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The Social Contract: Why We Obey Rules We Didn't Choose
Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau on the foundations of political obligation
You were born into laws you never agreed to. What gives a society the right to demand your obedience?
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The social contract tradition attempts to justify political authority by imagining a hypothetical agreement among individuals to form society. Thomas Hobbes argued that without government, life would be 'solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short' — so rational individuals surrender freedom to a sovereign in exchange for security.
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Question 1 of 1According to Locke, what justifies citizens revolting against their government?