Why Did Humans Create Government? Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau’s Social Contract Theories Explained

Why Does the State Exist?

Human beings live under laws, pay taxes, and are subject to various institutions established by the state. This naturally raises a fundamental question:

“Why does the state exist in the first place? Where does the state’s authority to govern its people come from?”

To answer this fundamental question, three of the most influential European political thinkers of the 17th and 18th centuries—Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau—offered very different answers.

Rather than tracing the legitimacy of the state and political authority to God or royal bloodlines, they developed the idea of Social Contract Theory, which holds that human beings created political society through mutual agreement.

However, because Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau held very different views of human nature and the state of nature, they also envisioned very different forms of government.

What Is Social Contract Theory?

The basic premise of Social Contract Theory is simple.

Imagine that human beings originally lived without a state or government. Political philosophers call this condition the “state of nature.”

Why, then, would people choose to leave the state of nature and create a government?

Social contract theorists argued that the state was neither created by divine will nor based on a king’s inherent right to rule from birth.

Instead, the state was a political community created through mutual agreement among individuals seeking to protect their lives, liberty, property, and other fundamental interests.

This idea represented a fundamental departure from the Divine Right of Kings, which justified royal authority as deriving from the will of God.

Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau: Key Differences at a Glance

Before examining each thinker in detail, it is helpful to understand the fundamental differences among Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau.

(1) Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679)

- Major Work: Leviathan (1651)

- View of Human Nature: Humans are primarily driven by self-preservation and their own desires.

- State of Nature: Without a common authority, human beings face insecurity and conflict—a condition Hobbes famously described as a “war of every man against every man.”

- Why Government Is Necessary: To protect life and maintain peace and security.

- Political Authority: Individuals authorize a powerful sovereign to maintain order.

- Political Direction: Strong sovereign authority and extensive political power.

- Right of Resistance: Generally rejected, although Hobbes recognized a basic right of self-preservation.

(2) John Locke (1632–1704)

- Major Work: Two Treatises of Government (1689)

- View of Human Nature: Humans are rational beings capable of understanding natural law.

- State of Nature: People are naturally free and equal, but their rights are not always securely protected.

- Why Government Is Necessary: To provide reliable protection for life, liberty, and property.

- Political Authority: Political power is entrusted to government by the people and must be exercised for their benefit.

- Political Direction: Limited government, representative institutions, and constitutional rule.

- Right of Resistance: Recognized when government violates the natural rights of the people.

(3) Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–1778)

- Major Work: The Social Contract (1762)

- View of Human Nature: Humans in the state of nature are relatively free and possess a natural capacity for compassion.

- State of Nature: Originally characterized by relative freedom and equality, before the development of social inequality and dependence.

- Why Government Is Necessary: To create a political community capable of preserving freedom and equality under common laws.

- Political Authority: Sovereignty belongs to the people collectively.

- Political Direction: Popular sovereignty and active, direct participation by citizens.

- Right of Resistance: The people themselves constitute the sovereign and are therefore the ultimate source of legitimate political authority.

In short, the three thinkers began with the same fundamental question—“Why do human beings need government?”—but arrived at very different conclusions.

Hobbes emphasized security and order, Locke emphasized natural rights and limited government, and Rousseau emphasized popular sovereignty, freedom, and equality.

These differences became some of the most important foundations of modern political thought.

1. Thomas Hobbes: “Without Government, Humans Will Fight One Another”

To understand Hobbes’s political thought, it is important to first consider the historical circumstances of England during his lifetime.

Hobbes lived through the English Civil War, a period of severe political turmoil and violent conflict.

Having witnessed the struggle between the monarchy and Parliament and the devastating consequences of civil war, Hobbes came to regard order and security as the most fundamental goals of political society.

# The War of All Against All

Rather than simply defining human beings as “evil,” Hobbes viewed them as beings fundamentally driven by self-preservation and the pursuit of their own desires.

The problem, however, is that people possess relatively similar abilities while the things they desire are limited.

When multiple people desire the same thing, competition inevitably arises.

Moreover, without government and law, there is no common authority capable of protecting individuals’ lives and property.

As a result, people may come to distrust one another and feel compelled to strike first before others can attack them.

Hobbes famously described this state of nature as:

“The war of all against all.”

In other words, without government, human beings would live in a condition of constant insecurity and fear, never knowing when they might be attacked by others.

# The Birth of the “Leviathan”

How, then, can human beings escape from this state of nature?

Hobbes argued that individuals enter into a social contract with one another and establish a powerful common authority—a sovereign—capable of maintaining order and controlling conflict.

To protect their lives and security, individuals authorize the sovereign to exercise extensive power on their behalf.

Hobbes symbolized this powerful political authority as the “Leviathan,” named after the enormous biblical creature.

In other words,

Even if some individual freedom must be restricted, it is better to have a strong government maintain order and protect life and security than to live in a state of anarchy.

Strong Sovereignty and the Limited Right of Resistance

For Hobbes, the greatest danger was not the rule of a single tyrant, but the collapse of political authority itself and a return to civil war and the state of nature.

He therefore argued that the sovereign established through the social contract must possess strong political power.

Because sovereign authority arises from a covenant made among individuals, Hobbes generally did not believe that citizens could simply break the covenant and resist the sovereign whenever they wished.

However, Hobbes did not argue that individuals must completely surrender their fundamental right to self-preservation.

Nevertheless, it is clear that his political theory could be used to justify strong centralized authority and absolute monarchy.

2. John Locke: “Government Exists to Protect the Rights of the People” (Locke, 1689/1988)

Locke viewed the state of nature much more positively than Hobbes did.

He believed that human beings are rational and capable of respecting one another’s life and liberty according to Natural Law, even in the absence of government.

Therefore, the state of nature was not necessarily a state of war.

However, there was one fundamental problem.

# A Peaceful but Insecure State of Nature

In the state of nature, there is no impartial judge and no government with the authority to enforce the law.

If someone violates another person’s rights, the injured individual must ultimately judge the offense and enforce punishment personally.

Because people cannot always judge their own disputes impartially, conflicts can easily arise.

Thus, for Locke, the state of nature was not the nightmarish state of constant warfare envisioned by Hobbes. Nevertheless, it remained an imperfect and insecure condition in which individual rights could not be reliably protected.

# Government to Protect Life, Liberty, and Property

For Locke, human beings possess fundamental natural rights from birth.

Among the most important of these are Life, Liberty, and Property.

People form a political community and establish a government in order to protect these rights more securely.

Importantly, this does not mean that individuals surrender all of their rights to the government.

Rather, the people entrust the government with the political power necessary to protect their rights.

Therefore, the government is not the master of the people. It is an institution created to protect the rights of the people.

# Separation of Powers and Limited Government

Because government is also run by human beings, political power can be abused.

For this reason, Locke argued that government power should be limited.

In particular, he distinguished between different forms of political power, including the legislative power, which makes laws, and the executive power, which enforces them.

Although it was Montesquieu who later developed the modern theory of the separation of powers into a more systematic form, Locke’s ideas also played an important role in the development of modern concepts of limited government and divided political authority.

# When Government Becomes Tyrannical, the People Have the Right to Replace It

One of the most important elements of Locke’s Social Contract Theory is the right of resistance—or ultimately, the right of revolution.

What happens if a government, instead of protecting the people’s life, liberty, and property, begins to violate those very rights?

Locke regarded this as a breach of the trust that the people had placed in their government.

Therefore, the people have the right to resist a tyrannical government and establish a new one.

These ideas later had a profound influence on the American Revolution and the development of modern liberal political thought.

3. Jean-Jacques Rousseau: “The People Are the Sovereign”

Rousseau raised an even more fundamental question than Hobbes and Locke:

“If human beings are born free, why do they live under the rule of others?”

The Social Contract begins with one of Rousseau’s most famous statements:

“Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.”

# Inequality Created by Civilization and Private Property

Rousseau viewed human beings in the state of nature as relatively free and equal.

However, as populations grew and human society developed, private property emerged, creating distinctions between the rich and the poor.

Differences in property produced economic inequality, which in turn developed into broader forms of social and political inequality.

Rousseau therefore did not believe that civilized society necessarily made human beings freer or happier.

Instead, he criticized the development of civilization and private property for intensifying inequality and relations of domination among human beings (Rousseau, 1755/1997).

# The General Will

How, then, can human beings form a political community while preserving their freedom?

This is where Rousseau introduces one of his most important concepts: the “General Will.”

The General Will is not simply the sum of everyone’s individual opinions.

Rather, it refers to a collective will directed toward the common good and shared interests of the political community, transcending purely private interests.

Through the social contract, individuals become members of the political community while simultaneously becoming participants in the exercise of sovereignty.

Citizens therefore do not simply submit to the will of another person. Instead, they obey laws that they themselves have participated in creating.

For Rousseau, this was the essence of political freedom.

# Sovereignty Cannot Be Transferred or Divided

Rousseau advocated a strong doctrine of popular sovereignty.

Sovereignty belongs collectively to the people and cannot be completely transferred to another person or body.

He was particularly critical of representative systems in which citizens delegate political decision-making entirely to elected representatives.

In his criticism of the British parliamentary system, Rousseau famously argued that the English people were free only when electing members of Parliament; once the election was over, they were again enslaved.

Rousseau’s political philosophy therefore had a profound influence on the tradition of direct democracy, which emphasizes the active participation of citizens in political decision-making.

# The Fundamental Differences Between Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau

The differences among these three thinkers can be summarized most simply by looking at how each answered the question: “Why do we need government?”

(1) Hobbes

The state of nature is filled with conflict, fear, and insecurity.

→ A strong government is necessary to protect life and maintain security.

(2) Locke

Human beings are naturally free, but the state of nature lacks reliable institutions for protecting individual rights.

→ A limited government is necessary to protect life, liberty, and property.

(3) Rousseau

Human beings are born free, but civilization and unequal social institutions have placed them in conditions of dependence and domination.

→ Citizens must collectively become the sovereign and participate in making the laws under which they live.

In the simplest terms:

Hobbes = Security and Order

Locke = Liberty and Rights

Rousseau = Equality and Popular Sovereignty

Why Social Contract Theory Matters

Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau differed greatly in their political theories.

However, they shared one crucial idea:

They sought the legitimacy of political authority not in God or royal bloodlines, but in human beings themselves.

In traditional theories of monarchy during the medieval and early modern periods, royal authority was often justified as deriving from God.

Social contract theorists, however, located the foundation of political order in human agreement and consent.

This represented a major transformation in modern political philosophy: the state exists for human beings; human beings do not exist for the state.

Locke’s theories of natural rights and the right of resistance had a major influence on the development of liberalism and constitutional government, while Rousseau’s concepts of popular sovereignty and the General Will strongly influenced democratic thought and the political ideas of the French Revolutionary era.

Hobbes also became an important foundational figure in modern political philosophy by explaining state authority through the secular logic of human agreement and self-preservation, rather than divine command.

[Deep Dive] Three Intellectual Bridges from Social Contract Theory to Modern Sociology

The Social Contract theories of Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau influenced more than the development of modern political philosophy.

The questions they raised—“How is social order maintained?”, “How is state authority legitimized?”, and “Where does social inequality come from?”—would later become central concerns of modern sociology.

Of course, it would be an oversimplification to suggest that the ideas of Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau directly developed into the theories of Durkheim, Weber, and Marx. Nevertheless, examining the connections between the questions raised by these early political philosophers and later sociological theories helps us understand some of the intellectual roots of modern sociology.

① Hobbes → Émile Durkheim’s “Anomie”

One of the most important questions for Hobbes was: “How is social order possible?”

In Hobbes’s state of nature, there is no common authority capable of restraining individuals and maintaining order. As a result, people constantly distrust and fear one another, and society can descend into a “war of all against all” (Hobbes, 1651/1996).

This concern can be compared with the later sociological problem of social order and social regulation examined by Émile Durkheim.

Durkheim used the concept of “anomie” to describe a condition in which rapid social change weakens established norms and values, leaving society unable to regulate human desires effectively (Durkheim, 1897/1951).

Although their theories are clearly different, they share an important concern: when the rules, norms, or institutions that bind individuals into a social order become weak, society can become unstable.

Hobbes: Absence of common authority → Breakdown of social order

Durkheim: Weakening of social norms and regulation → Anomie

In this sense, Hobbes’s political-philosophical question—“How is social order possible?”—later became one of the fundamental questions of sociology.

② Locke → Max Weber’s “Legal-Rational Authority”

One of Locke’s central questions was: “When is political authority legitimate?”

According to Locke, the power of government does not come from a king receiving authority from God. Rather, it is entrusted to government by the people for the purpose of protecting their life, liberty, and property.

Government itself must therefore be subject to the law, and a government that violates the rights of the people may lose its legitimacy.

This concern can be compared with Max Weber’s theory of Legitimate Domination.

Weber distinguished among three major types of legitimate authority: traditional authority, charismatic authority, and legal-rational authority.

Among these, Legal-Rational Authority is particularly important for understanding the modern bureaucratic state (Weber, 1978).

In a modern state, a public official or president is entitled to exercise political power not because that individual possesses a special bloodline or has been chosen by God.

Rather, laws and institutions grant that person specific powers and define the limits within which those powers may be exercised.

Although Locke and Weber should not be treated as belonging to a single, direct theoretical lineage, their ideas can be connected through a shared concern with political authority that is constrained and legitimized by laws and institutions rather than based on the arbitrary rule of individuals.

Locke: Government authority derives from the consent of the people and the trust placed in government.

Weber: Authority in the modern state gains legitimacy through legally established rules and procedures.

This intellectual connection provides an important framework for understanding what we now regard as fundamental features of modern political society: the rule of law and institutionalized state authority.

③ Rousseau → Marx, Conflict Sociology, and Theories of Inequality

Among the three thinkers, Rousseau examined the origins of social inequality most fundamentally.

In Discourse on the Origin of Inequality, Rousseau argued that the emergence of private property and growing differences in wealth contributed to the development of social inequality and relations of domination.

In other words, Rousseau raised the important idea that inequality does not arise simply from differences in individual ability but can also be produced by social institutions and property relations.

This concern can later be compared with Karl Marx’s theory of social class.

Marx focused on the structural conflict of interests in capitalist society between the capitalist class, which owns the means of production, and the working class, which must sell its labor power (Marx, 1867/1976).

While Rousseau questioned the relationship between private property and inequality, Marx developed a much more systematic economic and social theory analyzing the ownership of the means of production and the structure of social classes.

Rousseau: Development of private property → Expansion of social inequality

Marx: Private ownership of the means of production → Class division and class conflict

It would therefore be inaccurate to describe Rousseau as the founder of modern conflict theory. Nevertheless, he can be regarded as an important intellectual precursor to modern inequality research and conflict-oriented perspectives because he viewed social inequality not merely as an individual problem but as a product of social structures and institutions.

Many issues studied in sociology today—including income and wealth polarization, social mobility, the intergenerational transmission of wealth, social stratification, and inequality of opportunity—ultimately connect to the same fundamental question:

“How is social inequality created and reproduced?”

From Social Contract Theory to Sociology

Connecting the questions raised by these three thinkers to modern sociology reveals an interesting intellectual trajectory:

Hobbes → How is social order possible? → Durkheim’s social integration and anomie

Locke → How is state authority legitimized? → Weber’s legal-rational authority

Rousseau → Where does social inequality come from? → Marx’s class theory and modern inequality research

Although sociology did not emerge as an independent academic discipline until the 19th century, many of its fundamental questions had already been raised much earlier by political philosophers.

In this sense, the Social Contract theories of Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau go far beyond simply explaining “Why was the state created?”

Their ideas can be understood as an important intellectual starting point for some of the central questions of modern social science: social order, the legitimacy of power, liberty and rights, and social inequality.

Conclusion: Where Does the State Get Its Power?

Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau held very different views of human nature and the state of nature.

Hobbes placed greater emphasis on security, Locke on liberty and rights, and Rousseau on equality and popular sovereignty.

Yet their Social Contract theories ultimately lead us back to one fundamental question:

“For whom does the state exist, and from where does its power derive its legitimacy?”

One of the most important answers offered by modern Social Contract Theory was that the legitimacy of political authority ultimately comes from human beings and citizens themselves.

Ultimately, the central idea of Social Contract Theory can be expressed simply:

“It is not the king who creates the people; it is the people who create the state.”

The idea that “the people come before the state” developed within a Western social and cultural environment shaped by the growth of contractual relationships and individualism.

Even in premodern Europe, monarchs did not always exercise unlimited power. Various political and social forces—including the nobility, the Church, towns and cities, representative assemblies, and parliaments—existed alongside the monarchy and often placed important constraints on royal authority.