John Locke (1632- 1704) Born in Somerset England on august 29th, is noted for having given a profound philosophical contribution on the natural rights of man. The rights to life, liberty and property are the three fundamental natural rights expressed by Locke of which every government is mandated to fulfil. Hence he insists that people may legitimately rebel if the government violates their rights. He defended this with the claim that men by nature are free and equal against claims that God had made all people naturally subject to a monarch. These views he developed fully in his Second Treatise Concerning Civil Government, they were so radical that he never dared signed his name to it. His writings contributed immensely to libertarian ideals and Locke is often credited with founding the philosophical tradition of liberalism (a worldview founded on the ideas of liberty and equality), which went as far as triggering or greatly influencing the American Revolution.
The theory of natural law and natural right forms the central concept in Locke’s political philosophy. Locke’s defence of the natural right of man stems from his rejection of the philosophy of the divine right of kings which had earlier been posited by Sir Robert Filmer, insinuating that this right can be traced down to Adam as the source. Therefore Locke’s philosophy of natural right made people to see right as an entitlement belonging to all mankind and not to some certain class of human beings, he therefore provided arguments to establish the falsity of the divine right theory.
In accordance with the natural law tradition, Locke’s state of nature unlike that of Hobbes is not that in which there are no constraints on how people behave, the state of nature as conceived by Locke is governed by a law, this law Locke refers to as reason. Hence natural law is the law of reason which governs men in the state of nature.“The state of nature has a law of nature to govern it which obliges every one, and reason, which is that law, teaches all mankind who will but consult it that being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty or possessions.” Locke (1823:107). In the state of nature men are subject only to limits set by the law of nature. It is also a state of equality, that no one may take away or damage anything that contributes to the preservation of someone else’s life, liberty, help, limb or goods of another Locke (1823:107), is a fundamental principle raised in Locke’s natural rights theory that will see to the attainment of an improved and better wellbeing of the human being.
According to Locke, the fundamental law of nature says that men are to be preserved as much as possible. Hence the preservation of mankind is one of the basic principles enshrined in his natural rights theory. It is the right to life which is one of the three core rights in Locke’s natural right theory. This life doesn’t just entail survival but a life that will ensure the development of the human being. According to Locke, “natural reason tells us that men once they are born have a right to survive and thus a right to food and drink and such other things as nature provides for their subsistence” Locke (1823 :115). This implies that man has a natural right to live a better life, to a better standard of living and wellbeing, and to gain access to that which will enable the fulfilment of this ends.
Another of the three core rights is the right to property. Locke believes that laws are made for the protection of property and only for the public good. “What men enter into societies with government for is the preservation of their property. So it would be a gross absurdity to have a government that deprived them of that very property” Locke (1823:165). He believed that private property is absolutely essential for liberty, and people legitimately turned common property into private property by mixing their labour with it or by improving it.
Whenever the legislators endeavour to take away and destroy the property of the people, or to reduce them to slavery under arbitrary power, they put themselves into a state of war with the people who are thereupon absolved from any further obedience, and are left to the common refuge which God hath provided for all men against force and violence. When so ever, therefore the legislative shall transgress this fundamental rule of society and either by ambition, fear, folly or corruption endeavour to grasp themselves, or put into the hands of any other an absolute power over the lives, liberties and estates of the people, by this breach of trust they forfeit the power the people had put into their hands for quite contrary ends and it devolves to the people, who have a right to resume their original liberty. Locke (1823:201).
John Locke framed the natural right theory to such an extent that it eventually gave rise to or necessitated the evolution of natural right into the human rights theory, and laid the philosophical groundwork for modern human rights thought. Locke transformed the conception of natural rights theory into that context whereby they become binding on any government. As such, any government that must continue to exist must be able to guarantee individual or natural rights. Locke uses the principle of consent to distinguish his social contract theory from that of Hobbes. According to him individuals do not give up their natural rights when they enter into the social contract, as the legitimacy of the government depends on the consent of the people. This principle of consent along with the natural rights of right to life, liberty, property and the social contract are the three pivotal concepts in Locke’s political theory. Locke makes it clear that individuals are endowed with and entitled to certain natural rights which are independent of and exist prior to the existence of a government.
Locke characterise the state of nature as a state of perfect freedom but not as a state of individual licence, individuals are born free and equal and are endowed with natural rights to life, liberty and property which are intertwined as they complement each other. In other words a right to liberty is necessary for a right to life and a right to property is essential for a right to life, the right to liberty is instrumental in preserving the right to property. Putting it in another context, one cannot exercise his right to life which entails survival, food, drink and those other things necessary for his subsistence and development if he is restrained from his right to property. Suffice it to say that the right to life becomes useless or ineffective if there is no right to property and liberty. Man’s freedom is to enable the preservation of his life as Locke (1823:114) rightly states, “This freedom from absolute arbitrary power is so necessary to and closely linked with man’s preservation that he cannot part with it”. Locke stresses the need of a right to property as a means towards the preservation of life.
Locke proposed that individuals come together and form an organised society in order to protect and promote their rights more effectively. Through which a social contract is arrive at whereby individuals give up their rights to interpret and execute natural law, consenting to obey government and laws in return for the better promotion and protection of their rights. Therefore, for Locke the specific purpose of government is the protection of individual rights, and political power is based on the principle of consent. This contradicts various philosophies like that of Hobbes which implies that individuals couldn’t withdraw consent from a government without society itself being undermined.
Locke placed individual rights at the topmost radar above every social obligation, this is exemplified by his outspoken rejection of the theory of divine right of kings which had long been in existence. This theory characterised rights as certain privileges or the exclusive reserve of some certain class of people. Specifically, it postulates that the right to rule is an exclusive reserve of some class of people who claim to have their right from divine authority, therefore the consent of the people is not needed for government to be established.
In direct opposition to this theory of the divine right of kings alongside hereditary privileges, Locke argued that the power of government is limited not absolute. This idea of Locke helped pushed equality of human beings to the forefront in human rights reasoning. Locke therefore rests the legitimacy of government on the respect of individual rights because the individuals reserve the right to withdraw their consent and to dissolve a government that fails to honour the terms of the social contract. They have the right to resist absolute and arbitrary power. Therefore, he justifies resistance and rebellion against the government pending its violation of individual natural rights.
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