When we move from the politics of “Me” to the politics of “Us,” we rediscover those life-transforming, counterintuitive truths: that a nation is strong when it cares for the weak, that it becomes rich when it cares for the poor, that it becomes invulnerable when it cares for the vulnerable ( Morality, 20). Indeed, the social contract is precisely the answer to this question, as Rabbi Jonathan Sacks explains: On the Social Contract picks up where the Discourse left off, with the question of how to balance our individual competitiveness with the dignity of a common life. In Discourse on the Origin of Inequality, Rousseau noted that humans hunger for socialization, and that this hunger manifests in the opposing poles of competition and collaboration. Although at times technical and abstract, On the Social Contract is marked by a wonder at the human condition, especially at humanity’s evolutionary transformation from prehistoric, asocial animals, to civilized beings. Its account of the purpose and powers of government is both rigorous and impressively concise. Summary: Assimilating the insights of many of the early-modern natural law and social contract theorists, Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s On the Social Contract or, Principles of Political Right (1762) is a landmark in political theory.
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