Application and Practice of Social Contract Theory: Its Re-construction and Contemporary Meaning

Abstract

A Theory of social contract which is founded on individuality is a principle of norms to relate between law and politics, or rights and sovereignty. Though post-modernism unite in criticizing the theory of subjects (identification) on its logic of exclusion, the significance of social contract theory hasn’t been lost yet. The purpose of this article is to reflect on the matter. When we understand modern social contract theory as dialectic about an origin of political society, this means a democracy that voluntary judgment and practice by individuals make the society and politics. Therefore, this theory is a principle of social structure. Contrastively, when we understand contemporary social contract theory as an explanation of criterion for political society, this means a constraint to function of government. This is a theory of justice based on liberalism. On this article, I will think about a problem of its turn the principle of social structure into that of social criterion, and about a possibility of former principle (modern theory) for norms of law and policy.