Discourse on Political Economy (World's Classics) - Softcover

This title is among the permanent classics of political theory. Influenced by Montesquieu's "Spirit of Laws" (1748), it argues that the basis of any legitimate society must be the agreement of its members. Censored in its own time for its revolutionary tendencies, and still controversial in many respects, it is a main source of democratic belief. Rousseau is essentially a radical thinker, and in a broad sense a revolutionary. His doctrine states that as humans are born free, their subjection to government must be based on analysis of "the general will", his greatest contribution to political theory, which attempts to show how individuals can be united by self-interest, and so validate the society in which they live and the constraints which it imposes on them. Christopher Betts is the editor of "Rousseau: 'Discourse on Inequality'", and the translator of "Persian Letters" (Montesquieu).