Jean-Jacques Rousseau is known, on the one hand, for his treatise on the “general will”, the individual being part of it. On the other hand, Rousseau outlined in detail his concepts for education of an individual child, with little direct connexion to this general will.

„He will be forced to be free“, Rousseau writes in his social contract, and „obedience to law which we prescribe to ourselves is freedom“ (A: Rousseau 1762, p. 10).[i] The open question here remains, who really writes this law:

My goal is not to classify Rousseau‘s Emile only by his words: „don’t give the child, what it wants, but what it needs“ (B: Rousseau 1762/63, p. 122).[ii] After all, Rousseau himself described his own text as just daily notes which he considered more of an easy chat than a scientific analysis B, p. 7).[iii] Nevertheless, „Emile“ became an early comprehensive study of developmental psychology and psychological insights of behavioural details. However, in the context of an individual child’s individuality, the question arises, who decides, what this child needs?

It is easy to imagine one of Kant‘s seducers as the master, who decides, what it is that the child needs, one of those who are immediately on scene, as the „enlightened individual“ shows up and around for ideas (Kant 1784, p. 481).[iv] Rousseau did not actually appreciate that „what the child needs“ is defined by its teacher, another individual with other individual ideas and interests. If one considers the fact, that a generally accepted “general will” does not – yet – exist, then it becomes clear, that this individual is driven into a conflict, namely one between its own idea of a possible „general will“ and the master’s idea of one.

Kant warns, that the risk is indeed too high to follow Rousseau’s demand, that the individual shall give itself entirely into society, in order to get back from society what is intended to be the right thing for this individual. The disaster followed very quickly behind this father of the French Revolution, and in Kant’s lifetime, when the „terreur“ showed what happens to those who do not follow the new civil religion, as Robespierre has commanded.

But Rousseau insists to „take away from man his own resources and give him instead new ones, alien to him“ (A, p. 19).[v] Of course, one could image that the background of Rousseau’s words derives from his idea to erase by education antisocial evolution-based behavioural patterns: one of them could be the part of xenophobia which is today called racism,[vi] or territorialisation, by which inhabitants of a land attempt to keep invaders out. However, whichever entity Rousseau claims to be „taken away from man“, can such kind of education for an individual child be recommended in an era, where the rest of people refuse to be taken away any of their „resources“, while claiming maximised liberalism?

I will continue to discuss Rousseau’s proposals in view of the alternative proposal, i.e. to give yourself not entirely into society, as Rousseau proposes (A, p. 8),[vii] but only half: this is recommended by all major religions, e.g. in Christianity’s „love thy neighbour as thyself“, or by Islam’s „golden rule“. This means to keep half of your „resources“ for yourself and your secure individuality, thus sharing wishes and rights with all others in equal power and dignity. Such educational plan allows for societies to slowly develop towards the goal of living together in fairness, slowly, over numerous generations, because any educator will be unmasked by a child observing the educator‘s own insufficient education in deeds  in view of the educator‘s words, until, finally, at least part of the goal could be achieved.

There, the educated adult individual in the sense of Kant’s enlightenment would be one that reserves this half of itself for its own consideration. Therefore, this individual would make an own judgement, whether one of those Rousseau-ean social gifts are indeed part of the social contract, and a contract not only signed by a few leaders such as the American federalists, but by all members.

On the stage of present adult individuals, their society and their leaders, it becomes obvious, that individuals who give themselves totally into society in the first place, have already fallen victim of potential abuse. They behave like children unaware of the risks they take by leaving their fate in the hands of an unknown.

And here is Rousseau’s dilemma:

Rousseau did not consider that the masses of individuals were and are not enlightened, yet, they are not enlightened just because somebody shouted: be enlightened. As a consequence of liberalisation, the appeal for individuality ended in individualism, solipsism and hedonism, social hedonism at best, which in turn causes polarisation by the formation of interest groups fighting each other.

Part of his conflicting evidence is that Rousseau‘s assumption of an impeccable general will does not exist: the general will is part of societal will and liable to error: as a rule, or law, it becomes potentially terror. Or in other words: his „volonté générale“ comes down to be the same as „the people’s will“, i.e. the will of a crowd of people who are not yet independent, enlightened. This leads into a devil’s circle, in which the impeccable general will is expected to be the result of a people’s will, the individuals of which are not impeccable. Thus, the „general will“ ends up as an unreal ideal, or as an atrocity like in „To kill a mockingbird“.[viii]

Rousseau himself defines his own contradiction in the clearest of ways, when he writes: „To make laws for people, it would take gods to give men laws“ (A, p. 19),[ix] but also where he admits that legislators may be corrupt (A, p. 32).[x]

Though generally known as a father of the revolution, and as a classic of modern democratic theory, Rousseau became the theoretician of societal sovereignty, which does also not exist.

And the contradiction in his teaching: Education of the individual into the best of its nature, disregarding its role as part of a society, however, at the same time giving itself up into a society that will give the individual back what society or its contract want, not what the individual wants, nor necessarily, what it needs.

When the crowd of the abused realises its abuse, it becomes the good old monster, hidden in every individual’s nature, coming to full development in a crowd, switched on by a mysterious signal, which Elias Canetti attempted to decrypt by his archaeology of „Mass and Power“ for years and years.[xi] The monster rises even at the risk of destroying its own basis of existence.

The „general will“ only becomes reality in a society, all members of which are representatives of this will by their individual thinking and acting, i.e. living representatives of „the law“, its incarnation in individuality.

References

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[i] A: Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Social Contract, A discourse on the Origin of Inequality, and a Discourse on Political Economy, orig. 1762,  Digireads 2005, p.10.

[ii] B: Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Emile, or Treatise on Education, orig. Geneva 1762/63, Anaconda 2010, p. 122.

[iii] B, p. 7

[iv] Immanuel Kant, Was ist Aufklärung?, Berlin. Monatsschr., 1784, 2, p. 481.

[v] A, p. 19

[vi] Rousseau was a racists, as he wrote: „Neither the negroes nor the Laplanders can compete with the Europeans, when it comes to apprehension“ (author’s translation), B, p.47.

[vii] A, p.8, p. 10

[viii] Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird, 1960

[ix] A, p. 19, section 7.

[x] A, p. 32.

[xi] Elias Canetti, Mass and Power, 1960.