Discourse on Inequality
Encyclopedia
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Jean-Jacques Rousseau was a Genevan philosopher, writer, and composer of 18th-century Romanticism. His political philosophy influenced the French Revolution as well as the overall development of modern political, sociological and educational thought.His novel Émile: or, On Education is a treatise...
. The text was written in 1754 in response to a prize competition of the Academy of Dijon
Académie des Sciences, Arts et Belles-Lettres de Dijon
The Académie de Dijon was founded by Hector-Bernard Pouffier, the most senior member of the Parlement de Bourgogne, in 1725. It received royal lettres patentes in 1740...
answering the prompt: What is the origin of inequality among men, and is it authorized by natural law
Natural law
Natural law, or the law of nature , is any system of law which is purportedly determined by nature, and thus universal. Classically, natural law refers to the use of reason to analyze human nature and deduce binding rules of moral behavior. Natural law is contrasted with the positive law Natural...
? Though he was not recognized by the prize committee for this piece (as he had been for the Discourse on the Arts and Sciences
Discourse on the Arts and Sciences
A Discourse on the Moral Effects of the Arts and Sciences , more commonly known as Discourse on the Sciences and Arts , is an essay by Genevan philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau which argued that the arts and sciences corrupt human morality...
) he nevertheless published the text in 1755.
Content
Rousseau discusses two types of inequality, natural or physical and ethical or political. Natural inequality involves differences between one man's physical strength and that of another – it is a product of nature. Rousseau is not concerned with this type of inequality and wishes to investigate moral inequality. He argues moralMoral
A moral is a message conveyed or a lesson to be learned from a story or event. The moral may be left to the hearer, reader or viewer to determine for themselves, or may be explicitly encapsulated in a maxim...
inequality is endemic to a civil society
Civil society
Civil society is composed of the totality of many voluntary social relationships, civic and social organizations, and institutions that form the basis of a functioning society, as distinct from the force-backed structures of a state , the commercial institutions of the market, and private criminal...
and relates to, and causes, differences in power and wealth. This type of inequality is established by convention. Rousseau appears to take a cynical view of civil society, where man has strayed from his "natural state" of isolation and consequent freedom to satisfy his individual needs and desires. For Rousseau, civil society is a trick perpetrated by the powerful on the weak in order to maintain their power or wealth. But this is Rousseau's final conclusion; he begins his discussion with an analysis of a natural man who has not yet acquired language or abstract thought.
Rousseau's natural man is very different from that of Hobbes
Thomas Hobbes
Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury , in some older texts Thomas Hobbs of Malmsbury, was an English philosopher, best known today for his work on political philosophy...
. In fact, Rousseau explicitly points this out at various points throughout his work. Rousseau discredits Hobbes for taking an overly cynical view of man. Unlike Hobbes's natural man, Rousseau's is not motivated by fear of death because he cannot conceive of that end, thus fear of death already suggests a movement out of the state of nature
State of nature
State of nature is a term in political philosophy used in social contract theories to describe the hypothetical condition that preceded governments...
. Rousseau's natural man is more or less like any other animal, with "self-preservation being his chief and almost sole concern" and "the only goods he recognizes in the universe" being "food, a female, and sleep..." This natural man, unlike Hobbes's, is not in constant state of fear and anxiety.
Rousseau's natural man possesses a few qualities that allow him to distinguish himself from the animals over a long period of time. Of importance is man's ability to choose, which Rousseau refers to as "free-agency" (f. libre-arbitre). However Rousseau's proclamation of man's free will
Free will
"To make my own decisions whether I am successful or not due to uncontrollable forces" -Troy MorrisonA pragmatic definition of free willFree will is the ability of agents to make choices free from certain kinds of constraints. The existence of free will and its exact nature and definition have long...
is undermined by his belief that man is "a being that always acts in accordance with certain and invariable principles", and indeed contradicts the basic premise of the Discourse itself: that we can logically infer what actions man must have taken over the course of his development. In addition, Rousseau argues that "another principle which has escaped Hobbes" is man's compassion
Compassion
Compassion is a virtue — one in which the emotional capacities of empathy and sympathy are regarded as a part of love itself, and a cornerstone of greater social interconnection and humanism — foundational to the highest principles in philosophy, society, and personhood.There is an aspect of...
. This quality of man also motivates him to interact. Finally, man possesses the quality of "perfectibility
Perfection
Perfection is, broadly, a state of completeness and flawlessness.The term "perfection" is actually used to designate a range of diverse, if often kindred, concepts...
," which allows him to improve his own physical condition/environmental situation and develop ever more sophisticated survival tactics. The increasing regularity and convention of man's contact with other men transfigures his basic capacity for reason and reflection, his natural or naive love of self (amour de soi meme) into a corrupting dependency on the perceptions and favor of others. Natural, non-destructive love of self advances gradually yet qualitatively into a state of amour propre, a love of self now driven by pride and jealousy rather than merely elemental self-preservation. This accession to amour propre has four consequences: (1) competition, (2) self-comparison with others, (3) hatred, and (4) urge for power. These all lead to Rousseau's cynical civil society. But amour de soi meme also suggests a significant step out of the state of nature.
Rousseau's man is a "savage" man. He is a loner and self-sufficient. Any battle or skirmish was only to protect himself. The natural man was in prime condition, fast, and strong, capable of caring for himself. He killed only for his own self preservation. When the natural man established property as his own, this was the "beginning of evil" according to Rousseau, though, he acknowledges the sanctity of the institution of property and that government should be created to protect it. The natural man should have "pulled up the stakes" to prevent this evil from spreading. This property established divisions in the natural world. The first was the master-slave relationship. Property also led to the creation of families. The natural man was no longer alone. The subsequent divisions almost all stem from this division of land.
Dedication
The work is dedicated to the state of GenevaGeneva
Geneva In the national languages of Switzerland the city is known as Genf , Ginevra and Genevra is the second-most-populous city in Switzerland and is the most populous city of Romandie, the French-speaking part of Switzerland...
, Rousseau's birthplace. On the face of the dedication, he praises Geneva as a good, if not perfect, republic. The qualities he picks out for praise include the stability of its laws and institutions, the community spirit of its inhabitants, and its good relations with neighbouring states, neither threatening them nor threatened by them, and the well behaved women of Geneva. However, this is not how Geneva truly was. This is the type of the regime Rousseau wished for. The epistle dedicatory is a highly ironic and idealized version of the Geneva Rousseau really wanted. Also, his description is in great contrast with Paris, where he had spent many years previous to writing this discourse, and where he had left bitterly. So, his description of Geneva is in part, a statement against Paris.