by Shey Cannon

Created on: June 06, 2008

Rousseau argues that obedience to the general will increases our liberty because he believes that the particular will, the personal desires of an individual, holds back the people in a society. A group of people expressing their particular will would prevent, he believes, a State moving forward in a free and democratic way because so many people would hold different views to what they want. If all or most individuals expressed the best ideals for the State and its people, then, it would benefit each and every man and woman for the better. Rousseau believed that the particular will, the private desires, likes, and dislikes, made the individual a slave to their ego and continuously stagnated society from evolving. By putting aside one's particular will and consciously focusing on the general will, then, what the large collective group of people wants the State gets also. When the general will elevates the state we live in, the belief is we have the freedom to grow and develop as civilised human beings. Only then, can the individual exercise his hopes, ideas, and dreams, and become a more complete human being that can make positive changes for himself and the society he lives within. Rousseau writes in The Social Contract, His faculties are exercised and developed, his ideas are broadened, his feelings are ennobled, his entire soul is elevated to such a height that, if the abuse of this new condition did not lower his status to beneath the level he left, he ought constantly to bless the happy moment that pulled him away from it forever and which transformed him from a stupid, limited animal into an intelligent man and human being'.

So, Rousseau believes by living according to the state of nature man is a slave to his primitive desires and therefore freedom can never take place until he consciously takes into the consideration the general will of the society he lives in. When the general will is recognised the individual moves out of the state of nature and into a Civilised State, where justice, democracy and ultimately, freedom and moral liberty begin to express themselves which benefits all who live within that State.

The objection to Rousseau's argument is that no matter what the general will of the State may be, you can not make every individual in a society think exactly the same. There is always going to be groups of people who think differently to the general will. Yet, Rousseau believed by forcing those to abide by the general will would all be in the best

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