Moral psychology and political agency: Rousseau's liberating authorities

This study reconstructs Rousseau's notion of liberating authority through a variety of texts, with chapters revolving around his major authority figures: the Tutor, Wolmar, and the Legislator. Rousseau's understanding of authority and his treatment of the moral psychology of authority relations have serious implications for democratic societies. Rousseau demonstrates how the moral psychology of dependent social beings may impede the moral and political agency of citizens---helping us to appreciate what democratic citizenship means, in more than name alone. Rousseau describes liberating authorities who can regenerate the relations of dependence that characterize social life. Man may be found everywhere in chains, but that says nothing of the form those chains will take. Liberating authorities are required to strengthen man's naturally weak will and render him capable of self-mastery. Self-mastery is necessary to sustain commitments to moral autonomy and accountability. Only then can subjects become citizens, political agents, defenders of justice.