The Nature of Man in the State of Nature

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The Nature of Man in the State of Nature Thomas Hobbes and Jean-Jacques Rousseau shared the belief that humans have freedom and equality in nature, but they had dissimilar views of humans in the state of nature and how natural man became socialized. They agree that government stemmed from the creation of social contracts, yet they argue for opposing governments as the best form of political system. While Hobbes believed that the natural man lived in a state of war for survival, Rousseau believed in a passionate and empathetic human nature. Instead of viewing the socialization and governance of natural man positively in the same manner as Hobbes did, Rousseau flipped the political idea of monarchy upside-down. Rather than having an absolute authority, Rousseau believed in the general will of the people and popular sovereignty. In “Leviathan,” Hobbes argues for the existence of and man’s need for an absolute authority. Without the order of a government, he described “the life of man [as] solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short” (Hobbes 2007, 37). Defining the state of nature for the experience of humanity in the absence of a governing body, he depicts it as a harsh and hostile condition. According to Hobbes, in the state of nature “men live without a common power to keep them all in awe” so they conduct a war of “every man, against every man” (Hobbes 2007, 37). Rather than waging open battle against one another, natural men compete in a free-for-all with one another for finite resources. Along with the mentality of every-man-for-himself, the right of nature, or the freedom and right every man has to do whatever necessary for his own survival, also leads to conflict between natural men. “And therefore, as long as this natural right of every man to everything endureth, there can be no security to any” (Hobbes 2007, 39). As long as natural man has the right to
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