Rousseau argues excellently for amour-propre’s role in establishing an unjust society and overall inequality. Rousseau explains in depth how amour-propre effects human behavior and how it ultimately leads to the establishment of inequality in civilized society.
Rousseau begins his theory by introducing the two sentiments that humans are subjected to, amour-de-soi and amour-propre. Amour-de-soi is an unfettered, personally derived, love of one’s self. A love that is derived from one’s own idea of what it means to be human and to be alive, a feeling of self-preservation. On the contrary, amour-propre is a self-love derived from what others think of you. This type of self-love is formed by the opinions of others and is entirely destructive to
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humans. These two ideas, especially amour-propre, are important to his explanation of the origin of inequality. Rousseau, after laying out the two types of moral sentiments, begins to explain the origins of civilization and the subsequent arrival of political inequality. During, what Rousseau calls, the First Revolution, humans begin to discover some new tools and techniques. Humans built semi-permanent residences and create families, entering the first stages of a property based society. Living in a tight knit, makeshift society, humans began to enjoy each others presence as it made survival easier, even if at the consequence of making humans “softer”. Eventually after living together for extended periods of time, humans became familiar enough with each other that comparison became possible. Humans could now make a comparison between others based on looks, strength, weaknesses, this is where amour-propre takes control and the transition to political inequality begins. Public esteems now reigns supreme as the society begins to compare each other. Humans now begin to act based upon what will get them the most amount of self-esteem derived from public opinion rather than what would better suit themselves, amour-propre has all but taken over now.
Being that a human wants to be held in a higher esteem than another human in the same society, he also wants to be valued more, thus establishing inequality. At this point amour-de-soi is not entirely out of the picture but almost entirely obsolete. The place where humans went wrong, in terms of solidifying their own demise, is when they began to rely on each other, rather than rely on themselves for sustenance, the introduction of metallurgy and agriculture accentuates this. Once metallurgy and agriculture arise the small physical inequalities that were not a problem before are taken advantage of. A stronger person is able to plow and harvest the fields and therefore are more able to exponentially abuse their advantage over time. Now that humans are able to harvest land deduction leads humans to claim the lands as their own, thus the need for laws and justice. Progress and technology put some ahead of others and also creates divisions within a particular society. Harmful artificial inequalities follow from benign natural inequalities. Amour-propre’s role in founding inequality is solidified in the last part of Rousseau’s theory with the foundation of society. Because the rich have an illicit incentive to harm others, but have the most to lose from constant war, they are able to seduce the
poor into an unequal society where the rich keep what they have and the poor do as well, without war. The poor give up their natural freedoms and succumb to the trap of civilized society because they have nothing to lose from doing so, thus solidifying inequality. Rousseau fails to realize that the poor joining civilized society was inevitable. The rich have the resources and the illicit incentive to harm others to further their own agendas and increase their self-esteem, derived from amour-propre. The poor have nothing to lose from joining society, but have their lives to lose from not and by sacrificing their personal freedom they intern receive the protection of a civilized society. Those who are incapable of manipulating the public are naturally going to fall to the bottom of the food-chain and those who can will rise to the top, it is just an advanced form of our savage nature. The benign inequalities that Rousseau mentioned are not benign at all. Benign inequalities would be someone who was naturally equal, but in a different manner. For instance, a human may be tall and frail and can therefore reach higher trees to grab food, but his benign equal would be a short muscular person who could hunt better. The two are inherently equal but differ in appearance, thus making them unequal in Rousseau’s eyes. But what about the short, frail person who can’t reach the trees and who is not strong enough to hunt? What happens to him? How does he survive? He is naturally going to be a scavenger, therefore the short, frail human must rely on the other two humans because he does not have the capacity to compete. The short, frail person must submit to the protection of the two in order not to starve to death. Yes, amour-propre has an inherent role in furthering inequality, but it does not establish it. Inequality is established by our natural abilities, not the opinion of others, but amour-propre can be used to capitalize on those natural abilities. What the criticism lacks is the understanding that Rousseau acknowledges the fact that humans are naturally unequal, he categorizes these inequalities as natural inequalities, but he is not referring to natural inequalities when discussing the establishment of inequality, he is referring to political inequalities. Natural inequalities are those that one is born with, but political inequalities are those that are brought about due to society, for example wealth. Rousseau understands that without amour-propre those natural inequalities would not be capitalized upon, the naturally powerful would leave the naturally weak alone, the inequalities are essentially invisible. But in the society amour-propre is allowed to flourish, those natural inequalities are exposed and capitalized upon as the powerful are in contention with the opinion of the people, although the poor will most likely be left alone. In society the powerful will still have the capability to amass wealth and public esteem and therefore facilitate ineqaulity. Therefore, the criticism is not sound. In lieu of the criticism provided and the subsequent rebuttal, I think that Rousseau argues effectively for amour-propre’s inherent involvement in the establishment of inequality in a political society. Rousseau’s theory is near perfection, its criticism pose little threat to the theory as a hole.
Jean Jacques Rousseau in On Education writes about how to properly raise and educate a child. Rousseau's opinion is based on his own upbringing and lack of formal education at a young age. Rousseau depicts humanity as naturally good and becomes evil because humans tamper with nature, their greatest deficiency, but also possess the ability to transform into self-reliant individuals. Because of the context of the time, it can be seen that Rousseau was influenced by the idea of self-preservation, individual freedom, and the Enlightenment, which concerned the operation of reason, and the idea of human progress. Rousseau was unaware of psychology and the study of human development. This paper will argue that Rousseau theorizes that humanity is naturally good by birth, but can become evil through tampering and interfering with nature.
Both Aristotle's “Politics” and Jean Jacques Rousseau's Discourse on Inequality address the natural right and superiority of man and his subsets. In his piece, Aristotle discusses the emotional feeling of superiority, while Rousseau discusses the more logistical aspects. Together, their writing begs the question of the morality of slavery. Aristotle seems more willing to accept slavery as a natural creation by humans, however, in the end both of their pieces show the immorality and abnormality of slavery. Rousseau and Aristotle both believe that some people are naturally superior to others, and together they create a well-rounded understanding of how superiority complexes are justified.
Second Treatise of Government by John Locke and Discourse on the Origin of Inequality by Jean-Jacques Rousseau are books written to try and explain the origin of society. Both try to explain the evils and inequalities of society, and to a certain degree to discuss whether man in his natural state is better than man in society. These political science based theories do not appear, at first, to have anything in common with J. Hector St. John De Crèvecoeur’s Letters from an American Farmer, which are letters written by Crèvecoeur during the settling of America and the beginning of the American Revolution, however with examination we can see reflection of both Locke’s and Rousseau’s ideas about things such as human nature, government, and inequality.
Throughout the existence of man debates over property and inequality have always existed. Man has been trying to reach the perfect state of society for as long as they have existed. John Locke, Jean Jacques Rousseau, and Martin Luther King are three great examples of men who broke down the basics of how property and inequality are related. Each historical figure has their own distinct view on the situation. Some views are similar while others vary greatly. These philosophers and seekers of peace and equality make many great arguments as to how equality and property can impact man and society. Equality and property go hand in hand in creating an equal society. Each authors opinion has its own factors that create a mindset to support that opinion. In this paper we will discuss the writings of John Locke, Jean Jacques Rousseau, and Martin Luther King Jr. and the factors that influenced their opinions on inequality and property.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau was a great philosopher who lived in the Enlightenment. He was a very influential philosopher and “Thinker” he has written many books including The Discourse on the Origin of Inequality. Rousseau’s theory was in essence that humans were created naturally pure and innocent but over time and new technologies become more evil. He had thought that in the very first light of man he was completely innocent, a being who had no intention to harm anyone else. However as time progressed and the growing capacity for man increased and the
...eing mandated for protection. Rousseau’s conception of liberty is more dynamic. Starting from all humans being free, Rousseau conceives of the transition to civil society as the thorough enslavement of humans, with society acting as a corrupting force on Rousseau’s strong and independent natural man. Subsequently, Rousseau tries to reacquaint the individual with its lost freedom. The trajectory of Rousseau’s freedom is more compelling in that it challenges the static notion of freedom as a fixed concept. It perceives that inadvertently freedom can be transformed from perfectly available to largely unnoticeably deprived, and as something that changes and requires active attention to preserve. In this, Rousseau’s conception of liberty emerges as more compelling and interesting than Locke’s despite the Lockean interpretation dominating contemporary civil society.
John Locke and Jean Jacques Rousseau, following their predecessor Thomas Hobbes, both attempt to explain the development and dissolution of society and government. They begin, as Hobbes did, by defining the “state of nature”—a time before man found rational thought. In the Second Treatise[1] and the Discourse on Inequality[2], Locke and Rousseau, respectively, put forward very interesting and different accounts of the state of nature and the evolution of man, but the most astonishing difference between the two is their conceptions of property. Both correctly recognize the origin of property to be grounded in man’s natural desire to improve his life, but they differ in their description of the result of such a desire. Locke sees the need and purpose of society to protect property as something sacred to mankind, while Rousseau sees property as the cause of the corruption and eventual downfall of society. Although Rousseau raises interesting and applicable observations, Locke’s argument triumphs because he successfully shows the positive and essential effect of property on man.
In his “Discourse on the Origin and the Foundations of Inequality Among Mankind,” Jean-Jacque Rousseau attributes the foundation of moral inequalities, as a separate entity from the “natural” physical inequalities, which exist between only between men in a civilised society. Rousseau argues that the need to strive for excellence is one of man’s principle features and is responsible for the ills of society. This paper will argue that Rousseau is justified in his argument that the characteristic of perfectibility, as per his own definition, is the cause of the detriments in his civilised society.
In his Discourse on Inequality, Rousseau hypothesizes the natural state of man to understand where inequality commenced. To analyze the nature of man, Rousseau “strip[ped] that being, thus constituted, of all the supernatural gifts he could have received, and of all the artificial faculties he could have acquired only through a lengthy process,” so that all that was left was man without any knowledge or understanding of society or the precursors that led to it (Rousseau 47). In doing so, Rousseau saw that man was not cunning and devious as he is in society today, but rather an “animal less strong than some, less agile than others, but all in all, the most advantageously organized of all” (47). Rousseau finds that man leads a simple life in the sense that “the only goods he knows in the un...
In Rousseau’s book “A Discourse On Inequality”, he looks into the question of where the general inequality amongst men came from. Inequality exists economically, structurally, amongst different generations, genders, races, and in almost all other areas of society. However, Rousseau considers that there are really two categories of inequality. The first is called Natural/Physical, it occurs as an affect of nature. It includes inequalities of age,, health, bodily strength, and the qualities of the mind and soul. The second may be called Moral/Political inequality, this basically occurs through the consent of men. This consists of the privileges one group may have over another, such as the rich over the poor.
If scholarship is done right, it is that which is done impartially. The topic of this paper, the perfect woman, written by a man, may give those with prejudgments a ready answer to it; without the due analysis required by it. Reading both authors now, it is easy to bash Rousseau with sexism and stamp Wollstonecraft with feminism. But such was not my task, rather I examined both with an unprejudiced eye to the best of my ability. Thus, I hope the same is reciprocated by my reader, and take my interpretations and criticisms with the same impartial mind. To begin, then, my argument, I assert that although Rousseau and Wollstonecraft effect disparate views on the best education for women, the supposed disagreement of their model of the perfect woman is specious; their concept of the human species and its purpose is truly in contention.
While Rousseau praises the purity and freedom of humans in the state of nature, he favors civilization’s stage of development into the “hut society” stage and views contemporary society as a corruption of human virtue. Hut society significant inequality as people remained independent without the division of labor. Rousseau describes hut society as “A golden mean between the indolence of the primitive state and the petulant activity of our vanity” (150-151). He sees hut society as having the best of both worlds; limited in its vanity, but also enough so that people enjoy the company of others and are at least somewhat productive.
From his figurative window, Rousseau sees a Europe ravaged by conflicts resulting from supposedly peaceable and civilized institutions (111). He posits that the essentially problematic flaw, the cause of conflict, is a contradiction in modes of relating: while individuals live within a framework of enforced norms ("l...
The socioeconomic condition and status of a person greatly impacts whether or not love will be reciprocated. That is evidenced by the story of “Désirée’s Baby”, by Kate Chopin and the poems “The Passionate Shepherd to His Love”, by Christopher Marlowe and “The Nymph’s Reply to the Shepherd”, by Sir Walter Raleigh. All these literary works relate love with socioeconomic status and how love is subordinated to society’s norms.
The opening line of Jean-Jacques Rousseau's influential work 'The Social Contract' (1762), is 'man is born free, and he is everywhere in chains. Those who think themselves masters of others are indeed greater slaves than they'. These are not physical chains, but psychological and means that all men are constraints of the laws they are subjected to, and that they are forced into a false liberty, irrespective of class. This goes against Rousseau's theory of general will which is at the heart of his philosophy. In his Social Contract, Rousseau describes the transition from a state of of nature, where men are naturally free, to a state where they have to relinquish their naturalistic freedom. In this state, and by giving up their natural rights, individuals communise their rights to a state or body politic. Rousseau thinks by entering this social contract, where individuals unite their power and freedom, they can then gain civic freedom which enables them to remain free as the were before. In this essay, I will endeavour to provide arguments and examples to conclude if Rousseau provides a viable solution to what he calls the 'fundamental problem' posed in the essay title.