the ground overnight, full grown like a mushroom;
expresses many of Rousseau's own prejudices and idealizations)
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2) Families stay together
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3) Villages of families (tools & huts). [There are problems already at this stage:
(803).]
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4) Agriculture (property rights arrive on the scene...) (878) [Dependence introduces
possibility of oppression: (878)]
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5) Notions of Right and Justice set in stone the oppression of the weak, lead them to
see their oppression as part of the natural order of things. (Locke, Hobbes)

6) Devotion to Abstractions like Natural Right and Natural Law (These are just
artificial creations, says Rousseau.)
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7) Nationalism: Devotion to abstractions of group identity. (889) (Atrocities become
possible.)
Rousseau’s Conjectural History
The Psychology of Rousseau's "Natural" Human Being:
1) Two Principles of Natural Motivation: Empathy and Self Interest.
2) Hobbes was wrong to suggest that lacking an idea of goodness,
human beings would be vicious. [868] (Did Hobbes really hold this view?)
3) Pity a natural disposition to virtue (869)
4) Sentience, not rationality, is source of moral concern. (870)
5) Other virtues spring from pity (870)
6) Reason can eliminate this natural source of virtue. (870)
7) Philosophical accounts of morality always get things wrong. (855)
8) Pity takes the place of Law in the SON (870)
Rousseau’s Conjectural History
“None are more completely enslaved than
those who falsely believe themselves to
be free.”
-Goethe
Rousseau’s Conjectural History

Question: There are many points at which some of us probably don't agree
with Rousseau. If we're unconvinced by his account of "Natural Human
Beings," does it follow that his account of oppression and inequality is also
flawed?

Consider the reasons he gives why we should believe the account he
gives: (883)
1) supposed "right of conquest" could not arise in any other way. (Referring
to the notion that the wealthy are justified as Conquerors)
2) words "strong" and "weak" are equivocal, since we're naturally equal
from the metaphysical/natural perspective. These then stand in for "rich"
and "poor."
3) The poor had nothing to loose but their liberty, and could not rationally
have submitted that for any price. (As Locke's argument against Hobbes!)
4) Further, it's reasonable to believe that a thing was invented by those to
whom it is useful rather than by those to whom it is harmful.
Karl Marx: Alienated Labor

Example 1: "Case No. 14- Isabella
Read, 12 years old, Coal Bearer: "I
carry about 125 pounds on my back.
Have to stoop much and am frequently
in water up to calves of my legs. When
first went down, fell frequently asleep
while waiting for coal and from heat
and [fatigue]. I do not like the work,
nor do the lassies, but they are made
to like it. When the weather is warm,
there is [difficulty] breathing and
frequently the lights go out." -Great
Britain Parliamentary Report, Ashley
Mines Commission, 1842.

Example 2: Nike worker in
micronesia, working 15 hour days,
earning less than the price of a days
meals.
Karl Marx: Alienated Labor

Question: What is exploitation?

Case 1: I find you stranded with a flat tire in the desert. Knowing that you
will die of thirst without my help, I offer you my help... but only on condition
that you sign a legally binding document that gives me title to your house,
car, and all your worldly possessions.

Problem: Obviously my offer is unfair, but without me you would be even
worse off than you are with my help. How can my act be harmful or wrong,
since it results in your being better off than you would have been without my
help?

Case 2: Same as case 1, except that you are stranded because I put holes
in your tires before you set off. I then set off to find you, knowing that my act
would cause you to be stranded so that you will need my help... and so that
you will be willing to offer me most anything to get that help.
Karl Marx: Alienated Labor

1) The general conception of exploitation: Exploitation occurs iff a person
A harmfully utilizes a person B as a mere means for A's benefit. Exploitation
is the harmful, merely instrumental use of persons for the benefit of others
who utilize them.

2) The Transhistorical conception of exploitation in the labor process:
This conception is more specialized than (1). It is limited to relations within
the labor process, while (1) is not. According to Marx, each type of social
formation in the history of class divided societies has its own distinctive labor
process: in ancient city-states, it was slavery, in the Middle ages, it was the
Feudal system of serf labor, in modern capitalist society, it's wage-labor. The
following conception is 'transhistorical' in that it picks out elements common
to all the labor processes of the various class divided societies. These
elements are
1) The labor is forced
2) Part of the labor is uncompensated
3) the labor produces surplus products
4) the worker doesn't have control over the product.
Karl Marx: Alienated Labor

Surplus product is the value created by
the worker which goes beyond the value
embodied in his wages. According to
Marx, the worker receives only
compensation for his necessary labor (the
amount of labor necessary to provide for
his subsistence needs) and that the
surplus goes to the owner.
Karl Marx: Alienated Labor
3) The concept of exploitation in Capitalism:
(The Wage Labor Process)
Even more specialized: applies only to capitalist societies.
1) Labor is forced not through violence, but through monopoly,
by which the capitalist provides the only means of production:
the worker must work for the capitalist to survive.
2) Worker is paid only for part of the value he or she produces
3) there is surplus value created
4) the worker does not own the product, since the owner has
legal rights over it.
Karl Marx: Alienated Labor

THEORY OF ALIENATION:
1) Shows how people can be used as means-- as things.
2) shows why this is harmful to people.

WHAT CONSTITUTES ALIENATION OF LABOR?
1) Labor is external to the worker
2) labor is forced
3) worker puts value into commodity
4) worker's value (objectified) is no longer his own
5) this value is used as a means to his continued
oppression
Karl Marx: Alienated Labor

HOW ESTRANGED LABOR HARMS THE WORKER:
1) alienates 'nature from man' (object is no longer the
workers')
2) 'man from himself' (put into the object)
3) alienates man from man
4) turns man's species-being into a being alien to him,
and a means of his individual existence.

SPECIES BEING: The property that distinguishes us
from other things; the thing that's special about us.
According to Marx, what's special about us is our
capacity for creativity and productivity: the capacity to
work.
Karl Marx: Alienated Labor

MARX ON THE VALUE OF WORK:
[135?]1145: an animal is not distinct from the activities it performs.
[135*]1146: animals create only in response to need, but Humans
create even when free from physical need, and truly produces only
in freedom from such need. Animals produce only according to the
standards of need, while human beings produce according to
standards of beauty.
[134*]1144: Alienated laborers are "at home" only in their animal
functions, and are "not at home" when they are exercising their
highest human capacities. Alienation as the "loss of self."

According to Marx, Alienation makes a person's "species life" a
mere means to physical (animal) existence.
Karl Marx: Alienated Labor

"Let me hunt in the morning, fish in the
afternoon, breed cattle in the evening, and
criticize after dinner, just as I like, without
ever becoming a hunter, fisher, herdsman,
or critic." (The German Ideology)
Karl Marx: Alienated Labor

Marx on the DEVALUATION OF THE WORKER: "The devaluation of the worker
(and the worker's misery) is in direct proportion to the power and volume of the
worker's production." (1143)[133]

1) As the worker produces more, the owner becomes richer. (Where there's a surplus
of labor, impersonal working conditions, and few employers, the worker's subsistence
wages don't change as s/he works harder)
2) The wealth of the owner just is the work of the worker: the worker sells work to the
owner.
3) But work is the creative product of the worker; it is the worker's value. (In selling
this human value to the owner, Marx believes that the worker has entered a kind of
slavery contract.)
4) Through the labor process, a worker objectifies his or her human value by
changing labor into a commodity.
5) Except for wages, this is surplus value and is the property of the owner, not the
worker.
6) To the ownder, this surplus value is power. (As the owner becomes richer, s/he
gains more power.)
7) The owners power is used to maintain the status quo, and to find better and more
efficient ways to make workers work harder (to oppress the workers). Thus the
inverse relation between the value of workers and the volume of their production.)
9) Ultimately, it is the worker's own value which is the means to his and her
oppression.
Karl Marx: Alienated Labor

MEASURING EXPLOITATION: SURPLUS VALUE AND WAGES

SURPLUS VALUE: (value produced by the worker - value of wages
paid) In a monopoly, it is most economically rational for the
monopolist to pay the worker as little as he can. That is, just enough
for him to subsist. Since there's no way for the worker to survive
except by working for the monopolist, he will be willing to work for
mere subsistence.

Rate of Marxian exploitation:

=surplus value/value of wages
=(time worked-'time required to produce value of wages)/value of
wages
Karl Marx: Alienated Labor
Questions on Marx:
1) What is the characteristic that distinguishes human beings from
nonhuman animals? Compare Marx's view on this question to Aristotle's
view. How is this capacity related to Marx's theory of exploitation?
2) What does Marx mean in claiming that exploited workers are alienated (i)
from nature, (ii) from themselves, (iii) from one another?
3) What, in general, is Marx account of exploitation? What is the difference
between the general account, and the more specific accounts of the way
exploitation takes place in difference kinds of societies?
4) How, according to Marx, are workers exploited in capitalist societies?
5) Compare Marx, Rousseau, and Thrasymachus on the nature of "justice,"
explaining similarities & differences. [Don't worry about this one!]
6) Why does Marx believe that workers will be more deeply oppressed the
harder they work?
9) Why does Marx believe that workers' wages will be bare subsistence
wages?
10) What is the value of "work" for Marx? How is our capacity for work
connected with our need for freedom?
11) Explain the elements of Marx's concept of "alienation" [estrangement] of
labor.