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--- social_contract_model [2021/10/03 17:59] – az
+++ social_contract_model [2022/09/13 20:35] (current) – external edit 127.0.0.1
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 **Draft by AZ**
-In ancient Chinese philosophy it is said 本立而道生 běn lì ér dào shēng, “Establish the foundation and the Way will be produced.”
+===== The Idea of a Social Contract =====
-To me, the idea of the “social contract” was first conceived by 荀子 xún zǐ. Master Xun. The basic insight people had, probably over and over again from family to family or from community to community, was that if we freely used force to get our way, then people would always be getting injured or killed. I might win today, but when the same kind of conflict comes up tomorrow I might be injured and killed. So they decided to depend on enlightened self-interest, They had a group understanding: In our community, the contract is, “If you will refrain from hurting me, I will refrain from hurting you.”
+Children react against things that they decide are unfair to them. Even many animals will react against situations that they perceive to be unfair. When some people of our older generations see people with power and wealth claiming exemption from the laws and standards of behavior that apply to "ordinary people," they may shake their finger and say, "What's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander." On a more formal level of discourse, people refer to the systemization of issues of fairness and equality under the law as the [[Social Contract]]
-The practical problem comes when somebody figures out that all the other community members are docile, but s/he can behave as the predator invisible in the midst of the flock. Most societies nurture and indoctrinate youngsters so that they know what is expected of them. When they break the contract in little ways, they may be nurtured and taught to make up for cases when they have not foreseen the natural consequences of their predatory or parasitic behavior. If they produce severe consequences, then they may be disciplined. In extreme cases they can be ostracized.
+===== How can people be organized into a polity governed in accord with the social contract?=====
-I think that we need to understand how bonds of trust and responsibility can develop in a society that is run in this way, and that they make it possible for individuals to give allegiance to a society and to its government.
+In families, failure of parents to be fair to each other can lead to broken homes. Failure of parents to be fair to their children can lead to children running away in childhood or adolescence or to their leaving home at maturity and never coming back.
-If this basic idea is right, then the US attempts in Afghanistan were highly probable to fail. With predatory behavior being perpetrated by figures put into government by the USA, and with a low probability of a natural hierarchy of leaders and helpers forming parallel to the legal government, when the imposed structure fell under the weight of its own misdeeds there was no alternative organization prepared to resist the Taliban.
+In extended families, failure of individuals in older generations to be fair to individuals in younger generations can lead to conflicts and to weakness of the family in its conflicts or contests with other extended families.
-[[start]]
+In extended families that squeeze in fictive family members, the probability that some members with real genetic links with the family may be less than fair to members with only fictive family status is perhaps higher.
+When even more tenuous links unite individuals into tribes or other groups with substantial populations, it appears likely that individuals with wealth and power may exert top-down threats and punishments to control situations when fairness is being ignored by contending parties.
+There is no easy way to predict how a social contract can evolve and be accepted by people in complicated social situations and bound by preexisting social, religious, political, and family relationships.
+It is possible, however, to abstract from the evolution of organizations such as Solidarity in Poland, and see how with many attempts.some of them failures, a simple electrician became the president of a great nation.
+[[Forming Social-Contract Based Organizations]]
+[[start|Back to the first page]]