Documents

The Social Contract

Citation Formats

General Reference

Political Atlas. "The Social Contract." Accessed August 30, 2026. https://political.interactiveatlas.org/documents/the-social-contract-1762.

APA Style

Political Atlas. (n.d.). The Social Contract. Retrieved August 30, 2026, from https://political.interactiveatlas.org/documents/the-social-contract-1762

BibTeX

@misc{politicalatlas-the-social-contract,
  author = {Political Atlas},
  title = {The Social Contract},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://political.interactiveatlas.org/documents/the-social-contract-1762},
  note = {Accessed August 30, 2026}
}

The Social Contract is Jean-Jacques Rousseau's 1762 work of political philosophy, opening with the line "Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains," and arguing that legitimate political authority arises only from a social contract agreed to by the people as a collective body, expressing what Rousseau called the general will, rather than being imposed by a ruler from above.

Facts

Year

1762 1

Key Provision

Argues that legitimate political authority rests on a social contract in which individuals submit to the collectively expressed general will rather than to any private interest, opening with the declaration that man is born free and is everywhere in chains, and holding that laws are legitimate only when citizens themselves are, directly, their author. 1

Cross-Tradition Connections