Understanding Power based on State of Nature

Understanding Power based on State of Nature

            In his paper, The Second Treatise of Civil Government John Locke claims that for one to be able to understand how political power works him/she has to put into consideration the state that all men inclusive naturally placed in. According to Locke, the state of nature is a state that is characterized by the absence of government and not the absence of mutual responsibility, and political power is the right of being able to make law and enforcing it for the service of the public common good. He argues that state of nature teaches people the need of equality and independence whereby no man is termed or terms himself to be better than another man or no man who has more than what another man has.

A peaceful state doesn’t have to be characterized by brutality and competition kind of state where one man is not worried about hurting another man. Self-preserved kind of state can be made better by each man agreeing to pass on a civil government that will enforce the law of nature among the citizens.  The primary function of the man society should be to primary set up a legal contract which is easily entered and can be easily enforced. And the only contract of this type is the state of nature governance that everyone should be willing to uphold.

In this paper am going to defend Locke’s argument that the State of Nature is one perfect state of freedom where one can order his/her actions,  it’s a state of equality and liberty. As such, this will be against other theorist’s objections that argue that state of nature describes a kind of state where it is a war of every man against every man and everyone he is in competing for state and that state of nature has principles of self- preservation that is based on it.

The first objection describes the state of nature as which is filled by man competition. One where an individual values personal interests regardless of where others may fall. As such, this is a violent and brutal kind of condition. I object this because the state of nature could be relatively peaceful because man is naturally instilled the right to life, liberty, and property. The state of nature teaches every human being who decides to follow it that everybody being equal in society no one has to harm another in their life and possession. This state brings the evidence about nature that everyone can technically relate to the kind of power man is naturally endowed with to arbitrate their disputes.

Locke point of view about the property is that everyone naturally owns a property. Everyone has a property in his person, for instance, everyone owns their bodies. No one can use someone else’s body without the person permission, but someone can acquire property which is beyond their body limits through using labor. One through using other world’s objects can obtain property and that a property that is not owned can be made private property through labor.

However looking in his state of nature argument one is not supposed to have any extra property or possession because no one is supposed to own something privately solely, everything should be communal and every human should have the right to obtain anything. He says that people should always share with those less fortunate in the world because God gave the world to men in general and every activity should be taken to benefit everyone that exists in it and I agree with him because if we all bring the concept of sharing in our societies there wouldn’t be any need to fight each other for possessions.

In Locke’s discussion of political society in chapter eight in the community, the will of the majority should prevail. Still, this is subject to the law of nature, but he argues that the legislative body should remain central and it should enforce laws that contradict the natural law. In my trust, this is because laws should be set in a way that they apply equally to all citizens without putting some people in society in a different set up of laws. That’s why the legislative, executive and judicial powers should be divided.

This argument is one that wants to place the world in a fantasy notion, but it presents the reality that if it were applied it would be the best for the humankind existence.  It gives conventional kind of rights but the justest kind of rights for maximum freedom to the life of humans. Where no kind of government that enforce the human race with is rules but instead the humans have natural rights that govern how they interact with each other.

With the state of nature in place and everyone has the right to everything it can turn out to be like an invite to conflicts. Especially if the resources are scarce and competition strikes in, and everyone has to protect their survival. It’s a rare state to exist as the other theorists argue but I would say their argument is logical but still wrong because the kind of state that Locke argues about  it’s the most appropriate state that every human need. This kind of state of nature can cause chaos and even worse because when everyone has the right to everything, there is going to be overstepping and over interaction that every human will want to step out of.

If we are left everyone to decide and judge what best suits everyone without referring to any public consent it can turn into a disaster. Human nature lucky enough can provide an escape to this kind of miserable state and save people from having to go through it. Everyone can agree it’s a state that can cause a civil war and so peace is so much better than this condition, and the conclusion of how to obtain peace is through the means of peace that will do away with the concept of the perfect freedom state.

References

Balmford, Andrew, Rhys E. Green, and Martin Jenkins. “Measuring the changing state of             nature.” Trends in Ecology & Evolution 18.7 (2003): 326-330.

Craig, Edward. “Knowledge and the State of Nature.” (1990)