Top Illustration IDEAS by Jean Jacques ROUSSEAU

In this lesson from a TEACHER we offer you a brief summary of the Enlightenment ideas of Jean Jacques Rousseauof him, that although he develops a philosophy with traits of the Illuminist movement, there are certain contradictions in his thought that separate him from it. He also separated from the Encyclopedia of Diderot and d'Alambert, and in fact, Votaire, who collaborated with Rousseau and Montesquieu, in writing it, felt a strong enmity towards him.

One of his greatest achievements is in the field of education, and of course, in politics. His social contract theory, his defense of equality Between all human beings and their commitment to popular sovereignty, they gave rise to the French insurrection from March 18 to May 28, 1871, a movement known as The Paris Commune. The first workers' government in the world is due to this.

If you want to know more about Rousseau's ideas, keep reading this article that offers you a PROFESSOR.

Here is a list of the 11 ideas of Rousseau's Enlightenment, without a doubt, a fundamental thinker of the Enlightenment movement.

1. He revolutionized pedagogy by advocating that education should be based on natural education of girls and boys.
2. He develops the social contract theory, defending the natural goodness of the human being, against the State, the source of all corruption. He is thus opposed to the philosophy of Locke and Hobbes.
3. He considers that the ideas of the English liberalists only lead to the inequality and they are the origin of bourgeois society. Say, that he was also one of the first to use the term bourgeoisie.
4. Rousseau criticized the catholic religion, with which he had a strong confrontation.
5. He makes a political and social proposal based on the natural freedom of the human being, defending popular sovereignty.
6. Open the way to democracy by affirming that power resides in the people, who are sovereign and elect their rulers.
7. He considers that all individuals are born free and equal.
8. He introduces the concept of general will, later reformulated by Inmanuel Kant as a categorical imperative.
9. He anticipates Karl Marx, when speaking of the alienation of the human being.
10. He claims that people are good by nature, but that society corrupts them.
11. He understood that women were nothing more than simple companions of men, although he defended the equality of rights.

Rosseau was a controversial enlightened philosopher argued that "The human being is good by nature", and that it is society that perverts its natural goodness. This is what he assures in Emilio, or de la Educación, one of his most important works and a true turning point in the pedagogical field. To this day, these ideas are still valid.

"The fundamental principle of all morality, on which I have reasoned in all my writings and which I have developed in this The last thing with all the clarity of which I was capable, is that man is a naturally good being, a lover of justice and order; that there is by no means anything of original wickedness in the human heart, and that the first movements of nature are always right ”.

The human being in a state of nature is radically opposite to the historical human being, but this does not mean that Rousseau intends to break with the established system, but to reform it. In the Social contract makes a defense of civil human being (an individual different from the previous two) and a government agreed through the general will, which is manifested through equal laws for all citizens.

Jean Jaques Rousseau was one of the most important philosophers of the EnlightenmentThanks, mainly to his sociopolitical ideas. His theory of the social contract marks a before and after in the history of politics by defending national sovereignty and the general will.

In the Social Contract bet on a republican state, expression of the will of the people, which is reflected in common laws for all individuals. In this sense, the size of the State is fundamental because, the larger it is, the smaller the general will will be. In order for all individuals to comply with the laws, the ideas are the small territories.

In its construction site, Rousseau proposes a system of society based on natural will, which always coincides with the will of all. It is not necessary, he says, a supreme authority or leader, since human beings associate freely, in such a way, that, by virtue of his natural goodness, protect himself and others, without renouncing his will natural.

“Each one of us puts his person and all his power in common under the supreme direction of the general will; and each member is considered an indivisible part of the whole ”. And he adds that such an association “must be able to defend and protect, with all common force, the person and property of each one. associates, but in such a way that each of these, in union with all, obeys only himself, and remains as free as before".

Rousseau was a very prolific writer who left a great literary legacy. Among his most famous works are, Emilio or of the education, Social contract, Julia or the new Heloise, Confessions or the Speech on inequality between men.