Rousseau's Legacy in Two Conceptions of the General Will: Democratic and Transcendent

Abstract This paper explores the contrast between two conceptions of the general will to be found in Rousseau's work, especially in the Social Contract . The first of these identifies the general will with the decisions of the sovereign people as they legislate together; the second conceives of the general will as a transcendent fact about the society which may or may not be reflected in actual legislative decisions. Though these conceptions may be capable of reconciliation in Rousseau's own work, the tension remains and is reflected both in Rousseau's own ambivalence towards democracy and in the different ways his thought has been received and adapted in philosophy and politics.