Social contract. Political Theory Thread

[nadinbrzezinski]

11. Depends... who you read

some social contract theories look at this from a point of view of a society and how that society derives rights from what members want. That would be closer to both the views of John Locke and even some of the French revolutionaries.

Thomas Hobbes was more of the state of nature and how we chose to live in society to avoid it. It was a more authoritarian way of seeing life.

In modern terms, the social contract has evolved. And I prefer John Rawls ideas that all derives from a sense of justice and a search for justice. Of course in the Rawlian way of looking at things, police and police powers figure highly, since they come out of a collective need, and the society has a right to control police. Police derives from us, as a society and should be controlled by us. Johan Rawls is just fascinating and highly recommended.

And if you want to go to the edge of this, explore critical race theory, and how race actually influences a lot of our lives, even in a "post racial era." It also explores some of what i like to call on the edge of things, and how minority - majority interactions happen.

The Internet Encyclopedia of philosophy is a good intro, but you will not find critical race in there, I think partly because it originally started in law.

Though they do go into feminist theory, which is a while different kettle of fish.