BODIN defines a COMMONWEALTH as "the rightly ordered government of families, and the things they share in common, by a sovereign." He claims that the right to command and the duty to obey come from GOD. He argues that government is nothing more than the family writ large (a position that Aristotle would dispute). Bodin contends that the duty of civil obedience stems from the right of conquest, upon which one must choose between living as a subject or dying as a free man. He claims that as the husband and father has the power of life and death over his wife and children, so too does the sovereign over his subjects; but he contends that neither the father nor the sovereign will abuse this power because of their affection for their loved ones.

Bodin agrees with PLATO that "the highest felicity" attainable by man lies in the "intellective and contemplative virtues." But unlike Aristotle, Bodin sees no reason why this end should require involvement in political affairs: "It is a very grave error to suppose that no one is a citizen unless he is eligible for public office, and has a voice in popular estates, either in a deliberative or judicial capacity." But if one has no voice in "popular estates," what then can it mean to be a citizen? For Bodin, citizenship consists of nothing more than subjecting oneself to the authority of a sovereign in exchange for the sovereign's protection. The problem of restricted citizenship which we encountered with Aristotle and Socrates does not arise with Bodin, or with Hobbes. This is because if all that is required to be a citizen is submission to the sovereign (i.e., to be ruled but not to rule), anyone capable of consent can become a citizen. But since it does not include the right to participate in "determining the structure or activities of common life," citizenship is not very ennobling.

According to HOBBES, in the mythical state of nature, men are born free. A free man "is he, that in those things, which by his strength and wit he is able to do, is not hindered to do what he has a will to." In other words, in nature every man is free in that he has a natural and unrestricted right to pursue, and possess if he can, the objects of his desires. But men are also essentially equal by nature. While Hobbes concedes that there may be some variation among them in the faculties of both mind and body, these differences are not so considerable "that one man can thereupon claim to himself any benefit to which another may not pretend as well as he."

Not only are men free and equal by nature, but they also share the same motivation: to attain happiness, or what Hobbes calls "felicity." But contrary to Plato, for Hobbes felicity "consisteth not in the repose of a mind satisfied." Rather, according to Hobbes, felicity "is a continual progress of the desire, from one object to another; the attaining of the former being still but the way to the latter." Hobbes makes clear that no desire is inherently good or bad. Taken together, man's freedom, equality, and his "perpetual and restless desire of power after power that ceaseth only in death" puts him in a continual state of conflict with his fellow men, a state of war of each against all. In such a state, not only is a man's life insecure but the quality of his life is "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short." Since no man wants to live like that, the fundamental law of nature is that man ought to desire peace and do whatever is reasonable to bring it about.

Fortunately, man is endowed with reason which enables him to recognise his predicament and discover a solution which leads to civil peace. That solution involves him entering into a social contract with other men, each of whom covenants with every other, to transfer to a sovereign his natural right to exercise his free will. The reason that simply agreeing not to exercise one's will in a manner prejudicial to another is not sufficient by itself is because it is unenforceable and keeping such a promise is contrary to man's nature; consequently, such a promise provides no more security to a man than he previously enjoyed in the state of nature. This is why Hobbes found it necessary that men also covenant to transfer the authority to exercise their wills to a sovereign (the "Leviathan") whose sole obligation is to achieve the end for which he was created, the maintenance of civil peace. To achieve this goal his powers are absolute; this is to say the sovereign is authorised to legislate, execute, and judge; he is also to educate the people in the laws of nature and their civil obligations. And because each man authorised the sovereign to exercise his will on his behalf, the actions of the sovereign are binding on each of them. The only exception is that no man is obligated to obey any command that imperils his own life since such a command is inconsistent with the purpose for which he entered the covenant.

LOCKE's philosophy also is based on the doctrine of natural right: men in the state of nature are both free and equal. But unlike Hobbes', Locke's state of nature is not the state of war but of reason: "The State of Nature has a Law of Nature to govern it, which obliges everyone: Reason, which is that Law, teaches all Mankind, who will but consult it, that being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his Life, Health, Liberty, or Possessions." In Locke's state of nature, men have both right and responsibility: they have the right to take whatever actions are necessary to preserve their own freedom and vindicate any injury done to them, but also the duty of helping preserve the rule of reason and the rights of other men. There can be war in the state of nature, but in Locke's conception, it is a temporary condition rather than a permanent state. War arises not from a restless and perpetual desire for power after power, but from the fallibility of men's judgement. Each man in the state of nature is authorised to decide for himself when his or another's life, liberty, or property is in danger and to use whatever means he chooses to repel the menace. In other words, each man has the right to be the judge in his own case. But as his actions are influenced by his perceptions and senses, which sometimes fail, his judgement is not infallible. This lack of certainty in judgement, combined with the absence of an impartial judge on earth and sufficient executive power to restrain and deter, makes the peace and security enjoyed in the state of nature so tenuous. Men join together in civil society to secure a peace that is more certain and lasting but which also protects their freedom and the fruits of their Labour. Upon leaving the state of nature men create government and choose representatives to which they entrust legislative and executive powers.

It should be emphasised that political power is given in trust rather than by authorisation. The latter is a unrestricted transfer of right. The former, however, is not. It is a fiduciary arrangement by which one party is empowered to act for the benefit of another. If the trustee breaches this fiduciary duty, his power is forfeited, the trust is broken, and the right conveyed reverts to the trustor. In other words, the people are the ultimate repository of political power in a political system where political power is held by consent of the governed. The corollary is that the people also retain the right to evaluate how well their rulers have exercised the powers entrusted to them.

It is because individuals can reason that they are able to enter civil society, create governments, and evaluate the conduct of their rulers. This assumption of rationality, however, is not shared by Romantics, the most famous of whom was Edmund Burke.

BURKE, like Hobbes and Locke, rejects the Platonic Idea of the Good. But he vehemently disagrees with them regarding the natural rights of man. Burke denies that the individual is the functional unit of the social order; he denies the individual has a right to decide for himself, according to his own standards, and based on his particular opinions, whether to obey or overthrow civil authority. According to Burke, no individual has standing to make that determination:

Burke's problem with the doctrine of natural rights is that it presents an incomplete and misleading portrait of civil society and government; it endeavours to "practice the politics of the book." In deducing its general principles it neglects the details, failing to realise that God is in the details. The science of government, in Burke's view, is a practical science intended for practical purposes; as such it is ill suited to a priori theorising:

Aside from its championing of what Oakeshott has called the "politics of the felt need," what is most offensive is that rationalism and natural rights doctrine foster narcissism, selfishness, and cold-heartedness in the good "rational" man.

According to Burke, rationalism is based on the misguided notion that enlightened self-interest alone is sufficient to guarantee obedience to civil authority: "On the scheme of this barbarous philosophy, which is the offspring of cold hearts and muddy understandings . . . laws are to be supported only by their own terrors, and by the concern, which each individual may find in them, from his own private speculations, or can spare to them from his own private interests." In short, the problem with a philosophy based on reason is that it is all stick and no carrot. Obedience is motivated by fear of punishment rather esteem, affection, or genuine sense of community. As Burke lamented, "in the groves of their academy, at the end of every visto, you see nothing but the gallows."

Burke insists that rationality is not to be found in the individual but rather in the collective experience of the community. In Burke's view, a good, i.e. "rational," system of government is to be judged by its actual consequences, not by theoretical assumptions; one should "reprobate no form of government merely upon abstract principles." A good government is one that works. And a government can said to work, in Burke's view, if it has endured through the ages and commands the affection of the people. According to Burke, civic affection and sentiment, not individual reason, is the tie that binds men together in society.

The reason Locke (and Rousseau) paid insufficient attention to the dangers presented by popular sovereignty is because they were primarily concerned with working out a modus vivendi between the people and their rulers. In their time and with respect to this relationship, opinions and preferences of the mass citizenry reasonably could have been supposed to be of a single accord. This, indeed, was the assumption behind ROUSSEAU's theory of the 'general will' and the 'social contract.' Thus, little harm was done in presuming all men to be the same. In hindsight, this was error. By relegating citizens to a passive role, Locke's republicanism lessens the likelihood that citizens will learn how to apply their reason in evaluating political conduct and to broaden their conception of the common good. Put another way, republicanism does not minimise the danger that citizens will rely upon uninformed opinion to guide their conduct in the private and public spheres.

Another reason the deleterious effects of public opinion received scant consideration is that the theory of natural right was intended only to make men free, equal, and secure in their persons and property. The development of the individual's human potential, a matter of great consequence to the ancients, was of little concern to the early modern theorists. This helps explain why the chilling effects of public opinion on individualism failed to attract their attention. JOHN STUART MILL and ALEXIS DeTOCQUEVILLE were among the first to reassert that human beings had a higher and nobler purpose. As Mill stated:

It is not only the individual who is injured by the chilling effects of convention, society suffers also. The despotism of custom is a hindrance to human advancement, being in unceasing antagonism to that disposition to aim at something better than customary (i.e., "the spirit of progress"). For these reasons -- to enable the individual to map out for himself his plan of life free of societal interference and to foster the spirit of human progress -- Mill maintained that the right to dissent, to think and publish, and to act as one chooses was inviolate so long as the exercise of it does not pose a risk of harm to another.

But freedom of thought only ameliorates the effects of tyranny by majority opinion, not the causes. As noted above, the problem with majority opinion is not that it is majority but that it is average opinion; it is neither informed by reason nor ennobled by a broader vision of the common good. Mill understood that public opinion will always tend to the mediocre unless the members of the public learned to develop a broader conception of their true interests. Hence, he favoured greater participation in the political process. His purpose for advocating electoral systems which enabled all citizens to have their interests represented in the deliberative councils of government was to expose them to and maintain their interest in that sphere of social life which could in time lead to a broadened conception of their own and the common interest.

ROUSSEAU is not concerned with the question to which Hobbes and Locke attach much significance. He rejects the idea that any of the inequalities that existed in the state of nature -- physical or intellectual -- are sufficient to legitimate the political authority of one person over another. In fact, the state of nature holds no enchantment or romance for Rousseau. In his view, man in that state was nothing more than a "stupid, short-sighted animal" ruled by instincts rather than justice with no conception of morality or reason.

For Rousseau, civil society is necessary, not to ensure civil peace, but to transform the individual into "an intelligent being and a man." Civil society is essential if men are to exercise and develop their faculties, broaden their ideas and feelings, and uplift their souls.

Like Locke, Rousseau is concerned with preserving the individual's freedom. Unlike Locke, however, Rousseau does not equate freedom with independence. Man enjoyed independence in the state of nature but this is not the same thing as freedom. An individual is free if he is ruled by justice rather than instinct and has a say in the making of the laws to which he is subject. Thus, the question for Rousseau was how could man -- who was born free but is everywhere in chains -- regain his freedom?

For Rousseau the answer is communitarianism. As Rousseau argued in his Discourse on Inequality, egoistic "individualism" is a consequence, not a cause of civil society, an idea later embraced by Karl Marx. In contrast to the pessimistic view of human nature upon which Hobbes' and Locke's models are based, Rousseau's communitarianism embodied an optimistic -- perhaps too optimistic -- assessment of human nature. It requires each member to subordinate his rights and interests to the community. But, as both Rousseau and Marx noted, it is extremely difficult for an individual to subordinate his private self to his public self. If socialism (i.e., communitarianism) requires that men already be what they are to become, as Rousseau suggested, it would be a wholly unrealistic expectation indeed. (Marx differed from Rousseau in that he thought that this transformation would be made as a matter of course once civil society was destroyed).

The question is whether it is possible to craft a political system which is more muscular and robust. While Barber seems to think so, Rousseau's Social Contract suggests that this might be something more fervently to be hoped for than realistically to be expected. What is required according to Rousseau is nothing less than the complete social transformation of the individual, "who by himself is a complete and solitary whole, into a part of a greater whole from which he, in a sense, receives his life and his being; of marring man's constitution in order to strengthen it; of substituting a partial and moral existence for the physical and independent existence we have all received from nature." Citizens must, in short, relinquish their attributes in exchange for other traits that are foreign to them and which cannot be used without the help of others. Rousseau is not optimistic because it takes a very special kind of person to appreciate the advantages of a plan which requires the renunciation of private interests: "The social spirit that is to be produced by the new institutions would have to preside over their creation, and before the laws exist, men would have to be what they are to become by means of those same laws."

This is not to imply, however, that there can be no middle ground. Though a radical and complete transformation of the citizen's civic self is unlikely, it is possible for citizens -- through involvement in private organisations, the workplace, public associations, and local government -- to participate in communal activities through which they can learn to broaden their social visions, to feel connected to other of their fellow citizens, and to enhance their sense of personal efficacy.

But what about the non-participators in a participatory democracy? They have rights too. They also have a function: critic. The participators should listen to them because, owing to their distance from and lack of interest in political affairs, they bring a perspective which participators do not possess.