Rousseau's Social Contract and the Occupy Movement

When looking in the box room for something completely different, this evening, I came across a book I mislaid and have been missing for a long time. Jean-Jacque Rousseau's The Social Contract (1762), a slim volume whose cover is inscribed with the immortal epigraph: 'Man was born free, and he is everywhere in chains'.  I can't argue with that, although I do think the words are even more apt when applied to Woman, given the history of gender inequity in social participation that reproduced itself throughout modernity, long after  Rousseau left the mortal coil. A desire to invert gender politics was not the cause of my joy when I found this little book tonight, however; I have been thinking about it because of the questions of the social contract that have been opened up anew by the Occupy movement.

At random, I opened The Social Contract at  Chapter 14, The Same- Continued. And I read:

'The moment the people is lawfully assembled as a sovereign body all jurisdiction of the government ceases, the executive power is suspended, and the person of the humblest citizen is as sacred and inviolable as that of the highest magistrate, for in the presence of the represented there is no longer any representation. Most of the disturbances which took place in the Roman assemblies were the result of this rule being either unknown or neglected. The consuls were no more than the presidents of the people; the tribunes were mere speakers, the senate was nothing at all.

These intervals of suspension, when the prince recognises - or ought to recognize- who is superior, are always alarming for princes; and the assemblies of the people, which are the shield of the body politic amd the brake on the government, have always been the nightmare of magistrates; hence the latter spare no effort in raising objections, problems, promises to turn the citizens against assemblies. When the citizens are avaricious, cowardly, pusillanimous, and love repose more than freedom, they do not hold out against the redoubled efforts of the government. It is thus that, as the opposing force increases continuously, the sovereign authority atrophies in the end and the majority of republics fall and perish before their time.

 But between the sovereign authority and arbitrary government there is sometimes interposed an intermediate power of which we must now speak."*


Rousseau's meditations on the social contract certainly seem apposite in light of the new dialogue that has entered and is now ringing through the public domain. What will it lead to? where will it go? Only time -and the people- will tell. But one thing is certain: there is now a public assembly that is speaking for itself. The Occupy movement around the world - which remarkably eight weeks ago did not exist- is characterised by the communication forum of the General Assembly which anyone who wishes to can participate in. This is a new global social movement that is giving people around the world a chance to assemble and speak- about public governance and social organisation; about how we humans may live better actively and equably participating in our societies.  And as Rousseau's words show, this is a form of assembly and communication that people have engaged in since antiquity. For decades throughout the 20th century people grew so used to having the world mediated through TV and mass media and adopting the role of the passive consumer that they almost forgot that democracy means 'rule of the people'.  Mass media and TV passive consumption made people lazy. The interactivity and lively dialogue and cultural exchange  of social media has woken people up, at the same time as the Global Financial Crisis has created a real need for new ways and solutions to economic and environmental problems. And now the social media conversations of concerned citizens have materialised in embodied dialogue and the 'general assemblies' of the Occupy movements in the public squares all around the world.


                                                                                                                                            © Copyright Ruth Skilbeck 2011

*Rousseau, Jean-Jacques. (1762/2004). The Social Contract. Penguin Books. London.