The Social Contract

Credits and rights

Original writer

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Publisher of this edition

BoingyBooks Classics

Original publisher

Project Gutenberg

Adaptation credits

John Shoufler / BoingyBooks Classics — digital edition

Original source / edition

The Social Contract (1762)

License

Public Domain

License link

https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/

Rights and adaptation notice

This work is in the public domain. John Shoufler published this digital edition through BoingyBooks Classics. The original work remains public domain and may be copied, adapted, and shared.

The Social Contract by Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1762)

"Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains." Rousseau's radical argument that legitimate political authority must rest on the "general will" of the people — the philosophical dynamite that helped ignite the French Revolution.

Historical Significance:
Published in 1762, The Social Contract was immediately banned in France and Geneva. Rousseau argued that sovereignty belongs to the people, not to kings — a revolutionary idea that influenced the French Revolution's Declaration of the Rights of Man (1789) and the American Constitution. Robespierre carried a copy; Napoleon claimed to have read it. The book's concept of the "general will" has been both celebrated as the foundation of democracy and criticized as a justification for totalitarianism. It remains one of the most debated texts in political philosophy.

This public domain classic was originally published in 1762. Free to read and share.