Concept
General will
Overview
term in political philosophy
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).
In the original texts
Passages from public-domain books where General will is discussed.
It follows from what has gone before that the general will is always right and tends to the public advantage; but it does not follow that the deliberations of the people are always equally correct. Our will is always for our own good, but we do not always see what that is; the people is never corrupted, but it is often deceived, and on such occasions only does it seem to will what is bad.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The social contract & discourses
names the idea; a chapter is titled for it; states what it is; author linked in the graph; opens on it
The general will is the notion of the will: and the laws are the special clauses of this will and based upon the notion of it. (2) We add a remark upon the account of the origin and formation of notions which is usually given in the Logic of Understanding. It is not _we_ who frame the notions.
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, The Logic of Hegel
states what it is; author linked in the graph; names the idea
On the other hand, in the natural order, these different wills become more and more active in proportion as they become centralised; the general will is always weak, the corporate will takes the second place, the individual will is preferred to all; so that every one is himself first, then a magistrate, and then a citizen; a series just the opposite of that required by the social order.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Emile
states what it is; author linked in the graph; names the idea
If the man is to be found who is so badly constituted as to resist, whose organization is so vicious as to be insensible to those motives which operate upon all his fellows, he is not fit to live in society; he would contradict the very end of his association: he would be its enemy; he would place obstacles to its natural tendency; his rebellious disposition, his unsociable will, not being susceptible of that…
Paul Henri Thiry Holbach, The System of Nature, or, the Laws of the Moral and Physical World. Volume 1
opens on it; names the idea
They are thereby transformed into desires and purposes, which, since they implicate a common or mutually understood meaning, present new ties, converting a conjoint activity into a community of interest and endeavor. Thus there is generated what, metaphorically, may be termed a general will and social consciousness: desire and choice on the part of individuals in behalf of activities that, by means of symbols, are…
John Dewey, The public and its problems
names the idea
Philosophers who discussed General will
Related ideas
- Encyclopédie
- Liang Qichao
- French Revolution
- Three Principles of the People
- Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
- Isaiah Berlin
- Jean-Jacques Rousseau
- Karl Popper
- Nicolas Malebranche
- Political philosophy
- Rule of law
- Tyranny of the majority
- Blaise Pascal
- Bertrand Russell
- Montesquieu
- Bloomsbury Publishing
- Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen
- Sun Yat-sen
- The Spirit of Law
Place in the tradition
Part of Discourse ethics.