door latch*, Jean-Jacques Rousseau museum, Les Charmettes, France

“The people of England regards itself as free; but it is grossly mistaken; it is free only during the election of members of parliament. As soon as they are elected, slavery overtakes it, and it is nothing.”

― Jean-Jacques Rousseau, “The Social Contract and The Discourses”

 

the famous and influential The Social Contract was Rousseau's piece de resistance when it came to revolutionary thinking and abstract political thought. this work stressed a new concept; that of the "social contract". this contract was a mutual indenture between the people and the government, in which "the governed agree to be ruled only so that their rights, property and happiness [will] be protected by their rulers". the salient point of this entire work, onto which the French revolutionaries clung, was the idea that should this social contract be violated, "the governed are free to chose another set of governors or magistrates". this idea influenced both the formation of the “Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen” (1789, the French Constitution) and the Declaration of Independence (1775, the American Constitution). its influence is also seen in the fact that both the French and American revolutions ended with "contracts", outlining the rights and liberties of the governed. these contracts specified that government should protect the rights of every citizen, not just the wealthy and powerful members of society. this idea, however, was sometimes taken too far: Rousseau was not, as some have believed, encouraging anarchist thought. rather than just a simple disagreement between a people and its leaders, it was only when political authority broke the basic premise of the social contract and individual liberty was replaced by inequality that Rousseau believed that government should be torn down. so, although he supported the dismantlement of a government IF the government was in breach of their 'social contract', Rousseau still believed in order and civil obedience

 

* think the philips screws aren't original 17th century