THOMAS HOBBES

Thomas Hobbes X
Thomas Hobbes was born
prematurely in the midst of
war between Spain and
England, hence his statement
“Fear and I were born twins.”
 HOBBES AND HUMAN NATURE
Human Nature is equal to the
behaviour of human beings in
their natural condition.

Hobbes identified two kinds of

physical motions that account for
human life.
 Vital-involuntary or unwilled,
for example, unthinking life
functions: inhalation, digestion,
circulation; these purely physical
and therefore
physiological
 Voluntary or willed activities-
speaking, walking, getting
involved in politics and
various kinds of social interaction
(behaviour).

Psychology precedes social and

political science in the study of
human behaviour, for example,
before we walk we must move
our legs; before we speak we
must know what we wish to say.
Knowing and wiling constitute
the whole of the psychological
process. These are simply internal
voluntary motions within the
brain caused by the stimulation of
outer sensations.
Our will causes us to desire
things and desire is ceaseless. It
causes our drives/forces to
 imagine and to acquire
knowledge. This force Hobbes
called endeavor. Endeavour is
nothing more that, appetite or
desire for pleasure and aversion
to avoid pain.
The will is ceaseless; man’s quest
for pleasure is insatiable; human
beings are innately self-interested
power-seekers.
Hobbes claimed that the will is
the determining factor of human
behaviour not knowledge.
Felicity or happiness can be
experienced as a realization of
pleasure. We find pleasure in
something; it makes up happy.
All human beings do will and
desire one thing in common and
that is power, because it gives
them happiness. Power is a
means of attaining happiness.
Hobbes’ psychological profile of
man is seen as a desiring, power
seeking animal that uses his
intellectual capacity to further his
own ends.

He regards human nature as

utterly self-interested and self-
regarding, hence innately
antisocial. We will act according
to what we think, will produce
the greatest pleasure or the least
pain.
STATE OF NATURE
State of nature- a condition in
which people are unconstrained
by legal rules, since there is no
governing power to make such
rules.
Even the most primitive people
have some sort of polity.
Because of man’s ceaseless
desire for power and happiness,
in the state of nature where
there are no constraints man has
a right to anything and
everything, thus he will destroy
any obstacles in his path to
achieve same.
Therefore, the state of nature is
a state of war.

“Herein exists continual fear and

danger of violent death and the
life of man was solitary, poor,
nasty, brutish and short.”
By nature, human beings are
power seekers who if not
constrained will annihilate each
other.

Human nature is different in civil

society because of socialization
and political control.
Hobbes stated that in order to
have an insight to a given
situation one must empathize
because to be able to govern a
whole nation man must read in
himself how mankind will
behave. One must be honest and
accurate about oneself.
THEORY OF THE SOCIAL
CONTRACT AS IDENTIFIED BY
THOMAS HOBBES
The idea is that: the
State/Government was
formed/created as a result of a
contract between human beings
and the scope and extent of the
powers of government are to be
determined by an analysis of the
terms of the contract.
State -is equal to Government,
this is the body that gives the
State real life.
It was created by mutual
agreement of its members. Thus
government is legitimate only if it
corresponds to what men (the
people) have rationally consented
to.
Human beings would consent only
to that which rationally accords
with their needs and desires.
Civil Society- the legal and political

structure of Society.
WHY DO MEN CONTRACT OUT
Men created a State/Government
in order to:
secure peace
avoid the constant threat of
violence or even death
 the pain of war
 achieve some form of
happiness
 secure peace from other states
and from each other.
 It is raw self-interest, not moral
impulse that explains the
existence of the State.
 The powers of government
must be absolute to protect man
from himself, and each other.
 The desire for security compels
men to contract into civil society.
 All powers shall reside with
government and the rights of
individuals shall only be those
allowed.
 The State cannot exist, unless
men lay down their rights of
governing themselves and turn
it over to a common sovereign
power.
 Sovereignty means ultimate
power- the state possesses the
final ultimate power over all
other social and political bodies.
 The State controls the church
and it was supreme in matter of
religious beliefs.
Sovereignty- political unit with
final authority.

Government- people placed in

positions to make decisions

Because of man’s nature and his

lust for power he gave up all his
rights to the sovereign, less he
seeks more power, given some,
and uses it to subvert the
government. They have no
alternative because of fear of
returning to the State of Nature
and the pain inherent within.
The contract was not a reciprocal
agreement between subjects and
sovereign, men
contracted/agreed with each
other to turn their rights over to
the government and once this
was done they agreed to obey
because they had no choice.
They consented to obey
government because it was in
their self-interest to do so, to
avoid the penalties of breaking
the law. They would no obey the
law because it was morally
correct. If they broke the law they
would be punished.
Hobbes believed that a
monarchial form of government
was best to preserve sovereignty.
Monarchy ruled by power.
Constitutional rights do not really
limit the power of government.
Rights and liberties are granted
by government and can be taken
whenever the government see
it fit.
According to Hobbes all men
possessed the following rights:
Liberty/freedom
Sovereignty/life
Property/wealth
If government abused its powers
by violating people’s lives and
liberties the purpose of the
contract would be
vitiated/defective/violated/invalid
and might lead people to revolt
through an act of Civil
Disobedience
“An affirmation of one’s conscience
as the highest law but at the same
time acknowledging the need for
civil law and order”
Power- that which compels
obedience by the use of force or by
the threat thereof. Power is based
upon an appeal to self-interest.

Authority- is that form of

obedience that is inwardly willed
because the citizen feels he ought
to obey the law. He is pre-disposed
to obey the law.

Epicurean principle- the desire for

pleasure.
ROUSSEAU
ROUSSEAU
Rousseau was a Contract Theorist
and he was perceived as the
Intellectual Father of the French
Revolution.
State of Nature
His chief objective was to find a
social order whose laws were in
greatest harmony with the
fundamental laws of nature.
He believed that man’s life; his
freedom; and happiness depended
upon his understanding of the laws
of society and that nature and
society worked according to such
laws:
He identified two conditions
 The Natural
 The Social

“Natural man was simply man

divested of what he had acquired
in society.”

Social man is a product of society.

Rousseau posited that there was a
natural man and that the best
social system was that which
enabled him to realize his
potentialities to the fullest.
 Man in nature had neither
language nor knowledge.
 His needs were extremely simple
and purely physical.
 All he required was food, a mate,
rest
 He had no thoughts of the future
and lived for the present. Once his
needs were satisfied there was
harmony.
 In the natural condition man
enjoyed equality, in the faculties of
both body and mind.
 He agreed with Hobbes that
natural man was egoistic, solitary
and perhaps even brutish, but he
disagreed that resulted in war.
 He, felt that man was capable of
sympathy.
 Even without knowledge and
language man had the ability to
place himself in the position of
Man is naturally pitiful because
man was born good.
Modern man has lost the spirit of
community because he has lost his
“pity”.
For example, domestic violence
and the involvement of the
community in family life.
another and to sense his feelings.
He can empathize with others and
to a certain degree feel their
sorrows.
The only natural virtue that man
has is the “virtue of pity” the ability
to empathize and sympathize with
others in difficult circumstances.
In Rousseau’s state of nature man
was:
 Neither good nor evil,
 Quarrelsome nor domineering,
 Not educated; not progressive,
 Had no speech
 At that time man did not live in
society and had no culture.
 Man was amoral; he was neither
moral nor immoral.
 There was a state of peace.
 Man was born naturally good.
 Primitive man had no property;
therefore there were no social
classes.
The Origin of Society
Harmonious balance prevailed until
something in the physical
environment upset it.
 Population in increase.
 Change in climate conditions.
 Change in industry.
•First, families were formed and
then they banded to form
societies.
• As they learnt to act together
they learned to speak.
• With speech they acquired the
ability to accumulate knowledge
and pass it on to their children.
• Man had invented culture.

The cultivation of plants, the

domestication of animals, and the
division of labour, generally opened
the way to all kinds of social
inequalities which appeared for the
first time.
Hence it was the acquisition of
wealth/private property that
caused man to be enslaved, for
example, building a house, grilling
it up from thieves and hiding the
key and in an emergency you are
trapped inside.
Civilized man developed social
classes based on the development
of private property. Thus people
began to exploit each other.
The desire for private property
produced competition for
economic goods, and the striving
for political power, honour and
status.
Man lost his freedom because of
exploitation/domination. He lost
his innate values.
The struggle for innate social
desires and property affected the
innate goodness of man and he
became other directed.
Man began to calculate his own
selfish desires. Hence his ability to
rationalize became perverted.
Advantage was taken against other,
because man’s sole purpose was to
gain power and property.
Reasoning became corrupt and
man used his ability to rob others
and to exploit them, for example
confidence tricksters.
Man was perfect, but because of
society, that perfectibility was
destroyed and with inequalities the
civil state arose.
For Rousseau the state was
incompatible with natural man, it
did not allow man self-fulfillment,
it represented and deformed him.
Man was divided by artificial
inequalities and was held together
by force. The natural inequalities
perpetuated by the social
institutions known as inheritance,
soon acquired stability and
legitimacy.
Man began independent and free,
now became the tool and victim
of another.
“Man was born free yet we see him
every where in chains those
themselves masters of others cease
now to be even greater slaves that
the people they govern. How this
happens I am ignorant, but if I were
asked what renders it justifiable I
believe it may by in
my power to resolve the question.”
It became necessary to form a
society in which every member
would be protected by the united
power of the entire political
organization and in which each
individual though uniting with
others, remains free and equal.
THE SOCIAL CONTRACT
Rousseau proposed a State where
there was:
• no subjection of its members,
• instead members must enjoy
freedom and equality;
• popular sovereignty
• The social contract was to be
formed by free and equal
individuals.
• The individual does not simply
subordinate himself, but rather
assents only to such obligations that
he himself recognizes as valid and
necessary.
Rousseau recognized that there
would be inequalities such as
physical inequality and saw
inequality of property as
unavoidable.
For him the state was entitled to interfere
only when inequality endangered the
moral equality of citizens.
He advocated that limits be placed
on the inheritance of wealth when
such wealth could be used as
instruments in the hands of the
wealthy and powerful.
• He is a member of a society of equals
and has regained an equality like the
one he enjoyed in the nature but a
new form and on a higher level.
• Here all desire the happiness of each.
• He argued that sovereignty is
inalienable and indivisible.
• In large communities democracy
exists with representation and
delegation of powers.
•He recognized that the force of
government,
• Government , although it professed to
represent the general will, could
usurp power and act against the
common good.
• Government was a constant threat to
man’s freedom and yet it was
indispensable;
• Government was the corrupting
element in society;
• Government threatens continually to
undermine the sovereignty of the
people.
He suggested that aristocracy may be
the best form of government.
However aristocracy was to be a
government composed of a minority
chosen on the basis of age and
experience.
But even then, those who govern will
have to be guided by divine wisdom
and patience.