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What is AskPhilosophers? This site puts the talents and knowledge of philosophers at the service of the general public. Send in a question that you think might be related to philosophy and we will do our best to respond to it. To date, there have been 2252 questions posted and 2946 responses. [more]

Question of the day

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What place does social welfare have within the larger context of the social contract? In other words, is there a philosophical connection (and/or basis) between social welfare and the ideas and principles inherent within the social contract?

Stated in its most elementary form, the social contract requires human beings to give up some of their natural rights in order to receive certain protections that government provides under the social contract. The question therefore is whether or not social welfare constitutes one of these "protections"?

Did John Locke, Rousseau, or Hobbes ever speak of social welfare as an inherent aspect of the social contract? Is it logical or illogical -- on a strictly philosophical basis -- to suppose that social welfare is a natural product of the social contract?

Are there any other authors/works that might be cited that deal with this philosophical investigation?

Response from Thomas Pogge on June 2, 2007

If we understand welfare broadly in terms of the fulfillment of human interests, then the idea of a social contract among human beings is related, in the first instance, to individual welfare. Each contractor will work out, on the basis of her or his own interests, what agreement to seek or to make.

Social welfare (understood as some aggregate of individual "welfares" or in some other way) is typically said to result from social arrangements justified through a social contract -- either because contractors do not know how alternative designs of the social order would affect them in particular and therefore seek a design that is good for all or because each contractor will resist designs that impose great risks or burdens upon herself.

A widely shared element of social-contract thinking is then that the agreement or contract brings the contractors a net welfare gain relative to non-agreement. The contractors are more than compensated, in welfare terms, for what they give up.

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