Discourse on the Origin of InequalityJean-Jacques Rousseau

Rousseau's Discourse on the Origin of Inequality argues that most of what passes for human nature is actually the product of social development. The state of nature is not Hobbes's war of all against all. Natural man is solitary, self-sufficient, moved by self-preservation and pity, without language, reason, or morality. He is neither good nor evil. He simply is.

The decisive turn is the invention of property. "The first man who, having enclosed a piece of ground, bethought himself of saying 'This is mine,' and found people simple enough to believe him, was the real founder of civil society." From property follow dependence, comparison, vanity, and inequality. Language develops alongside social life, and with it the capacity for abstract thought, but also for deception, flattery, and domination.

Rousseau distinguishes natural inequality (differences in strength, health, intelligence) from moral or political inequality (differences in wealth, rank, and power). The first is unavoidable. The second is artificial, and it grows as societies become more complex. The division of labor, the accumulation of wealth, and the establishment of laws all deepen the gap between rich and poor. Laws, Rousseau argues, were invented by the wealthy to protect their advantages under the guise of universal justice.

The Discourse does not propose a return to the state of nature. Rousseau knows that path is closed. But by showing that inequality is historical rather than natural, he makes it possible to ask whether existing institutions are legitimate, a question The Social Contract will take up directly.