Politics and the family: Locke's transformation of the family in the 'Two Treatises of Government'

This dissertation examines Locke's discussion of the family and shows how it relates to his political thought as a whole. I do this by means of a textual analysis of the relevant sections of Locke's Two Treatises of Government. In the early chapters of this dissertation, I focus primarily on the First Treatise, where this theme is treated most comprehensively, considering both the broad topic of patriarchal rule and the more specific question of how Locke's attack on patriarchy affects the family. I then proceed to an analysis of Locke's treatment of the family in the Second Treatise and show how it fits together with the argument of the First Treatise, on which it is largely based. I argue that Locke's concern with developing a theory of politics that would maximize freedom from absolute, arbitrary rule is the informing principle of his entire political philosophy. The connection between absolute rule and the family is evident in Locke's attack on patriarchy in the First Treatise. It is simultaneously a critique of despotic rule by fathers in private families and of despotic rule by monarchs which was traditionally likened--by Filmer and others--to the rule of a father over his household.;I argue, moreover, that the existence of the family poses a considerable problem for Locke's premise of individual autonomy. If people exist in family groups in the state of nature, or the family and the state of nature co-exist as Locke admits later in the Second treatise (pars. 105-107), how can Locke argue that human beings are naturally free, equal and autonomous? I argue that Locke tries to resolve this problem by interpreting family life in such a way as to weaken its communal structure in order to make it conform as much as possible with Locke's basic premise that people are naturally free, equal and autonomous individuals.;By arguing for joint parental (rather than paternal) authority, limiting parental power to each child's period of dependence, attacking primogeniture and patriarchal authority over the extended family or clan, limiting conjugal power, accepting divorce and championing property rights for women, Locke mounts a devastating attack on patriarchy. In its place, Locke's reforms would create a smaller, less stable family, which over time will dissolve into economically and politically independent adults--resembling the free, equal and autonomous individuals of Locke's state of nature--among whom authority can be established only by consent or contract.