Natural State Of Rousseau's Doctrine

"Natural state" theory is the foundation of Rousseau's political philosophy This paper intends to discuss Rousseau's definition of "natural state" according to his internal logic, to discribe the process from the "natural state" to the "social state" and to reveal the changes of human nature during this process. After the discussion of the "natural state", Rousseau makes freedom as the essential attribute of human being, which implies the tension of his political philosophy. There are lots of critical voices which focus on the inconsistency in Rousseau's theory, for example, the conflict between freedom and totalitarianism, between democracy and autocracy and between individual and collective, which the author of this paper will discuss. This paper will point out that this inconsistency will be resolved at Rousseau's discussion about the "natural state".