Enlightenment and Revolution Democratizing Institutional Essay

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Revolution could never be warranted under Hobbes' scheme; the contract implied that the sovereign power could do no wrong as it had been given full right to act for the populous. Locke took parts of the social contract theory, but had a far more liberal approach. He believed, like Hobbes, that the reason for the establishment of a government or any sort of civil society was to find a way to resolve conflicts and defend life, health, liberty, and property without resorting to mere physical force. This stemmed from Locke's belief that humans were inherently ruled by reason, even if it was selfish reason. This also led him to the belief that revolution was not only permissible, but in some cases even obligated. When governments no longer performed what they were reasonably formed to accomplish, it made no sense to keep them.

Robespierre took this philosophy to extreme lengths in France in the late eighteenth century, going so far as to approve of the execution of Louis XVI for he sake of the Revolution and the establishment of a new government even though he had previously turned down a position as judge because he did not believe in the death penalty.

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The reign of Terror that immediately followed the French Revolution illustrates how the liberalist thinking that blossomed during the Enlightenment can sometimes become too heavy for its own good; when the rights of the individual begin to be lost in the rights of the Republic at large, the government is surely not living up to its moral and ethical purpose the way it was conceived of by Locke and other liberal thinkers. Indeed, the French Revolution did not lead directly to a democratic government; this would take another half-century of off-and-on monarchies and revolutions to truly come about on the Continent......

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