On Rousseau’s Concept Of The General Will

The concept of the general will is the key to Rousseau’s "Social Contract", and it is also agreat creation of Rousseau’s political philosophy. This article puts Rousseau’s general willtheory and its related problems into a preliminary discussion. The main body of this article isdivided into four parts:The first part mainly clarify the concept of the general will, to grasp the general willtheory must start from the perspective of the concept. By comparing the general will with thewill of all and the individual will, eventually we get the meaning of the general will,and thegeneral will has supremacy: the will of all is the sum of the individual will, containing theprivate interests;the General will is the result of the interaction of the individual will,and italways points to the public interest.The Will of all cannot replace the general will to becomethe guidance of the public,the general will is the basis of legitimacy; the general will isderived from the individual will and the general will have a general binding force, anindividual will have to obey the general will.The second part: the general will theory is controversial, so Rousseau set for a lot oftough conditions to realize the general will: legislators enlighten people with the general will;legislators make use of civil religion as supporting tools to complete the task, and it isbeneficial to cultivate the social spirit; Agreed principles represent the people’s sovereignty, itis entirely legitimate conditions. Among them, the legislators, civil religion and Agreedprinciples is cultural conditions that achieve the general will, the three complement each other,not a single one can be omitted. Investigation to the people is mainly related to social andeconomic conditions, it is the basis of the cultural conditions.The third part is about the purpose of setting the general will. Freedom in Rousseau’spolitical philosophy occupies the highest position, it is focus on the central question ofpolitical philosophy. To be specific, Rousseau’s idea contains the evolution of natural freedom,political freedom and moral freedom, the process of freedom is the same with "SocialContract". Rousseau provides a positive alternative plan after the loss of natural freedom formankind into political society, that is obeying the laws made by their people for their own.The main content of the forth part is to talk over the effective execution of the general will.As the government is a necessary evil, and any government will gradually corrupt.It willfrom the execution of the general will to personal despots. The most and direct way to restrainthis evil is to resort to natural right.People as sovereign must assemble regularly.