Reason and Agreement in Social Contract Views

Abstract

Abstract Social contract views work from the intuitive idea of agreement. The appeal of this notion lies in the liberal idea that cooperation ought to be based in the individuals’ consent and ought to be for their mutual benefit. Social contract views differ according to how the idea of agreement is specified: Who are the parties to the agreement? How are they situated with respect to one another (status quo, state of nature, or equality)? What are the intentions, capacities, and interests of these individuals, and what rights and powers do they have? What is the purpose of the agreement? Is the agreement conceived of in historical or nonhisrical terms? Since these and other parameters have been set in different ways, it is difficult to generalize and speak of the social contract tradition. Hobbes’s idea of agreement differs fundamentally from Rousseau’s, just as Gauthier and Buchanan conceive of agreement very differently than Rawls and Scanlon. Rather than being a particular kind of ethical view, the general notion of agreement functions as a framework for justification in ethics. This framework is based on the liberal idea that the legitimacy of social rules and institutions depends on their being freely and publicly acceptable to all individuals bound by them. If rational individuals in appropriately defined circumstances could or would agree to certain rules or institutions, then insofar as we identify with these individuals and their interests, what they accept should also be acceptable to us now as a basis for our cooperation. Seen in this way, the justificatory force of social contract views depends only in part on the idea of agreement; even more essential is the conception of the person and the conception of practical reason that are built into particular views.