Political Obligation

Is political obligation absolute, conditional or non existent?
Absolute
Tacit consent – Plato
Tacit consent is not the same as consent. Reality may stop you leaving the state, commitments and such.
Does not take into account how the state is formed (may be unjust) and the laws its passes by be unjust
Social Contract
Hobbes – guarantees security and is better than state of nature
Hobbes’ Leviathan is able to do whatever it pleases as long as it guarantees security. It seems entirely possible to make things just as bad as a state of nature – removal of freedoms, arbitrary arrest etc and this would be justified.
Surely the state has more duties than just security?
Rousseau – general will (elections)
Tyranny of majority (does taking part in elections not mean we implicitly promise to accept the majority verdict?)
Do we have better?
Non Existent
Anarchist Thinking (Wolff)
Although we may obey the state out of prudence, the reality is that the state is unjust because our primary obligation is autonomy and the state infringes upon that. Thus, the actions of the state can never be viewed as legitimate
If our autonomy directs us towards a state, then surely it is legitimate?
What if a regime makes a just law – do we have a duty of disobedience against justice?
Thoreau
Conscience decides what is right and wrong, not majorities
This would allow terrorists who kill thousands to be considered ‘legitimate’
Empirically, the framework of society would break down if people acted how they pleased.
Conditional
Rawls
It is too hard to form a basis of disobedience on grounds of personal morality, because that is no sense objective. Therefore, we must look at grounds for justice – equal liberty and fair equality as our objective criteria, if the law contravenes these principles we must act
The law is to enact justice, and if it goes against the above principles we are in a paradoxical situation – thus we have a right to civil disobedience.


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