{"id":903116,"date":"2026-09-17T15:41:34","date_gmt":"2026-09-17T13:41:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/grundlinien.de\/?page_id=903116"},"modified":"2026-09-17T16:30:51","modified_gmt":"2026-09-17T14:30:51","slug":"why-is-the-state-not-a-contract","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/grundlinien.de\/en\/why-is-the-state-not-a-contract\/","title":{"rendered":"Why is the state not a contract?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In brief:<\/strong> Because a contract proceeds from the arbitrary will of the contracting parties and produces a common<\/em>, not a universal<\/em> will. Whoever thinks the state as a contract makes membership a matter of pleasure and transfers the rules of private property into a sphere where they do not belong. Hegel directs this objection expressly against Kant as well \u2013 and against Kant\u2019s treatment of marriage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What a contract is<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The answer stands already in abstract right<\/a>, long before the state. \u00a7 75<\/a> determines contract<\/a> by three marks: it proceeds from arbitrary will<\/a>; the will that comes into being through it is only one posited<\/em> by the parties, and hence \u201eonly common<\/em>, not universal in and for itself\u201c; and its object is \u201ea single external thing<\/em>\u201c. None of the three fits the state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Just as little does the nature of the state<\/em> lie in a contractual relation, whether the state be taken as a contract of all with all, or as a contract of all these with the prince and the government. \u2013 The intrusion of this, as well as of the relations of private property in general, into the relation of the state has produced the greatest confusions in constitutional law and in actuality.<\/p>\nGroundlines, \u00a7 75<\/a> note<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

The side-blow at Kant<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The same paragraph contains one of the book\u2019s harshest judgements on a predecessor. In the Metaphysics of Morals<\/em> Kant had determined marriage as a contract concerning the reciprocal use of the sexual organs. Hegel:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The concept of contract cannot, therefore, subsume marriage<\/em> under it; this subsumption is put forward, in its \u2013 one must say \u2013 disgracefulness, by Kant<\/em>.<\/p>\nGroundlines, \u00a7 75<\/a> note<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

The argument is the same as with the state: a relation in which the participants give up precisely their singularity cannot be described with the categories of the exchange of things. That marriage and the state are disposed of in one<\/em> sentence is no accident \u2013 for Hegel both are shapes of ethical life<\/a>, not of commerce.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What he concedes to Rousseau \u2013 and where he leaves him<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

In \u00a7 258<\/a> note Rousseau is expressly credited with a merit: he was the first to advance a principle of the state that is thought<\/em> in its content as well, namely the will<\/a>. For Hegel the mistake lies one step further on:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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But since he conceived the will only in the determinate form of the individual<\/em> will (as Fichte likewise later did), and the general will not as the rational element in and for itself of the will, but only as the communal<\/em> element that emerges from this individual will as conscious<\/em>, the union of individuals within the state becomes a contract<\/em>.<\/p>\nGroundlines, \u00a7 258<\/a> note<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

This is a conceptual, not a political criticism: Rousseau\u2019s volont\u00e9 g\u00e9n\u00e9rale<\/em> is counted up out of what individuals actually will \u2013 and is thereby a common, not a universal. Hegel holds the consequence to be disastrous and says so in a sentence about the French Revolution that has been quoted in both directions: the first tremendous spectacle of undertaking \u201eto begin the constitution of a great actual state entirely afresh, from thought<\/em> alone\u201c \u2013 and, because these were abstractions devoid of any Idea, at the same time \u201ethe most terrible and violent of events\u201c.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And the other side: against Haller<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Whoever concludes from this that Hegel wants to return to the pre-revolutionary condition should read the footnote to the same paragraph. It is aimed at Carl Ludwig von Haller, the spokesman of the Restoration, who had declared the rule of the more powerful to be \u201ethe eternal, unalterable order of God\u201c. Hegel takes him apart over several pages and formulates in doing so a sentence that remains a touchstone to this day:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Hatred of law<\/em>, of right determined legally<\/em>, is the shibboleth by which fanaticism, feeble-mindedness, and the hypocrisy of good intentions reveal themselves and unfailingly betray what they are, whatever other garb they may otherwise choose to put on.<\/p>\nGroundlines, \u00a7 258<\/a> note, footnote<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

The state is therefore neither contract nor natural force. It is the form in which a commonwealth determines itself by thought-out, i.e. universal, laws and principles<\/em>. Whoever derives the state from contract loses universality; whoever derives it from power loses law.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What the objection still reaches today<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

It reaches every construction that derives the binding force of the state from consent \u2013 from hypothetical consensus to the argument that one is after all free to emigrate. Hegel\u2019s question remains uncomfortable: if validity follows from consent, what is valid as against the one who does not consent? He himself draws the consequence in \u00a7 100<\/a> note, with punishment as the example: the state makes the rationality of the concept of crime valid \u201ewith<\/em> or without<\/em> the consent of individuals\u201c.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whoever does not share the objection should at least answer it. It is the reason why \u00a7 258<\/a> contains the much-quoted and seldom-read sentence that the highest duty of individuals is \u201eto be members of the state\u201c \u2013 a sentence that does not mean obedience but denies that membership is a choice. On the relation of state and individual see also Is the state God for Hegel?<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sources.<\/strong> Groundlines \u00a7 75<\/a> and note (the concept of contract; against Kant, Metaphysical First Principles of the Doctrine of Right<\/em>, \u00a7\u00a7 24\u201327), \u00a7 100<\/a> note (against Beccaria), \u00a7 161<\/a>\u2013\u00a7 164<\/a> (marriage), \u00a7 258<\/a> and note with footnote (Rousseau; Carl Ludwig von Haller, Restauration der Staatswissenschaft<\/em>, 1816 ff.), \u00a7 281<\/a>. \u2013 In the glossary: Contract<\/a>, The State<\/a>, The State of Nature<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n