Specifically for law enforcement, social contract theory is important to justify the power that law enforcement can exert over the population as a whole (Evans and MacMillan, 2014). The power imbalance, held by law enforcement, is part of the contract that society has agreed upon in exchange for security.

Social contract theory says that people live together in society in accordance with an agreement that establishes moral and political rules of behavior. Some people believe that if we live according to a social contract, we can live morally by our own choice and not because a divine being requires it.

The normative concept of political legitimacy is often seen as related to the justification of authority. According to Locke, and contrary to his predecessor Thomas Hobbes, the social contract thus does not create authority. Political authority is embodied in individuals and pre-exists in the state of nature.

Social Contract Theory (Hobbes): There agreements are the justified moral rules, where one gives up some part of their liberty for selfish benefit (don’t harm anyone, don’t steal from anyone, keep one’s agreements, limited beneficence, etc.) You just studied 6 terms!

A social contract is an unofficial agreement shared by everyone in a society in which they give up some freedom for security. As members of a society, we agree to the social contract — we cooperate with each other and obey society’s laws. We also give up some freedoms, because we want the protection society can offer.

The social contract is the idea that people get together and agree to give up some of their freedoms in order to have the government protect their truly important freedoms. This idea is strongly reflected in the Declaration of Independence.

A social contract or political contract is a perceived agreement among the people of a state about the rules that will define their government. These rules are usually called laws. Both the United States Declaration of Independence and United States Constitution use the theory of social contracts.

The famous introduction clearly reflected John Locke’s social contract theory: “…to secure these rights [Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of happiness], Governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” Jefferson further reasoned that since the British government had …

Answer: According to the ideas of Locke and Jefferson, libery and order can coexist in the social contract. Liberty is a natural right to all people, and people agree to the social contract in order to have their liberty protected, and also in order to be able to excercise such liberty.

The enlightenment saw the development of social contract theory of which Hobbes and Locke were the principal exponents. The theory of social contract is essentially a morally justified agreement made amongst individuals through which an organised society is brought into existence .

Hobbes is famous for his early and elaborate development of what has come to be known as “social contract theory”, the method of justifying political principles or arrangements by appeal to the agreement that would be made among suitably situated rational, free, and equal persons.

The Social Contract — as espoused by Thomas Hobbes, John Locke and Jean Jacque Rousseau, as three dynamic thinkers, and also by a few other modern philosophical thinkers — is a convention between men that aims to discard the proverbial “State of Nature”, whereby people are to live without government or written laws.

Rawls argued that only under a “veil of ignorance” could human beings reach a fair and impartial agreement (contract) as true equals not biased by their place in society. They would have to rely only on the human powers of reason to choose principles of social justice for their society.

Hobbes theory of Social Contract supports absolute sovereign without giving any value to individuals, while Locke and Rousseau supports individual than the state or the government. He rules out a representative form of government. But, Locke does not make any such distinction.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau wrote the philosophical treatises A Discourse on the Origins of Inequality (1755) and The Social Contract (1762); the novels Julie; or, The New Eloise (1761) and Émile; or, On Education (1762); and the autobiographical Confessions (1782–1789), among other works.