Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Genevan philosopher — the general will and the corruption of society

Citizen of the Republic of Geneva; held no academic post · Switzerland · d. 28 June 1712 (Geneva, Republic of Geneva) — 2 July 1778 (Ermenonville, near Paris)

Published Du contrat social and Émile within weeks of each other in 1762; both were burned, the second in Paris and Geneva alike, and he spent the rest of his life moving between refuges. His claim that a people can be free only when it obeys a law it has given itself is the founding thought of modern democratic legitimacy, and the source of its oldest quarrel.

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Record

Life: 28 June 1712 (Geneva, Republic of Geneva) — 2 July 1778 (Ermenonville, near Paris)
Country: Switzerland
Period: Enlightenment
Affiliation: Citizen of the Republic of Geneva; held no academic post
Areas: Political philosophy, Moral philosophy, Education, Autobiography, Music
Major works: Discours sur les sciences et les arts (1750)
Discours sur l'origine et les fondements de l'inégalité parmi les hommes (1755)
Julie, ou la Nouvelle Héloïse (1761)
Du contrat social (1762)
Émile, ou De l'éducation (1762)
Lettres écrites de la montagne (1764)
Les Confessions (1782)
Les Rêveries du promeneur solitaire (1782)
Key concepts: The general will, Amour de soi and amour-propre, The social contract, Natural goodness, The legislator, Civil religion, Perfectibility, The noble savage attributed to him
Influenced by: Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, Samuel von Pufendorf, Plutarch, Denis Diderot, Montesquieu
Sources: Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Jean Jacques Rousseau
Wikipedia, Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Stories

Agenda

AI and the public sphere: who authors the decisions made in your name

The argument about artificial intelligence and democracy is usually run as a question of benefit and harm. The harder question is authorship. Arendt, Habermas, Foucault, Rousseau, Marx and Norbert Wiener each supply a piece of it, and the 2026 research supplies some awkward facts.

Jürgen Habermas, Hannah Arendt, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Norbert Wiener

Newsroom17 September 2026