Sovereign Analysis in The Social Contract

This term broadly refers to the leader of a state, whether an individual or a collective body (like a legislature or popular assembly). Because the sovereign is the highest authority in a republic, it is responsible for creating laws for the nation, and everyone else who works for the state ultimately works in service of the sovereign. Rousseau specifically argues that, in any legitimate state, the people (as a collective) are the sovereign, because they freely decide to form a society by agreeing to the social contract. A contract that forces people to give away their freedom is illegitimate, Rousseau argues, which means that any legitimate social contract must preserve people’s freedom, power, or sovereignty over themselves. In fact, he explains, the formation of society simply changes the form of sovereignty: individuals (who are sovereign over themselves in the state of nature) band together and agree to take collective sovereignty for their collective good. Because this agreement is the origin of all legitimate society, Rousseau concludes, sovereignty must always reside in the hands of the people, and so the people must directly make all the laws. In other words, the legislature should be an assembly of all citizens, and the executive branch (or government) should work for this sovereign assembly. Rousseau’s concept of popular sovereignty was radical in his own time, but it is now a standard principle of many liberal democracies, in which it is commonly accepted that the government works for “the people.” Nevertheless, Rousseau’s particular vision of the sovereign as a citizens’ assembly, rather than a legislature of representatives, has been fulfilled almost nowhere in the contemporary world.

Sovereign Quotes in The Social Contract

The The Social Contract quotes below are all either spoken by Sovereign or refer to Sovereign. For each quote, you can also see the other terms and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:

Born as I was the citizen of a free state and a member of its sovereign body, the very right to vote imposes on me the duty to instruct myself in public affairs, however little influence my voice may have in them. And whenever I reflect upon governments, I am happy to find that my studies always give me fresh reasons for admiring that of my own country.

Related Characters: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (speaker)

Related Symbols: The Human Body and the Body Politic

Page Number and Citation: 49

Explanation and Analysis:

The act of association consists of a reciprocal commitment between society and the individual, so that each person, in making a contract, as it were, with himself, finds himself doubly committed, first, as a member of the sovereign body in relation to individuals, and secondly as a member of the state in relation to the sovereign. Here there can be no invoking the principle of civil law which says that no man is bound by a contract with himself, for there is a great difference between having an obligation to oneself and having an obligation to something of which one is a member.

Related Characters: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (speaker)

Related Symbols: The Human Body and the Body Politic

Page Number and Citation: 62

Explanation and Analysis:

I have already said that the general will cannot relate to any particular object. For such a particular object is either within the state or outside the state. If it is outside, then a will which is alien to it is not general with regard to it: if the object is within the state, it forms a part of the state. Thus there comes into being a relationship between the whole and the part which involves two separate entities, the part being one, and the whole, less that particular part, being the other. But a whole less a particular part is no longer a whole; and so as long as this relationship exists there is no whole but only two unequal parts, from which it follows that the will of the one is no longer general with respect to the other.

Related Characters: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (speaker)

Page Number and Citation: 81

Explanation and Analysis:

We can no longer ask who is to make laws, because laws are acts of the general will; no longer ask if the prince is above the law, because he is a part of the state; no longer ask if the law can be unjust, because no one is unjust to himself; and no longer ask how we can be both free and subject to laws, for the laws are but registers of what we ourselves desire.

Related Characters: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (speaker)

Page Number and Citation: 82

Explanation and Analysis:

The public force thus needs its own agent to call it together and put it into action in accordance with the instructions of the general will, to serve also as a means of communication between the state and the sovereign, and in a sense to do for the public person what is done for the individual by the union of soul and body. This is the reason why the state needs a government, something often unhappily confused with the sovereign, but of which it is really only the minister.

What, then, is the government? An intermediary body established between the subjects and the sovereign for their mutual communication, a body charged with the execution of the laws and the maintenance of freedom, both civil and political.

Related Characters: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (speaker)

Related Symbols: The Human Body and the Body Politic

Page Number and Citation: 102

Explanation and Analysis:

The sovereign, having no other force than the legislative power, acts only through the laws, and since the laws are nothing other than authentic acts of the general will, the sovereign can act only when the people is assembled.

Related Characters: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (speaker)

Page Number and Citation: 136

Explanation and Analysis:

The idea of representation is a modem one. It comes to us from feudal government, from that iniquitous and absurd system under which the human race is degraded and which dishonours the name of man. In the republics and even in the monarchies of the ancient world, the people never had representatives; the very word was unknown.

Related Characters: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (speaker)

Page Number and Citation: 141

Explanation and Analysis:

At the opening of these assemblies, of which the only purpose is the maintenance of the social treaty, two motions should be put, motions which may never be annulled and which must be voted separately:
The first: “Does it please the sovereign to maintain the present form of government?”
The second: “Does it please the people to leave the administration to those at present charged with it?”

Related Characters: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (speaker)

Page Number and Citation: 148

Explanation and Analysis:

It is useless to separate the morals of a nation from the objects of its esteem; for both spring from the same principle and both necessarily merge together. Among all the peoples of the world, it is not nature but opinion which governs the choice of their pleasures. Reform the opinions of men, and their morals will be purified of themselves. Men always love what is good or what they think is good, but it is in their judgement that they err; hence it is their judgement that has to be regulated. To judge morals is to judge what is honoured; to judge what is honoured, is to look to opinion as law.

Related Characters: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (speaker)

Page Number and Citation: 174

Explanation and Analysis:

Sovereign Term Timeline in The Social Contract

The timeline below shows where the term Sovereign appears in The Social Contract. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.

Sovereignty, Citizenship, and Direct Democracy Theme Icon

Government and the Separation of Powers Theme Icon

...(which are synonyms); a state (as a “passive” institution that is governed by laws); a sovereign (as a body that “active[ly]” makes laws); or a power (when compared with other nations).... (full context)

...a member of society is two things at the same time: a citizen “of the sovereign body” who is partially responsible for making laws and “a member of the state” who... (full context)

While the sovereign is just made up of individuals and so cannot legitimately injure them, individuals often renege... (full context)

If they already possess land, people bring this land under the control of the sovereign when they join a society. This guarantees it to them as private property, but it... (full context)

...“the common good” (which is simply whatever best serves everyone’s common interests). He notes that sovereignty simply is “the exercise of the general will,” and the sovereign is “a collective being”... (full context)

Only the sovereign’s general will can create valid laws, so any will that is divided, or only the... (full context)

In order to fulfill the general will and preserve itself, the sovereign needs some system to organize and control its different parts and resources. But it cannot... (full context)

Rousseau reiterates that all citizens are fundamentally equal, because “they all pledge themselves [to the sovereign] under the same conditions and must all enjoy the same rights.” Sovereignty, then, “is not... (full context)

National Longevity and Moral Virtue Theme Icon

...the better society is likely to be. The lawgiver is “special and superior” to the sovereign and the government, and must not be involved in legislation or the execution of laws,... (full context)

...kinds of entities. First, to determine “the relation of all with all, or of the sovereign with the state,” it needs “Political Laws” (which, if suitable to a given country, become... (full context)

...they cannot hold the executive power, because this encompasses “particular acts” that are beyond the sovereign’s job of making laws. Rather, the sovereign needs a government, which (first) communicates between subjects... (full context)

The government communicates between the sovereign and the subjects (which are different perspectives on the people). To function well, the sovereign,... (full context)

...comprised of different parts or administrators, organized hierarchically. However, governments only exist because of the sovereign, and their one and only function is to enact the general will. If officials pursue... (full context)

...essentially different wills”: the self-interested personal will, the “corporate will” of the government, and the sovereign (or the people’s) will. While in theory a magistrate should let the sovereign will dominate... (full context)

...concludes that it is possible to change the role of the government relative to the sovereign and the subjects by changing its number of magistrates. In the previous chapter, he argued... (full context)

Rousseau reminds the reader that the government ultimately works and speaks for the sovereign (the people). Then, he distinguishes three different kinds of aristocracy: “natural, elective and hereditary.” Natural... (full context)

Rousseau contends that there is an inevitable tension between the government and the sovereign (just like the tension between the particular and general wills of citizens and magistrates). Ultimately,... (full context)

...country, and in a healthy state these laws become stronger over time because of the sovereign legislature’s continuous recognition. If the original laws instead grow “weaker with age,” this is a... (full context)

The sovereign’s power resides in the legislature, which acts through laws that express the general will. Of... (full context)

...forth by the law. The stronger (or more active) the government, “the more frequently the sovereign should meet in assemblies.” But when a state is larger than a single town or... (full context)

When the people actually assemble in their capacity as the sovereign, the government or executive branch is momentarily invalid (because it is only ever an expression... (full context)

When citizens stop prioritizing their “public service” as members of the sovereign over their own personal wealth—for instance, by preferring to “pay mercenaries” rather than fight in... (full context)

As citizens gradually give up on participating in the sovereign legislature, they put representatives and deputies in their place. But Rousseau considers this incorrect, because... (full context)

Rousseau reiterates that the legislative (sovereign) and executive (government) powers must be separate, so that there is a clear distinction between... (full context)

Since the government is not created through a contract with the sovereign, Rousseau asks, how is it actually instituted? He says that it involves two parts: first,... (full context)

...is not a contract but a law,” emphasizes that magistrates must work dutifully for the sovereign, rather than having power over it. Therefore, “hereditary government” is illegitimate except during transitions from... (full context)

...lot [randomly],” but Rousseau emphasizes that, either way, elections are the government’s job (not the sovereign’s). In a perfect democracy, random elections would be fairer because serving as a magistrate is... (full context)

...laws and elected magistrates, so all Romans could vote, and “the Roman people was truly sovereign.” Convened under the legally permitted circumstances, these comitia essentially functioned as the government as well... (full context)

...that sometimes “a special magistrate” called a tribunate is necessary to balance power among the sovereign, the government, and the people. It is neither legislative nor executive—in fact, “it can do... (full context)

...legal proceedings need to be sped up to deal with impending circumstances, and sometimes the sovereign needs to suspend institutions—but only in the “rare and obvious cases” when the nation’s security... (full context)

...“The clergy” is simultaneously legislative and executive, meaning that Christian countries have “two powers, two sovereigns.” Rousseau praises Hobbes for “reuniting” the church and state, but concludes that Christianity’s “dominant spirit”... (full context)

...citizen.” Some religions create a mixed society with two different institutions acting as the state—the sovereign and the church—which Rousseau considers “so manifestly bad” that it is not worth taking seriously.... (full context)

...can only obligate subjects to act when it is necessary for the public interest, the sovereign cannot control citizens’ personal religious beliefs. But it can and should establish a set of... (full context)

Sovereign Term Analysis

Sovereign Quotes in The Social Contract

Sovereign Term Timeline in The Social Contract