Political Philosophy of

Thomas Hobbes &

State of Nature
 INTRODUCTION

• Hobbes is the founding father of modern political philosophy. Directly or

indirectly, he has set the terms of debate about the fundamentals of political
life right into our own times. Few have liked his thesis, that the problems
of political life mean that a society should accept an unaccountable
sovereign as its sole political authority. Nonetheless, we still live in the
world that Hobbes addressed head on: a world where human authority is
something that requires justification, and is automatically accepted by few;
a world where social and political inequality also appears questionable; and
a world where religious authority faces significant dispute.
HOBBES’ POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
 Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679): Argues in favor of absolute monarchy.
 He published his book, the Leviathan, in 1651. In this book he
gave a striking exposition of the theoryof Social Contract.
 His object was to defend the absolute power of the monarch and he
used the doctrine of the Social Contract to support it.
 Believed that life in the state of nature is "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish,
and short"
 His most famous work is Leviathan.
POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY

 Believed that humans are inherently bad because everyone is self-

interested.
 Hobbes felt it was best to submit to the will of a Sovereign without
question. He believed that humans are inherently bad because everyone
is self-interested. Hobbes felt it was best to submit to the will of a
Sovereign without question.
POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY

• Using the device of the social contract, Hobbes explained the nature of
sovereignty, its location, the relationship with the individual, the essential
functions of a government, and the origins of a state. Hobbes defended a
case for absolute legal sovereignty, since sovereign power was the result
of a zero-sum game. Absolute power ensured complete order. Conversely,
its absence meant chaos.
HUMAN NATURE-PLEASURE-PAIN THEORY

• Contrary to Aristotle and the medieval thinkers, who saw human nature as innately social, Hobbes
viewed human beings as isolated, egoistic, self-interested, and seeking society as a means to their
ends. Individuals were creatures of desire, seeking pleasure and avoiding pain. Pleasures were good
and pain bad, which was why men sought to pursue and maximize their pleasures and avoid pain.
The pleasure-pain theory was developed in a coherent and systematic theory of human behaviour
and motivation by the Utilitarians, especially Bentham in the eighteenth century. In addition to
being creatures of pleasure and pain, Hobbes saw individuals constantly in motion to satisfy their
desires. Continual success in the attainment and fulfilment of their desires was called felicity, a
condition of movement and not rest. Appetites were insatiable, for the satisfaction of some gave rise
to others. Satisfaction therefore was a temporary feeling, for individuals were aware of the
recurrence of desires. Not only did individuals ensure the means for present satisfaction, but they
also provided for future ones.
 HUMAN NATURE-PERSONAL SATISFACTION

• Human will, in Hobbes’ philosophy, did not imply anything spiritual or transcendental
but was related to the natural needs of the body. He mentioned a long list of passions, but
the special emphasis was on fear, in particular the fear of death, and on the universal and
perfectly justified quest for power. In contrast to classical philosophers, Hobbes did not
assign any positive or higher aim to life. There “is no Summum Bonum (Greatest Good)
as is spoken of in the Books of the Old Moral Philosophers”. Since individuals would
like to do their own thing, pursue their own desires, there was no ultimate human good as
a criterion of ethical judgement. One could expect, in life, at most only “felicity”, which
was continual prosperity. “For there is no such thing as perpetual tranquility of mind,
while we live here; because Life itself is but Motion, and can never be without Desire,
nor without Fear, no more than without Sense”.
HUMAN NATURE-SLAVE TO DESIRES

• Hobbes contended that life was nothing but a perpetual and relentless desire
and pursuit of power, a prerequisite for felicity. He pointed out that one
ought to recognize a “general inclination of all mankind, a perpetual and
restless desire for Power after power that ceased only in Death”.
Consequently, individuals were averse to death, especially accidental death,
for it marked the end of attainment of all felicity. Power was sought for it
represented a means of acquiring those things that made life worthwhile and
contented, called felicity. The fact that all individuals (and not merely the
political elite) sought power distinguished Hobbes from Machiavelli.
 HUMAN NATURE-EQUALITY OF MEN
• Another significant facet of Hobbes’ perception that set him apart from both ancient and
medieval philosophers was his belief in the equality of men, the fact that men were equal in
physical power, and faculties of mind. By equality, Hobbes meant equal ability and the
equal hope of attaining the ends individuals aspired for. The physically weak may achieve
by cunning what the strong could accomplish through force. Hobbes accepted differences
in physical or natural endowments. Human beings were endowed with both reason and
passions (reason being passive while passions active). Differences in passions created
differences in wits, with a desire to excel over others. Since individuals were equal and
active, those who succeeded would have more enemies and competitors, and face
maximum danger. A permanent rivalry existed between human beings for honour, riches
and authority, with life as nothing but potential warfare, a war of everyone against the
others.
 STATE OF NATURE

• In the light of bleak and pessimistic human nature, the picturization of the
state of nature was gloomy and sordid. Hobbes saw human relationships as
those of mutual suspicion and hostility. The only rule that individuals
acknowledged was that one would take if one had the power, and retain as
long as one could. In this “ill condition”, there was no law, no justice, no
notion of right and wrong with only force and fraud as the two cardinal
virtues. Justice and injustice “relate to man in society, not in solitude”. Daniel
Defoe’s (1660-1731) Robinson Crusoe (1719) graphically captured the
Hobbesian depiction of an atomistic asocial individual.
 STATE OF NATURE

• The principal cause of conflict was within the nature of man. Competition,
diffidence and glory were the three reasons that were responsible for quarrel
and rivalry among individuals. “The first maketh men invade for Gain; the
second, for Safety; and the third, for Reputation. The first use Violence, to
make themselves Masters of other men’s persons ... the second to defend
them; the third, for trifles. Hobbes did not attribute the predicament of the
natural person to either sin or depravity, but to human nature. The individual
was the author of his own ruination. The state of nature degenerated into a
state of war, “a war of every man against every man”. The state of nature was
a condition when political authority failed:
 NATURAL LAWS
• In a state of nature, individuals enjoyed complete liberty, including a natural right to
everything, even to one another’s bodies. Subsequently, Hobbes, like Grotius, argued that
the laws of nature were also proper laws, since they were “delivered in the word of God”. It
prescribes types of civil manners that promote peaceful behaviour. Natural laws in Hobbes’
theory did not mean eternal justice, perfect morality or standards to judge existing laws as
the Stoics did. They did not imply the existence of common good, for they merely created
the common conditions which were necessary to fulfil each individual good. These laws
were immutable. There were three important natural laws: (a) seek peace and follow it; (b)
abandon the natural right to things; and (c) that individuals must honour their contracts.
Hobbes stressed the fact that peace demanded mutual confidence, for society depended on
mutual trust. This led him to conclude that supreme power ought to coincide with supreme
authority.
 SOCIAL CONTRACT

• Since the first law of nature enjoined individuals to seek peace, the only way
to attain it was through a covenant leading to the establishment of a state.
Individuals surrendered all their powers through a contract to a third party
who was not a party to the contract, but nevertheless received all the powers
that were surrendered. The commonwealth was constituted when the multitude
of individuals were united in one person, when every person said to the other,
“I Authorise and give up my Right of Governing my self, to this Man, or this
Assembly of men, on this condition, that thou give up thy Right to him, and
Authorise all his Actions in like manner”.
 SOCIAL CONTRACT

• Everyone, by consenting to a set of rules, guaranteed basic equality with every

other member. This also meant that no one possessed more rights than another.
The sovereign must treat all the individuals equally in matters of justice and
levying taxes. Hobbes defined justice as equality in treatment and equality in
rights. It also involved keeping one’s promises, for non-performance would
lead to an unequal status. Hobbes equated justice with fairness, treating others
as one would expect to be treated. Once the sovereign power was created it
would be bestowed with all powers..
 SOCIAL CONTRACT

• Hobbes preferred the beneficiary of the contract, the third person, to be a

monarch. Commonwealths differed not due to the nature of the sovereign
power, but in the numbers who wielded and exercised this power. Monarchy
was preferable to an aristocracy or democracy because of the following
reasons:
• 1. The self-indulgence of one compared to that of many would be cheaper;
• 2. The existence of an identity of interests between the king and his subjects; and
• 3. Less intrigues and plots, which were normally due to personal ambitions and envy
of members of the ruling elite.
 SOCIAL CONTRACT

• Adhering to the Monist view, Hobbes saw the sovereign power as undivided,
unlimited, inalienable and permanent. The contract created the state and the
government simultaneously. His defense of absolute state power in reality was
a justification of absolute government or monarchy, because of a failure to
distinguish between the state and the government. However, absolute power
was not based on the notion of the divine rights of kings but derived through a
contract that was mutually agreed upon and willingly acquiesced to.
 SOCIAL CONTRACT

• Hobbes’ theory of sovereignty was a precursor of Austin’s theory. The

sovereign enjoyed absolute powers only because the individuals had totally
surrendered their powers. Hobbes conceptualized an absolute sovereign power
only because of his thorough-going individualism. The absolute sovereign
represented the individuals and was constituted by them for providing order
and security, and averting the worst of all evils, civil war.
 INDIVIDUALISM AND LIBERALISM
• Individualism and absolutism of the state were two sides of the same coin in Hobbes’
theory. Absolute sovereignty was the logical complement to riotous anarchy. His premises
were individualistic and liberal, but his conclusions absolutist and illiberal, which was why
his philosophy contained both liberal and illiberal features. It was liberal because the state
and society were constituted by free and equal individuals who were egoistic, self-
interested and selfish. It was liberal because it emphasized the element of consent as the
basis of legitimate regulation of human affairs, as a yardstick for independence and choice
in society. The illiberal aspect of Hobbes’ theory was that an all-powerful absolute
sovereign was a self-perpetuating one. There was no procedure to periodically renew the
individual’s consent to the sovereign power. The subject did not actively participate in the
political process, nor was there a mechanism to secure his active support. Society itself was
a loose composition of discrete individuals lacking cohesiveness.
 LIBERTY AND THE RIGHT OF SELF-PRESERVATION

• Hobbes defined freedom as the private pursuit of the individual, which implied
that everyone could create his own conception of freedom within a framework
of state authority. Liberty was defined as whatever the law permitted, and on
whatever the law was silent. Liberty signified absence of restraints and
coercion.
• However, the Leviathan could command the individual to perform ceremonies
that were necessary for public worship. Hobbes made a beginning to identify
and safeguard what was essentially a private sphere of the individual, where
none, including the state, could exercise control.
 WOMEN AND GENDER QUESTION

• Consent meant submission willingly and voluntarily in exchange for protection of one’s
life. Since women were as capable as men, they did not require any protection from men.
Protection was required by both the subject and the child, who were dependent on the
sovereign and parents respectively. In the case of a child, it was the mother as a parent who
constituted authority and guaranteed protection by virtue of giving birth to the child. The
child in the process granted her its consent.
• In the state of nature, every woman who had children became both a mother and a lord. A
mother lost the right of authority over her child if taken prisoner, in which case she selected
the person who would exert authority over her child in her absence. Hobbes described the
idea of female subordination as a human creation. Male heirs were preferred to females, for
they were naturally fitter for labour and danger. In a state of nature, the natural domination
of the mother was accepted, because it was she who could declare the father of her child.
 PARENTAL POWER

• The significance of Hobbes’ political thought was the departure he made from
patriarchalism of the mid-seventeenth century. He insisted that paternal power
in the state of nature was not derived from fatherhood as such. Since the
family’s importance was only because of its procreative functions, and if
sovereignty was a product of procreation, then the mother was also an equal
and full partner in the act of generation with claims over the child. By denying
the patriarchal claims he dismissed the idea that all authority, including that of
the parents, was natural. Subordination among human beings was a product of
convention subject to consent.
Thank You