POLS 2900 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Body Politic, Tyrant, Personal Rule
25 Jun 2018
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John Locke
Common wealth - people as a whole grant legislature to a given assembly, produce laws,
enforced by an executive, the monarch
Unlike Hobbes common wealth - all members are subject to the law, there is no one above the
law
People give the power to the government, the given assembly, conditionally.
If the government abuses this the people are no longer required to obey the government
- Constitutional government and popular sovereignty
2nd tretus of government
Origin of political authority
- power to make laws with the penalties of death - sees
Hobbes - sovereign, coercive apparatus, strike fear so that subjects don't disobey
Locke - government is a punishment (same as Hobbesian view)
Distinctive because:
Neither discuss a theory of citizenship to compliment government
Politics creates and sustains the coercive power of the state
How can we justify making laws with the penalty of death?
Hobbes - state of nature, asking subjects to give up their natural right
Locke - account of the state of nature, more complicated than that of Hobbes, 2 accounts of how
government comes about (ļ¬rst 10 chapters of 2nd treats)
1. Logic of nature
2. Logic of history
-State of nature, timeless, exists outside of history. Natural equality bw people, everyone is
free.
-Right to life, liberty and property (Locke rights). Property - refers to the right to own. Also
refers to the right to life and liberty, property of self
-Differs from Hobbes - state of nature is not a state of war. State of nature has a law of nature
to govern it - logic. Obligated to preserve themselves. Does not lead to a war between all
people, we are Godās creation therefore we are his property. Cannot destroy oneself of
another person. Obligation to do so
-Believes people who violate laws of nature have moved away from laws and nature and
violate these. Lawbreakers, not madmen. Criminals place themselves at war with all other
people by violating the laws of nature. We must deal with these people accordingly, if they
are not of danger to other people we must deter them and others from doing criminal actions
-Inconveniences that arise when people enforce laws in the state of nature - they could be
biased in their favour. Locke introduces distinction between state of nature and state of war.
-State of nature - common judge with authority. State of war - force without right to invade the
rights of others.
-Men take themselves out of nature and put themselves into society (hobbsian) (lockeās point)
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-Argument appears puzzling - something may be missing from Lockeās account of the state of
nature - this is a dynamic narrative, a way of explaining how the state of nature is somehow
transformed into hobbes state of war, therefore creating a political community
-This can be found in ch 5 - property rights and how God gave the world to all human beings
as a common property
-Natural law constraints on appropriation. (1) No one can take more of something than they
can actually use and (2) you must leave enough and as good for others
-Right and convenience go together
-In this state life is primitive, it is also peaceful, no occasion for tension to arise over property
-Money
-Value arrises from peoples consent to their value
-Gold and silver, advantage over other commodities, bc it is imperishable - maintains value,
this means that people can hoard money without violating natural law
-The invention of money plants the seeds of inequality, distinction between rich and poor
-Link bw money and commerce upsets the concept of the state of nature
-Divorced * in lockeās terms
-Poor have incentive to steal, the rich have incentive to compete with one another
-State of nature transforming into the state of war
-(First state of nature)
-(Second state of nature) self interest contradicts natural law
-Before money, no one had incentive to create more than they needed. After invention of
money, peoples living standards of living, incentive to create more money
-Locke is a theorist of government
-Defending a system that is pre capitalist (writing in the 17th century), looking back we can
see that this system of government was developing into the modern system of capitalism that
we know
How do we get from the state of nature to civil society?
-People have to agree to form a society to protect everyone
-Need of a contract, (such as a Hobbesian covenant)
-Hobbes - ppl must agree to transfer their rights to one sovereign
-Locke - everyone agrees to form a community, must be a unanimous agreement, agree that
decisions will be made by a community. Consent to get in, once you are in you must agree
that all is up to the majority.
-Justiļ¬cation - Body politic, must move in the direction of the greater force (majority)
-paragraph 97
-* Express consent - every person must take an oath, including children regardless of
birthplace. Cannot take it back
-vs * Passive consent - unknowingly being under the rule of other laws, without oath. Passive
laws justiļ¬ed by Locke so that ppl who don't give express consent, people who are not
citizens and foreigners are still subject to the law
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