Marx's Inheritance And Criticism Of Rousseau's Human Rights Thought

Jean-jacques Rousseau was an intellectual pioneer of the French Revolution and one of the most prominent representatives of the Enlightenment in the 18th century.Jean-jacques Rousseau’s The Social Contract became a guiding theory in the bourgeois democratic revolution.Jean-jacques Rousseau’s idea of free and equal human rights,which started from "Natural rights",played a pioneering role.In Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s thought of human rights,the ultimate goal is to establish a social contract that can realize freedom and equality,the theoretical premise is natural human rights,the theory of public will and the people’s sovereignty are the core of his theory.In the study of the source of Marxism’s thought,although most scholars believe that Marxism absorbed the German classical philosophy,the French materialism,but in his theory,we can see a lot of Shadow from Jean-Jacques Rousseau ’ s Theory.Marxism inherited Jean-jacques Rousseau’s ideas of equality and freedom and put Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s ideas on the historical materialism.Marxism recognized Jean-jacques Rousseau’s theoretical contribution,but also clearly recognized the flaws and deficiencies in Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s human rights theory.First of all,based on the theory of natural human rights,the origin of human rights is framed in a fictitious presupposition,which is an abstract human rights.Jean-jacques Rousseau did not see that the subject of human rights should be a real person,that rights also arise from social and historical development and changes,and human rights are seen as eternal,this reveals that Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s natural human rights are non historical and non practical.Second,Jean-jacques Rousseau’s so called human rights were bourgeois privileges,and his ideas on human rights were centered on the private good and did not break the shackles of the class.As the foundation of all inequality and freedom,private ownership makes civil society fall into the opposition between human rights and civil rights.Political emancipation only gave human rights in the form of"Equality"and "Freedom".However,Jean-Jacques Rousseau did not realize the essence of human beings,so he did not achieve the emancipation and free development of human beings.After Marxism discovered Jean-Jacques Rousseau’ s limitations,he replaced Jean Jacques Rousseau’ s idealistic research method with the method of historical materialism,overcame the defects of this abstract,metaphysical view of human rights,and realized the criticism and sublation of Jean-Jacques Rousseau’ s human rights thought.In the era of Rights,human rights is undoubtedly one of the most important theoretical and practical issues.By combing and recognizingMarxism’s inheritance and criticism of Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s human rights thought,we can more intuitively realize the progressiveness of Marxism’s human rights theory.On the basis of criticizing Jean-Jacques Rousseau and other western human rights theories,Marxism completed his own construction of human rights thought.Marxism’s human rights thought is of great importance to the issue of how to protect and perfect human rights and what kind of human rights to protect,it can be a guide.