The current investigation seeks to display that Rousseau’s philosophy was based on a reverence for the state of nature. This led to the formation of a social contract out of this nature, so that the social contract became valorized in Rousseau’s work. The social contract states that nature is something that humanity overcomes for the benefit of its fellow humanity. The report then demonstrates how Locke had a similar idea of the social contract rising from a state of nature. Both thinkers shared similar valorization of nature, but there were definitely differences in terms of the extent to which this nature was valorized.

The social contract. This concept is important for an understanding of Rousseau’s political philosophy. “In Rousseau’s explanation of freedom, there is a division between two types of freedom. They are personal freedom and social freedom. Personal freedom comes from a human’s basic instincts and natural selfishness. An individual acts only if the benefits. Rousseau also called this freedom a state of nature” (Amezquita, 2010).

Rousseau was similar in his embrace of the social contract to Locke. Locke saw the natural state of human beings being a free state. He believed that society was social and cooperative, whereas other thinkers, like Hobbes, believed that society was an individualist and competitive. Locke saw war as being introduced into this basically peaceful nature and then continuing and adding to itself until it moved people to create civilization and social contracts, rather than seeing it as a natural state. In this state of civilization, people were more willing to give up personal authority but remained independent and free by nature. This theory has also had a lasting impact on society, even though it was more negative than Rousseau in terms of philosophy because it stresses individual freedoms’ importance.