4 ms·

I read it more as OP meaning the social contract is not a suicide pact. Which is correct: a contract must be beneficial to both parties.

ubernostrum 9y ago
a contract must be beneficial to both parties. Except this isn't Hobbes' position. In his system, the benefit to the populace as a whole occurs only once: at the time the sovereign is invested with authority, ending the "war of all against all". Once the sovereign has been given power, that's it. In Hobbes' system there are no further responsibilities on the sovereign's part to wield that power for a good purpose. There is no concept of power retained by the people, or power to overthrow the sovereign in the event the sovereign fails to provide what the people desire. In fact, such an idea is a contradiction in terms in Hobbes' system; there can be no power other than that which is possessed by the sovereign, because in Hobbes' system all power is ceded permanently and irrevocably to the sovereign.
- brudgers 9y ago
  The ongoing benefit of the social contract is that the sovereign keeps the peace. If the sovereign fails to keep the peace, the sovereign is no longer sovereign (in the Hobbesian sense of 'sovereign'). As Dennis the Peasant says "Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses." [1] That's why Leviathan's frontspiece [2] depicts the body sovereign as comprising many individuals rather than solid. [1]: "not from some farcical aquatic ceremony." [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Leviathan_by_Thomas_Hobbes.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Leviathan_by_Thomas_Hobbe...
  - ubernostrum 9y ago
    Humor aside, Hobbes would not agree with you. He explicitly denies that the covenant can be breached by the sovereign, and explicitly denies that the people would have the right to remove or alter the government of the sovereign. Any principle of the sovereign "breaching" the covenant is non-Hobbesian, and probably a confusion with the theories of John Locke, which were radically different.
brudgers 9y ago
Yes. *A Mans Covenant Not To Defend Himselfe, Is Voyd* A Covenant not to defend my selfe from force, by force, is alwayes voyd. For (as I have shewed before) no man can transferre, or lay down his Right to save himselfe from Death, Wounds, and Imprisonment, (the avoyding whereof is the onely End of laying down any Right,) and therefore the promise of not resisting force, in no Covenant transferreth any right; nor is obliging. For though a man may Covenant thus, "Unlesse I do so, or so, kill me;" he cannot Covenant thus "Unless I do so, or so, I will not resist you, when you come to kill me." For man by nature chooseth the lesser evill, which is danger of death in resisting; rather than the greater, which is certain and present death in not resisting. And this is granted to be true by all men, in that they lead Criminals to Execution, and Prison, with armed men, notwithstanding that such Criminals have consented to the Law, by which they are condemned. https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/3207/pg3207.txt https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/3207/pg3207.txt

ubernostrum 9y ago

a contract must be beneficial to both parties. Except this isn't Hobbes' position. In his system, the benefit to the populace as a whole occurs only once: at the time the sovereign is invested with authority, ending the "war of all against all". Once the sovereign has been given power, that's it. In Hobbes' system there are no further responsibilities on the sovereign's part to wield that power for a good purpose. There is no concept of power retained by the people, or power to overthrow the sovereign in the event the sovereign fails to provide what the people desire. In fact, such an idea is a contradiction in terms in Hobbes' system; there can be no power other than that which is possessed by the sovereign, because in Hobbes' system all power is ceded permanently and irrevocably to the sovereign.

brudgers 9y ago
The ongoing benefit of the social contract is that the sovereign keeps the peace. If the sovereign fails to keep the peace, the sovereign is no longer sovereign (in the Hobbesian sense of 'sovereign'). As Dennis the Peasant says "Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses." [1] That's why Leviathan's frontspiece [2] depicts the body sovereign as comprising many individuals rather than solid. [1]: "not from some farcical aquatic ceremony." [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Leviathan_by_Thomas_Hobbes.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Leviathan_by_Thomas_Hobbe...
- ubernostrum 9y ago
  Humor aside, Hobbes would not agree with you. He explicitly denies that the covenant can be breached by the sovereign, and explicitly denies that the people would have the right to remove or alter the government of the sovereign. Any principle of the sovereign "breaching" the covenant is non-Hobbesian, and probably a confusion with the theories of John Locke, which were radically different.

brudgers 9y ago

Yes. *A Mans Covenant Not To Defend Himselfe, Is Voyd* A Covenant not to defend my selfe from force, by force, is alwayes voyd. For (as I have shewed before) no man can transferre, or lay down his Right to save himselfe from Death, Wounds, and Imprisonment, (the avoyding whereof is the onely End of laying down any Right,) and therefore the promise of not resisting force, in no Covenant transferreth any right; nor is obliging. For though a man may Covenant thus, "Unlesse I do so, or so, kill me;" he cannot Covenant thus "Unless I do so, or so, I will not resist you, when you come to kill me." For man by nature chooseth the lesser evill, which is danger of death in resisting; rather than the greater, which is certain and present death in not resisting. And this is granted to be true by all men, in that they lead Criminals to Execution, and Prison, with armed men, notwithstanding that such Criminals have consented to the Law, by which they are condemned. https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/3207/pg3207.txt https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/3207/pg3207.txt