In the 17th and 18th centuries, Europe was experiencing a changing of the guard at the hands of the philosophes, a group of social reformers from the nobility and middle class. Branded by the philosophes as an intellectual movement advocating for the application of reason and individualism in all aspects of life, the Enlightenment, influenced by the ideas of the Scientific Revolution, sparked discussion in the hopes of bettering society and rounding it into its most ideal form. Although it was a truly international and cosmopolitan movement, one of its most important proponents was the French philosopher, Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778), author of works such as Discourse on the Origins of the Inequality of Mankind and The Social Contract. Rousseau epitomized the Enlightenment and its core ideas, that individual liberty should be of utmost importance and government and religion should fulfill the needs of the general will.
In the beginning, as Rousseau asserted, humans are born happy with no laws and no social
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For one, the proposal provided a nice middle ground between humans’ primitive instincts and the necessity of a governing body. It allowed people to maintain their individual liberty while having the structure of a formal government because submission to the authority of the general will guarantees individuals from being subordinated to the wills of others, and also ensures that they themselves obey the law because they are the authors of the law. However, if someone were to disagree with the direction of the general will, he/she should still be compelled to stay in the social contract because he can maintain both his particular interest and the common interest. The idea of a social contract resonated with the people during the Enlightenment as it related to their interest in pursuing of whatever they wanted to, as opposed to adopting the mentality of a