Locke felt if institutions like the state and the legal system were necessary, then it was because a few stupid or evil people insisted on exceeding their natural rights and taking the life and property of others.
To protect against this happening, it was necessary for peace loving respecters of property to organize a state apparatus that would legislate in accordance with natural rights and consequently enforce that legislation. Essentially the task of that state apparatus was to secure a higher level of observance of the law of nature than would occur in its absence. Without such a state men and women in all conflicts with each other would be the judges of their own cases. The power of that state was therefore based upon a social contract between members of society who transfer their natural rights to authorities on he understanding those rights will be protected.
This authority or government was to be elected for a fixed term by a simple majority vote, and it was expected those participating would agree in advance to adhere to the view of the majority. Those elected were themselves bound by this contract and were not above the law. Legitimate political power as Locke saw it, is a trust. It derives from a sort of contract between members of society, but it can’t itself just be a matter of contractual rights and duties. Instead it is exercised on the behalf of society by elected rulers or as we would call them now professional politicians in accordance with their own best judgment of what truly serves the interests of society effectively. This is a political model based on trust and accountability. Through such an elected assembly each new generation can alter laws it inherits or renew its assent to those it wishes to retain. It can also decide the levels of public spending and taxation. Taxation without public consent was an attack on the right of property itself. This denial of government taxation without public consent, was most popular with Americans during the American Revolution of the 1770’s who were greatly inspired by Locke’s ideas on their road to independence.
In essence Locke argued for what we know as a constitutional and democratic government and the principals of liberalism so prevalent today. The basic principal of liberalism being that the state is a servant of the people and the main purpose of that state was to protect and serve the people and property against the property-less. He envisaged a “state of peace, goodwill and mutual assistance and preservation”
Thomas Hobbes unlike Locke was an absolutist, absolutism being a political theory made popular by Hobbes. An absolutist system being one where there is no limitation on what a legitimate government may legally do, where authority is absolute and unchecked. This is not to say that a legitimate government can do anything whatsoever and get away with it, but rather an assertion hat a duly constituted government has the right to absolute authority.
Hobbes did not see a state of nature as a state of plenty he saw it as a state of war. He imagined a fictional state were no government existed, and he had a bleak image where everyone would be fighting over scarce resources it would be a state of war. Man would not be required to have some social responsibility; he thought self interest would be man’s main motive the pursuit of passion, power and wealth. Hobbes concluded that in nature, when all men would act on the basis of their unstable beliefs, there would be an equal instability in their actions. Men would rightly or wrongly conclude that all other men represented a danger to them the life of a man Hobbes said would be ‘solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short’.
It should be noted Hobbes preference for sovereignty was for that of a monarchial government, he advocated the divine right of kings and ancient doctrine that sovereigns are representatives of god and derive their right to rule directly from god. The monarch was considered god’s representative in all secular matters; this negated the problems faced by the reformation and differences between different religions. According to the doctrine a ruler’s power is not subject to secular limitation as the ruler is only responsible to god, this only enforces the idea’s regarding absolutist authority.
Hobbes was interested in unstable societies as many were in his time, and how to bring about stability an ordered society. Disorder in society would lead to fear and risk to one’s own life. Men would kill for their passions and desires. He advocated obedience to an absolute ruler the divine right of kings, since he reasoned that man would attempt to escape from the intolerant conditions under which he would exist in a state of nature or war as he saw it. After all man was rational and a government protecting against this state of war would or could be one of consent.
The power of sovereignty is the only guarantee of peace and order, to obtain peace and order we would have to sacrifice the right to do as we please. Natural law would be founded on reason and rational man feared death or pain and this fear was stronger than any desire for one’s selfish needs, as he saw it were are all locked in a constant power struggle to avoid death, that would be possible if peace was made paramount and the only way that could be obtained was through absolutism. Man must be capable of putting aside pride and passion for peace and abandoning the state of nature in return for a civil society. To maintain this sovereignty and protect against a state of nature, we must enter into a contract with the sovereign and relinquish all our natural rights. There would be no limit to sovereignty power and no appeal it would be above the law. Hobbes provided no institutions and conceded that his idea of state could be considered bad, but felt it was a much better alternative to a state of nature or war as he saw it. The only limit to sovereignty Hobbes felt should be it role in economic matters, he felt there should be a civil freedom the right to buy, sell and trade with others when one wanted.
Central to the theories of Locke and Hobbes is the concept of a social contract. The social contract is a contract between man and the relevant governing body. Hobbes and Locke both agreed that a social contract was necessary to prevent anarchy and certain individuals taking advantage of others natural rights, breaking natural law. For Locke and Hobbes the social contract theory was an attempt to lay the foundations for a legitimate political authority and outline the obligations that subjects would owe to such an authority.
Both theorists started their analysis from a hypothetical situation, where a state and all the apparatus it entailed did not exist, this they called a state of nature. Hobbes and Locke had different views regarding this state of nature. For Hobbes every man was at war with every other man. He saw the state of nature as a state of war, where every man feared his death and had to seek power in order to secure his life. The Hobbesian man was egotistical, selfish and concerned only with self-preservation. Hobbes felt man was rational and would realise the situation was intolerable. He felt man would contract with each other to give up their individual power and subject themselves to the dictate of a sovereign. The sovereign retained the power each individual had enjoyed in a state of nature. Matters such as justice now came under the authority of the sovereign. Hobbes main concern was with security of life, rational man would realise the benefit to be derived from their subjection to a sovereign who even if he were a tyrant would provide men with more security than that in state of nature.
Locke’s conception of the state of the nature was a realm where men were capable of co-operating with each other. The state of nature was a moral realm where individuals executed the law of nature to their own needs. He saw the state of nature as a state of inconvenience where the want of a common superior rendered the relations between men a matter of selfish caprice. Individuals as executors of the law of nature would interpret it in their own favour. Locke like Hobbes appreciated the need for government to regulate the relations between men.
The contract envisaged by Locke was very different from Hobbes. The Lockean individual only gave up as much of his power as was necessary for the sovereign to leave for him the right to “life, liberty and property”. The sovereign was granted a trust by which he governed to safeguard the natural rights of individuals. If a sovereign should prove to be in breach of the trust granted, then the subjects had the right to rebel against the sovereign authority and regain their own power as executors of the law of nature.
Both Locke and Hobbes rely heavily on the notion that individual nationality can determine the transition from their hypothetical state of nature to a legitimate political or sovereign authority. Many believe this to be a contrived basis on which to construct the legitimate foundations of government. The detached autonomous individuals Locke and Hobbes viewed as the primary units of a legitimate political society have been seen by some thinkers as an adequate basis for the proper construction of the state. Both were concerned with the security necessary for the individual’s existence. However theories of both did to some extent introduce the notion that men had some sort of say in their political destiny, even if it meant sacrificing much of their natural freedom.
Bibliography:
Brian Redhead [ed] [1995] Plato to Nato Studies in Political Thought. Penguin