Brian Hamilton-Vise

Rousseau on natural law

“[For Rousseau,] droit politique is not a droit naturel, even if the law of nature is the foundation of all legitimate political order. The expression droit naturel, then, covers two distinct notions. One designates that which is not truly a law [droit], because it can’t be made the object of a public declaration: that’s the law [loi] of nature. The other gestures towards that which is not truly a law [droit] because it needs no such declaration. The Manuscrit de Genève shows this clearly: the true natural law [droit naturel], which he calls ‘reasoned natural law [droit naturel raisonné],’ is not anterior but posterior to political law [droit politique], ‘because the law is anterior to justice and not justice to the law.’ It is only by the institution of political societies that it will come about, perhaps, that we be driven to ‘a en user avec les autre hommes à peu près comme avec nos Concitoyens.’ For, ‘we do not properly begin to become human beings except after having been Citizens.’ Between the nature of a person and humanity, between anthropology and morality, the droit politique is a necessary mediation.”

—Bruno Bernardi, Introduction to Rousseau’s Du contrat social (Paris: Flammarion: 2001), p. 19–20.

I don’t yet understand the difference between droit and loi in French. The quote I leave untranslated, I can’t understand.

2 June 2009 | Comments (0)
Tags: Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Political Theory