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Example research essay topic: State Of Nature State Of War - 1,888 words

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How does political philosophy identify the good regime? Since the ancient time people faced the necessity of protecting their natural rights, i. e. inalienable rights given to them by nature.

No one is eligible to violate these rights. On the other hand people need certain mechanism to defend their natural rights. One of the outstanding philosophers Thomas Hobbes (5 April 1588 4 December 1679) in his brilliant masterpiece Leviathan tried to find the answers on various questions related to human beings and their existence in society etc. That the attempt to give a philosophic background to the principles of civil society.

According to Hobbes a necessity of the civil state is obvious; a man has to defend his natural rights because in the absence of legitimate rules society lives in chaos, " There Is Always Warre Of Every One Against Every One Hereby it is manifest, that during the time men live without a common Power to keep them all in awe, they are in that condition which is called Warre; and such a warre, as is of every man, against every man. 1 In his social investigations on the nature of society, Thomas Hobbes comes to a conclusion that people need (a) to protect their natural rights and (b) these rights need to be protected according to certain rules to avoid chaos and a permanent state of war. This conclusion is absolutely correct because the state of war itself violate the natural right of human beings. Thus people have to find the solution to protect their rights by concentrating their power to defend themselves in one hand in order to stop the permanent state of war. At the same time people need to interact within a society without a war.

Hobbes makes a conclusion that people should transfer their natural rights to a supreme power, a sovereign who becomes strong enough to protect the rights of individuals particularly and the society in general. Such a social model is built on the basis of covenant between a sovereign and members of society according to which people transfer their natural rights. People get their security and their natural rights protection in exchange of transferring their power to a sovereign. Theory of Hobbes explains the necessity of central power to stop "natural chaos" on one hand but on the other hand it does not explain such phenomena as war, death penalties etc. Sovereign being responsible for society and for each of its member sends people to war to die or sentences law violators to death breaking their natural rights but observing the social contract. If sovereign exists as a collective power to protect the natural rights of individuals, does not he break covenant sending the individuals to war or sentencing them to death?

A very indicative example was given by a brilliant philosopher Hanna Arendt who analyzed the Nazis crimes and Holocaust during the World War II. In her addressing to Adolf Eichmann, a Nazi who was an one of the ideologists" of Holocaust she wrote And just as you supported and carried out a policy of not wanting to share the earth with the Jewish people and the people of a number of other nations - as though you and your superiors had any right to determine who should and who should not inhabit the world - we find that no one, that is, no member of the human race, can be expected to want to share the earth with you. This is the reason, and the only reason, you must hang. " 2 The Hobbes vision of the state or sovereign was rather totalitarian one. Leviathan is a huge machine which obtains the absolute power by seizing the rights of people, i. e. Leviathan gets the absolute monopoly of managing society and leaving its members deprived of civil rights.

According to Hobbes power should be as it was mentioned an absolute one. Actually Leviathan is a dictator, a monarch who acts on his own. It would be good if absolute monarchy were moral in its nature, but modern history showed than no dictatorship can be moral. The British philosopher John Locke developed the theory of society in general and of a state in particularly.

To study clearly the background of power both thinkers come back to a question of the state of nature. If Hobbes presents the state of nature as a state of war where everyone is against everyone, John Locke describes the original state of nature as a state of perfect freedom to order their actions, and dispose of their possessions and persons, as they think fit, within the bounds of the law of nature, without asking leave, or depending upon the will of any other man. 3 While Hobbes says of the state of nature as a state of violence Locke says that all creatures in the state of nature posses equal rights and no one has the right to violate others rights. According to Hobbes the government is the only institution to bring an accord to the society of people who live in the state of war, to stop chaos on its own judgment while Locke says that government is needed to support human being natural rights more effectively. A very important conclusion of Locke is that government power is limited to the public good of the society.

It is a power that hath no other end but preservation, and therefore can never have a right to destroy, enslave, or designedly to impoverish the subjects. 4 Hobbes idea of a government is a totalitarian one, i. e. Leviathan possesses complete power while Locke demonstrates the danger of absolute power and introduces the principle of power separation into different branches, i. e. basics of the modern democracy. He says that legislative power is a transferable one.

It is transferred for a limited term only from the majority to one or a group of people. The mission of the legislative power is to establish laws which are in accord with the first and fundamental natural law, which is to govern even the legislative itself, is the preservation of the society, and (as far as will consist with the public good) of every person in it. 5 The theories of state, principles of social co-existence have been main topics for thinkers since the ancient times. Aristotle in his Politics tried to find answers to a question of social co-existence within a state. Aristotle unlike Hobbes assumes that every state is established for the social good only. Every state is a community of some kind, and every community is established with a view to some good; for mankind always acts in order to obtain that which they think good. But, if all communities aim at some good, the state or political community, which is the highest of all, and which embraces all the rest, aims at good in a greater degree than any other, and at the highest good. 6 He compares social relationships in a state with those in a family.

A state according to Aristotle is a natural community. He says that a state is formed when several villages are united in a single complete community, large enough to be nearly or quite self-sufficing 7. A state according to Aristotle is a political interaction between free and equal. A human being is a political creature in his essence and a state is the highest stage of his political development. Aristotle understands a state as a unity consisting of certain elements.

He outlines the elements a state consists of. They are unified territory and a community of citizens. Citizens are people participating in legislative and executive power. A state is also characterized by a unified cult; it has common army and unified understanding of justice. Aristotle considers private property to be an integral part of the human nature. He discusses the issue of property in the view of common vs private.

Property should be in a certain sense common, but, as a general rule, private; for, when everyone has a distinct interest, men will not complain of one another, and they will make more progress, because every one will be attending to his own business. 8 Aristotle gives the classification of political states. He distinguishes between good and bad regimes. Actually both types have common nature. If they are aimed to the common good they are in the forms of royalty, aristocracy and a constitutional government or polity.

If regimes are aimed to gain benefits for one person or a limited group of people they are tyranny, oligarchy and democracy. Royalty, aristocracy and polity take forms of tyranny, oligarchy and democracy accordingly. The best form of the state according to Aristotle is the polity, a regime where the majority rules for the sake of common welfare. On the other hand the polity itself is a mixture of oligarchy and democracy. This element of polity, unity of interests of wealthy and poor, riches and freedom is typical for the state. Aristotle examines the nature of revolutions.

He asserts that a state can not live in happiness if any of its citizens is unhappy. The happy life of citizens is the main mission of a state. The main reason of revolutions according to Aristotle is an inequality. Questions of a state and a social construction worried the best thinkers of mankind. One of the most outstanding philosophers of the Ancient Greece Plato (428 / 427 BC 348 / 347 BC) tried to find the answers to questions which were in the focus of the philosophers. In the dialogue of Socrates and Crito Plato stands for the law priority.

Socrates speaks with Crito not on behalf of condemned but on behalf of laws. The dialogue is built on opinion of many vs law. Crito himself and many of Socrates followers consider he should take his chance and escape from the prison, but this will break the law. Dialogue of Socrates and Crito is a debate between those who advocate the state and its main institution and those who can bring the state to chaos for the sake of personal interest, though this interest is a vital one. The laws are obligatory to be executed and a law which is not working undermines the essence of the state. Or does it seem to you that the state may exist and not be overturned, in which court rulings have no strength, but by private people they are made ineffective and ruined?" 9 According to Socrates a citizen should either obey commonly accepted laws or leave the country.

Socrates introduces the state and its laws as something very native for citizens; he associates them with motherland and the citizens parents with whom citizens are closely connected. The laws according to Socrates could be not absolutely correct but they are obligatory for execution. All their fallacies should be discussed, improved and corrected. After all this it is obvious that Socrates by Plato is an advocate of classical Greek polity in which the state and society were closely connected and the state and social activity thought to be united with the individual. Author opposes the wise truth vs wrong opinion of a mob. It could be taken as feature of aristocracy.

But it would be wrong to consider that correlation of common and individual was...


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Research essay sample on State Of Nature State Of War

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