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Full Idea
Since sovereignty is merely the exercise of the general will, it can never be alienated, and the sovereign which is only a collective being, cannot be represented by anything but itself. Power can perfectly well be transmitted, but not the will.
Clarification
'alienated' here means 'given away'
Gist of Idea
Sovereignty is the exercise of the general will, which can never be delegated
Source
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.01)
Book Ref
Rousseau,Jean-Jacques: 'The Basic Political Writings', ed/tr. Cress,Donald A. [Hackett 1987], p.153
A Reaction
Part of the post-Hobbesian revolution, which sees sovereignty as residing in the will or consensus of the people, rather than in a divine right, or a right of power. In 2016 this isn't going very well. A people choosing to obey is thereby dissolved.
| 20566 | Hobbes says the people voluntarily give up their sovereignty, in a contract with a ruler [Hobbes, by Oksala] |
| 19930 | Sovereignty must include the power to make people submit to it [Spinoza] |
| 19787 | People accept the right to be commanded, because they themselves wish to command [Rousseau] |
| 20567 | Rousseau insists that popular sovereignty needs a means of expressing consent [Rousseau, by Oksala] |
| 19801 | Sovereignty is the exercise of the general will, which can never be delegated [Rousseau] |
| 19805 | Just as people control their limbs, the general-will state has total control of its members [Rousseau] |
| 19818 | Political laws are fundamental, as they firmly organise the state - but they could still be changed [Rousseau] |
| 19848 | The sovereignty does not appoint the leaders [Rousseau] |
| 23046 | States only have full authority if they heed the claims of human fellowship [Green,TH] |
| 23418 | Liberal state legitimacy is based on a belief in justice, not in some conception of the good life [Kymlicka] |
| 20086 | Nowadays sovereignty (once the basis of a state) has become relative [Reybrouck] |
| 20608 | Unjust institutions may be seen as just; are they legitimate if just but seen as unjust? [Tuckness/Wolf] |