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Chapter 4 traces the development of the notion of the social contract in the thinking of Hobbes and Locke, and looks at the way in which Spinoza attempted to resolve political and religious pluralism. With the theories of Hobbes and Locke, modern legal philosophy developed two different versions of the social-contract model as legitimation of state and law. They both put the individual at the centre of their political theories. The social contract serves here as metaphor for the view that an individual is bound to a central authority only if he could have voluntarily agreed to it. In the case of both philosophers, this leads to a narrow account of legal morality: the law should restrict itself to safeguarding the conditions for fair and peaceful coexistence, and refrain from enforcing ideals of moral perfection. The difference between Hobbes and Locke lies primarily in the fact that Hobbes bases his argument on a completely amoral point of view: the self-interest of the individual man in light of his instinct for survival. Locke, on the other hand, adopts a moral perspective: the right to freedom of an individual. These different points of departure lead to dissimilar views of the role of the state. While Hobbes emphasises the importance of law and order, Locke also advocates freedom. Hobbes propagates an absolutist state, aimed at the maintenance of order so as to pacify the imminent war of all against all. Locke arrives at a liberal constitutional state which in a neutral manner has to protect the freedom and property rights of everyone. Spinoza, in his turn, attempts to overcome the pluralism in worldviews by showing that at their core all worldviews boil down to the same. Differing from Hobbes, and closer to Locke, Spinoza contends that the granting of freedom not only does not harm public peace, but is essential for the thriving of piety and for securing public peace.

DOI: 10.1007/978-94-007-1457-1_4

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