Practice question · Put in order
Arrange the steps of the contract argument in the order it proceeds.
- Test existing institutions against the result
- Show why that condition is unsatisfactory
- Describe the condition of people without political authority
- Derive the form of legitimate authority from that agreement
- Identify what free and equal people would agree to in order to leave it
Hints
- The argument begins by describing a condition, not an institution.
- Testing real institutions is the last step, not the first.
Show the answer
- Describe the condition of people without political authority
- Show why that condition is unsatisfactory
- Identify what free and equal people would agree to in order to leave it
- Derive the form of legitimate authority from that agreement
- Test existing institutions against the result
Why
Laying the argument out as a sequence shows why the state of nature does so much work: everything downstream depends on how bad it was said to be. This is also why the three theorists reach such different conclusions from an identical method.
Practise The Liberal State and Its Contracts
The app has 4 more questions on this lesson, and keeps your place in the course. Political Science I is free to start.
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