The Social Contract

The Social Contract

by

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

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Themes and Colors
Human Freedom and Society Theme Icon
Sovereignty, Citizenship, and Direct Democracy Theme Icon
Government and the Separation of Powers Theme Icon
National Longevity and Moral Virtue Theme Icon
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Social Contract, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Government and the Separation of Powers Theme Icon

While Rousseau makes it clear that the people should have sovereignty (or ultimate power) as a community, he does not have complete faith in all of the people as individuals. This is just one of many reasons that Rousseau advocates for the separation of powers: namely, he thinks that there has to be a separate executive agency, which he calls the government, to implement the laws that the sovereign creates. However, he also emphasizes the sovereign’s responsibility for closely controlling the government in order to prevent it from overreaching, and he suggests that a republic’s success rides largely on the balance between the government’s strength and its accountability to the sovereign.

Government—which Rousseau defines as “the legitimate exercise of executive power”—is necessary because the sovereign is not capable of taking “particular acts.” In practical terms, this means that the people cannot be expected to enforce the laws against themselves, and so legitimate governments need a separate executive branch to do that job. In the abstract, Rousseau argues that the sovereign cannot undertake “particular acts” because it is bound to implement the general will, and “the general will cannot relate to any particular object.” For instance, say a state is about to go to war. While the sovereign people should have the authority to decide if a military draft is appropriate and pass a law instituting one if needed, it does not have the right to decide who will be drafted—this has to be done by the government because laws, by definition, cannot pick out specific people. It is not in the nation’s interest for one family’s children to go to war rather than another’s or, say, for certain people to have their prison sentences written into the constitution. These decisions are made when the laws are implemented by the government, not when they are first written by the legislature. By implementing the law when the legislature cannot, the government helps balance or mediate between this legislature (or the sovereign) and the subjects over whom they rule. Paradoxically, both the sovereign and the subjects are the people themselves, just presented from two different angles: the people make the laws as members of the sovereign, and they are bound to the laws as subjects of the state. This is where their inherent conflict of interest comes from: everyone brings their private interests as individuals into their public role as members of the sovereign. By making all laws general and ensuring that the government (not the sovereign) is in charge of implementing these laws, citizens’ private interests are minimized, and they are never forced into the difficult position of incriminating themselves.

As the government’s job is to ensure that citizens hold up both halves of their bargain—following the laws in addition to contributing to their formation—this government must have the right amount of power, so that it maintains the rule of law without getting in the sovereign’s way. Rousseau frequently emphasizes that the government works for the sovereign and has no legitimate authority besides the power that this sovereign delegates to it. But if the government grows too strong, it can pose a threat to the sovereign: its agents can “abuse their power” and put their own personal interests above the common good. On the other hand, if government is too weak, not only do the sovereign’s laws not get implemented, but disobedient citizens erode the rule of law and the perceived authority of the sovereign. Therefore, it is crucial that the government have neither too much power nor too little. Although Rousseau initially explains this through complicated mathematical equations, his argument is actually quite simple: when a nation has more people, government should be more hierarchical because it has more to do and needs to be more efficient. In such a country, then, there should be fewer magistrates (or administrators) at the top of the executive branch and a smaller proportion of the populace should participate in government, as compared to a smaller and less populous country, which can afford to involve more people in government and deliberate longer to create more precise solutions to its smaller-scale problems.

This is how Rousseau differentiates between monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy: in a monarchy, one person controls the whole government; in an aristocracy, a small group of people does; and in a democracy, everyone works for the government (but there is no separation between the legislative and executive branches). Rousseau thinks that monarchies work better in larger states and democracies in smaller states, but an elected aristocracy is almost always the best system because it ensures that government administrators have fewer conflicts of interest and are elected based on their “honesty, sagacity, [and] experience.” However, it is important to clarify that these terms only pertain to the executive branch, and Rousseau thinks that all lawmaking power should always remain in the sovereign people’s hands. In short, he always believes in what is now called “democracy”—the people should rule, and they should elect a government to implement the laws they create. By balancing power between the sovereign and the government, Rousseau protects against corruption and ensures that all parts of the state work efficiently together. Readers might note that contemporary states have one more branch: a judiciary. In fact, Rousseau briefly mentions the importance of having a court system, or “tribunate,” to help balance power by stopping the passage of illegal legislation and the unequal enforcement of laws.

While the details of Rousseau’s ideal government—namely, the highly democratic legislature that holds power over a hierarchical, efficient executive branch—seems idealistic when compared to most modern democracies, there is no question that his fundamental belief in the separation of powers has played a critical role in the last several centuries of political theory and nation-building.

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Government and the Separation of Powers Quotes in The Social Contract

Below you will find the important quotes in The Social Contract related to the theme of Government and the Separation of Powers.
Book 2, Chapter 6 Quotes

I have already said that the general will cannot relate to any particular object. For such a particular object is either within the state or outside the state. If it is outside, then a will which is alien to it is not general with regard to it: if the object is within the state, it forms a part of the state. Thus there comes into being a relationship between the whole and the part which involves two separate entities, the part being one, and the whole, less that particular part, being the other. But a whole less a particular part is no longer a whole; and so as long as this relationship exists there is no whole but only two unequal parts, from which it follows that the will of the one is no longer general with respect to the other.

Related Characters: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (speaker)
Page Number: 81
Explanation and Analysis:
Book 3, Chapter 1 Quotes

The public force thus needs its own agent to call it together and put it into action in accordance with the instructions of the general will, to serve also as a means of communication between the state and the sovereign, and in a sense to do for the public person what is done for the individual by the union of soul and body. This is the reason why the state needs a government, something often unhappily confused with the sovereign, but of which it is really only the minister.

What, then, is the government? An intermediary body established between the subjects and the sovereign for their mutual communication, a body charged with the execution of the laws and the maintenance of freedom, both civil and political.

Related Characters: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (speaker)
Related Symbols: The Human Body and the Body Politic
Page Number: 102
Explanation and Analysis:
Book 3, Chapter 12 Quotes

The sovereign, having no other force than the legislative power, acts only through the laws, and since the laws are nothing other than authentic acts of the general will, the sovereign can act only when the people is assembled.

Related Characters: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (speaker)
Page Number: 136
Explanation and Analysis:
Book 3, Chapter 15 Quotes

The better the state is constituted, the more does public business take precedence over private in the minds of the citizens. There is indeed much less private business, because the sum of the public happiness furnishes a larger proportion of each individual’s happiness, so there remains less for him to seek on his own. In a well-regulated nation, every man hastens to the assemblies; under a bad government, no one wants to take a step to go to them, because no one feels the least interest in what is done there, since it is predictable that the general will will not be dominant, and, in short, because domestic concerns absorb all the individual’s attention. Good laws lead men to make better ones; bad laws lead to worse. As soon as someone says of the business of the state—“What does it matter to me?”—then the state must be reckoned lost.

Related Characters: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (speaker)
Page Number: 140-1
Explanation and Analysis:
Book 3, Chapter 18 Quotes

At the opening of these assemblies, of which the only purpose is the maintenance of the social treaty, two motions should be put, motions which may never be annulled and which must be voted separately:
The first: “Does it please the sovereign to maintain the present form of government?”
The second: “Does it please the people to leave the administration to those at present charged with it?”

Related Characters: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (speaker)
Page Number: 148
Explanation and Analysis: