Tearing Up the Social Contract

The social contract fails to provide strong moral obligations and stifles equality, justice, and freedom.

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As far as we can go back, from early Greek thinkers like Aristotle and Plato to modern philosophers like Voltaire and Rousseau, the social order is said to prescribe a moral code and act as the basis to institutionalize a society’s civil constitution, laws, and judicial system. So long as there is a consensus on a moral ideal, so that we all (or mostly) agree on what is morally normative, a sustainable and peaceful society will flourish, so the argument goes. This secular understanding of morality, one that is socially prescribed rather than divinely ingrained, inspired, or dictated, has many namesakes like moral relativism, subjective morality, subjectivism, emotivism, hedonism, epicureanism, sociomorality, et cetera. Where the truth or justification of moral judgments is not objective, absolute, or universal, it is relative to the standards, traditions, convictions, or practices of a person or group of persons.[1] Morality is only as concrete as its culture or creed. Granted, this should be expected given its precarious relationship with morality itself–––moral codes that lack an objective quality in the real world must be defined by what it associates or harmonizes with, whether it is emotional, sensual, ideological, philosophical, religious, professional, or political. Morality is purely behavioural, in this sense, and only as strong as its relational and contextual fabric. Of all the variants of moral relativism infecting the West, there is one political strand that acts as the keystone of secularism and its constitutional structure: the social contract.   

The social contract may hold a golden sceptre of nobility and prestige, but in reality, it sits idly bankrupt on a throne made of sticks and stones. It peacocks virtue by robbing the tombs of religious institutions and wears moral norms from the dominant religion like a coat of arms. In this case, a Christian conscience. By taking the moral forefront of political engagement, it freely (and conveniently) usurps common ideals from Christianity, or the Judeo-Christian worldview at large, as the breadwinner of Western thought. Its constitutional parentage, no doubt, brings a sense of honour and respect to the table that otherwise would not present itself naturally.

While Christ advised not to cast our pearls before the swine, not to give what is sacred to the dogs, that is exactly what has happened (Matthew 7:6). The result? Christianity, the necessary foundation for a flourishing democracy – the freedom of expression and conscience, the right to human equality, the obligation to justice and moral facts – is trampled underfoot and attacked.

Types of Social Contracts

It first ought to be established that a social contract itself is not inherently wrong, nor does it necessarily lead to immoral activity. It is an equivocal, mutable social construct that hinges on mutual belief, where our belief is binding and our behaviour is expected to bend to it. A social contract forms naturally within every possible society, whether implicit or explicit, formal and informal, or whichever way you want to cut it. An implicit or informal social contract is one you and I may both voluntarily agree to and/or assume unconsciously like raising our hands in the classroom (a ‘can do’), proper etiquette in a restaurant or holding the door open for strangers at the grocery store (a ‘should do’), or even apologizing for subtle inconveniences (saying “sorry” is a Canadian expectation). These implicit contracts are sometimes called “unspoken rules” and typically form symptomatically as a reaction from greater social contracts that carry far more weight. An explicit or formal social contract is one we voluntarily and consciously agree to and/or assume like religious dogma (a ‘must believe’), a moral norm or the civil law (a ‘must do’) in order to take advantage of the country’s benefits and is, ultimately, formalized into a nation’s constitution given the scope, significance, and magnitude of its subject matter. A greater social contract like the value of freedom of expression and conscience, for instance, manifests itself implicit in the ways we freely extend our beliefs and values without thinking about it, like, holding a door open for a stranger in spite of their visible religious markers or socioeconomic status without having to worry about your political alignment and repercussions thereof; this is conscionable and normative. Either way, a social contract encourages to-be-expected behaviour, with degrees of expression and obligation depending on its weight, which stimulates a relational and contextual standard within society to live by. It is the outward expression of social norms and ideals.

Now, you and I both agree (I hope) that human equality is good, right, and true, and because of this strongly held moral belief slavery is illegal; or if it isn’t already, then it ought to be illegal everywhere. That is because civil law reflects our religious and moral sentiments. However, what makes the social contract particularly dangerous is how necessary and fundamental it is perceived or believed to be in the public square, especially for political or moral obligations and civil discourse, as if democratic institutions depend solely on a mutual agreement to enable a functioning and flourishing democracy while religious motives otherwise hinder it. But consider the massive civil, economic, and legal ramifications on a nation if the majority disagreed, if the privileged disapproved, or if both the populous and elitists mutually believed slavery was not inherently wrong but, say, a necessary evil. If constitutive social contracts are the be-all and end-all, the law ‘slavery is illegal’ is solely built upon the presupposition that “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men [humans] are created equal”.[2] But this is actually a problem. Moral obligation is strictly legal and, therefore, a sociopolitical enterprise.

Our conscience, religious beliefs, and moral sentiments that create social contracts must consciously holdfast, be anchored by, and aim toward, a moral truth–––truth is not predicated on mutual belief or agreement. The principle of building your house on rock and not on sand can be, if not, should be applied in every sphere (cf. Matthew 7:24-27). Having a firm basis for obligation, in any society, is a very good thing. But the concern intensifies, even more, when what we mean by ‘is good’ is no longer concrete. That is, the floppier a definition becomes the more distorted the commonsensical understanding (implicit agreement) of what that word means becomes. And that applies to more than just ‘good’ nowadays but words like ‘is’ and ‘truth’ as well. If we exchange the rock for shifting sand, we cannot expect people to stand their ground without losing their footing. Worse yet, if the social contract is the basis of ‘is’ and ‘good’, the shifting sand slowly becomes the new normal with each generation and, therefore, is good. That is, until the storms comes.  

A social contract is only a problem when a person or group assumes human-to-human engagement is the (only) ultimate foundation of morality and justice, virtue and vice, right and wrong, good and evil, and that “human agency and identity emerge in communicative interaction.”[3] Thus, morality begins and ends in atmospheric leanings, groupthink, and legal documents. The presupposition here is that instead of being “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights” or “founded upon principles that recognize the supremacy of God and the rule of law”[4] (cf. Genesis 1:27; Galatians 3:28; Wisdom of Solomon 2:23), a contract that points to a greater standard than itself, we humans are the “truth makers”, so to speak, making up the rules as we go along. That is, there is no basis in reality or reasonable ground in nature to justify the claim that freedom of expression is good or that each human is equal–––we think and feel, and therefore, it is. While we may agree that it is good, what is to prevent the majority of people from freely thinking or feeling otherwise? Especially in a delicate political system such as ours, which is built on the freedom of expression, religion, and conscience and yet socially devalues a higher transcendent source of conscience? 

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Racial Contract

A classic criticism of the social contract is the racial-conscious argument or what some call the racial contract, which was in full effect at the same time Thomas Jefferson penned the words “all men are created equal”. White Indo-European men were seen as ‘fully human’ deserving of equality and freedom according to the racial contract, and this status earned them greater social power (such as the option to make contracts), whereas others were denied such privileges and were relegated to the status of objects of contracts (Blacks, Chinese/Oriental, etc.)[5]. Racism is not inherently or objectively wrong in nature or by societal standards, nor can the social contract govern inappropriate beliefs, attitudes, and behaviours. If it is socially normal, then it is morally normative. Period.

The social contract, here, ends up being its own worst enemy. If a corrupt contract is in place, favoured by economic prosperity and material wealth, and disseminated by implicit or explicit degrees of ‘peer pressure’, so to speak, which emotionally protects it from being replaced or abandoned, the moral requirement to overturn said immoral contract necessitates an obligation to an objective moral standard for all members involved to aim for, lest it be peer pressure from the other side. Equality, then, whether determined by socioeconomic status or innate human worth, cannot be prescriptive or obligatory–––equality is a handshake until someone withdraws their hand. Why would someone withdraw their hand? When they stop believing equality is innate or “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights”. When the contract no longer points to something higher than itself.

This ethic ends up stimulating ineffectual self-pleasing obligations with conflicting ‘good’ trajectories and contradictory ‘is’ qualities within the same society. In other words, because differing social contracts are formed naturally, competing points of view are integral to the fabric of moral norms, where one side morally distrusts the other. But this causes further problems. Not only is morality at war within itself, but if formal social contracts are the basis of moral responsibility, the dominant view is the higher moral standard above the other, stimulating a culture where each view needs to politicize and popularize its subjective moral code in order to make a mutual moral belief as ‘objective’ as it can be. So, the pursuit to condemn slavery as illegal was not necessarily good (socially normative) until it was constitutional! (And yet, when it read “all men are created equal”, the definition of “all” was exclusive and contextual.) It redirects moral obligations toward sociopolitical activism to make ‘moral truth’, which ultimately rewrites legislative actions, and moral obligations, into a sports club of sorts, the cultural repercussions of which we see today (i.e., Fox News v. CNN). So, the explicit social contracts of said groups end up conflating ‘is’ and ‘ought’ with their own moral ideas and political agenda. Their claimed moral trajectory is right, the opponent is wrong, evil. All because good and evil peak at State ordination. Yet, who is to say which moral position is ideal or good for society without appealing to some objective moral standard? Both cannot be right. Or if moral relativism were true, who is to say which moral position is ideal or good for society without appealing to economic sustainability? Which is precisely what slave owners did. And to say both competing views are necessary for a democratic society is to say ‘slavery should be legal’ is a valid moral view! Competing formal contracts encourages moral prejudice and judicial partiality, which demoralizes freedom.

Moreover, if competing social contracts are the basis to differentiate right from wrong, good from evil, then overturning slavery and racism is hardly moral progress. If progress implies improvement, and there is no standard to determine what is good apart from like-mannered belief, attitude, or behaviour, by what standard does one consensus show improvement while the other fails to meet the mark? To summarize religious philosopher Paul M. Gould, slavery was morally right when it was widely accepted, and it was morally wrong when it was widely rejected. Society was never right nor was it ever wrong–––there was no moral progress, just a winning view[6]. What does this do, then?

If moral relativism is the heart of the social contract, as it is right now, there will always be (at least) two competing moral points of view. Picture two fists progressively applying pressure to a glob of playdough. Each fist is a set of secular moral beliefs, and the playdough is the social contract slowly being shaped by each fist. Now each fist is a contrary belief aiming for political power, because the political/legal is the essence of true contract formation, they cannot truly shake hands because there is no underpinning moral truth to objectively unify the set of beliefs. All a fist can do is apply less or more pressure to the playdough. After a while, the playdough thins, the fists hit, and conflict ensues. The contract oozes out the edges from the pressure applied to both sides. There is no more neutral ground or wiggle room to navigate the social climate. The social contract loses its common sensibility once shared between opposing views, hence the oversensitivity and intensification of the New Social Movements today (i.e., Critical race theory, wokeness, social justice, etc.). Freedom is caught in the crossfire, leaving civil discourse a political walking on eggshells (or landmines depending), having lost its intrinsic value. The social contract encourages morally competing views with no long-lasting remedy for disunity.

Sensual Contract

Second, without presupposing objective moral law is innate as opposed to constructed, a person can lose directive (a fixed focal point to aim at, to know if you hit or miss the target), which undermines our mutual sense of value and trajectory, especially regarding implicit contracts. Moral relativism does not stimulate common sense or hierarchical values, nor does it offer a priority structure of imperatives that we all ought to agree upon. Who is to definitively declare that one belief, attitude, behaviour, or feeling is superior to the next?

For instance, the famous golden rule “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you”, which is seen as the quasi-backbone of the social contract, falls flat regarding sexual ethics or, what I am calling, the sensual contract. One person might find certain gestures or advances appropriate (attractive even), while the other finds it detestable. There is no source of justification to say, with any sort of certainty and reliability, whose belief, attitude, behaviour, or feeling is appropriate or inappropriate. Take ex-radio host Jian Ghomeshi for example, who was fired by the CBC in 2017 for accusations of violent sexual misconduct but insisted his innocence. He claimed that all sexual activity was consensual: “I have always been interested in a variety of activities in the bedroom but I only participate in sexual practices that are mutually agreed upon, consensual, and exciting for both partners,” and continues on to say that, “Let me be the first to say that my tastes in the bedroom may not be palatable to some folks. They may be strange, enticing, weird, normal, or outright offensive to others.… But that is my private life.… And no one, and certainly no employer, should have dominion over what people do consensually in their private life.”[7] What is perceived as negotiation for one person is perceived as manipulation for another. The golden rule cannot depend on unspoken rules or mutual agreement alone lest it fall prey to miscommunication. It requires an objective moral law that presupposes equality, freedom, and justice are innate to human moral value for it to be common sense. That is, moral truth is the bedrock of communication. This is also why the golden rule works in a Christian context, there is a spiritual subtext that underpins the social contract (cf. Matthew 7:12). If there is no actual reference point to differentiate right from wrong, good from evil, then even relational and contextual understanding is up in the air. The social contract cannot restrain moral miscommunication.

In another way, suppose a person cheats on their spouse in “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness”, and two of the three parties involved implicitly agree that this affection is “more real” and “better” and more “advantageous for the two of them” than its previous arrangement, and now suppose their immediate friends and family also agree. What is the one who has been cheated on to do? The majority have spoken, and one has been left for dead[8].

Furthermore, implicit contracts are counterintuitive across vast social groups with differing social contracts. While Shakespeare is mandatory learning in the education curriculum, we would be wise to heed his counsel: the family feud between the Montagues and Capulets is quite the social contract, but star-crossed lovers Romeo and Juliet cheated their household honour having thought it better to pursue each other anyway. The feud was not a binding social contract, it was an obstacle. If the social contract is predicated on attitudes and feelings to differentiate right and wrong, deep affection will beg to differ. The social contract cannot restrain anti-contractual feelings.

Self-Defeating Contracts

Lastly, with these two problems on hand, it should be apparent that the social contract as a basis for morality is self-defeating in a democratic context. Suppose most of us agree that slavery is wrong, why does the majority rule affirm it is wrong, especially if (some) disagree with the majority? What grants the majority the authority? We made that rule up, too, if I’m not mistaken; some are not obligated to follow it. There is nothing outside of the social contract that warrants more political weight and rights to the majority rule. Shouldn’t the quality of the vote outweigh the quantity of votes? And who has the right to determine the quality of a vote? Experts?! Find but one expert and you’ll find ten more who can’t agree on what an expert even is. It ends up becoming a vicious circle of self-justification.

In a secular moral system, some will have more rights than others. If you argue ‘slavery is wrong because freedom is good’ because ‘it’s fair’, you’re appealing to an objective moral sense of justice that presupposes fairness, judicial impartiality, and that human equality is truly good and intrinsic to each person (not based on consensus)–––moral truth–––but if person x desires slaves on their property, who can rightfully claim person x is wrong? Especially if consensus says otherwise. Further, why would person x not want to be at the top of the food chain if the opportunity comes; or rather, what is the moral obligation or imperative to say ‘slavery is prohibited on my property’ outside of social pressure and normalcy? It’s your word versus theirs! To offset this lack of obligation and contradiction between contracts, incentives would have to be generated to curve appetites toward a certain way of thinking, whether economic, social, or political. But incentivizing moral behaviour hardly sounds moral, now does it? If you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours, and together we’ll get that dreaded monkey off our back (let’s hope you’re not the monkey).

Or, perhaps, you may argue that social contracts offer a “sustainable, harmonious, unified society”. You are also appealing to objective morality. If you say, ‘not objective, just mutually agreed,’ not only does this not specify “who” deserves such a right to be seen as “mutual”, but it is also circular reasoning and self-referentially incoherent to say what is agreed upon is more sustainable, harmonious, and unifying for society as a whole if there is no universal standard or goal to define let alone justify either directive. If equality is not innate, is it not more commonsensical to ask: ‘which part of society deserves “mutual” status?’ If we adhere to utilitarian moral code, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. So, if some become involuntary slaves for the “greater good”, what then is the real issue?

This moral problem is threefold. If morality manifests in human thought and communication alone, it can only manifest as (a) moral belief, (b) moral attitude, or (c) moral behaviour. And our moral beliefs can undercut our moral attitudes. Christian philosopher Alexander Pruss quickly dispenses the self-contradiction:

(a) Moral beliefs: if belief grounds morality, then emotions and attitudes that “feel good” can betray our moral beliefs and what is morally right and wrong[9]. For instance, “Bob believes he ought to turn Carl in for being a runaway slave. But his emotions and attitudes do not match that belief. He hides Carl and feels morally good about hiding Carl despite his belief”. A moral relativist is committed to say that Bob has done something wrong in hiding Carl. Also consider Harriet Tubman, who strove against the immediate moral beliefs of the culture. Was she wrong?

(b) Moral attitudes: If attitude grounds morality, then implicit beliefs or biases can immediately betray our moral attitudes and what is morally right and wrong. Suppose “Alice thinks of herself as a progressive, and thinks that racism is wrong. Nonetheless, her moral attitudes do not evince genuine disapproval of racist behavior, say when she is with friends who tell racist jokes.” He goes on to say if we define right and wrong in this way, “then our implicit biases unacceptably affect what is morally right and wrong, so that racist behavior turns out to be permissible for Alice, her beliefs to the contrary notwithstanding.” A moral relativist is committed, again, to say that Alice has done something objectively wrong in not disapproving of the racial behaviour.

(c) Moral behaviour: If moral beliefs lead to morally required/forbidden action and moral attitudes lead to morally disapproved/approved actions, each ground will undercut each other in a vicious circle[10]. Behaviour is the result of belief and attitude. People can be self-deceived. Each moral ground above requires objective truth to differentiate between the differing attitudes and beliefs. And if there is no moral truth, then a person cannot, by definition, be morally wrong or self-deceived.

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Conclusion

The social contract is no basis for moral norms or ideals, and cannot stimulate moral obligations outside of self-motivation. The effect that moral relativism and the social contract has on human equality and individual moral worth, cornerstones of democracy, is perilous. It, too, is only as inalienable and constitutional as its mutual affirmation. If morality is reduced to belief, attitude, and behaviour in social contexts, then those who suffer with mental deficiencies, disabilities, or physical impairments that inhibit emotional and social interaction and communication, such as severe autism, down syndrome, or deafness, are less morally capable and valuable. In fact, they cannot be more moral or valued than their physical capacity permits them to be; human equality and moral value is subject to societal context, and some folk give less back to society. If moral value is contextual, then mutable. If mutable, measurable. If measurable, it’s subject to grade. If gradable, then there’s a top and there’s a bottom. And, in secularism, you do not have any inherent value or meaning. It has to be earned, obtained within the confines of a social contract. It’s surrounded by potential. And here, potentiality is notched by the perception of others and reckoned by power, privilege, and prestige (those that can, or are fortunate enough to have the opportunity). Like the Caesars of old and the Supreme Leaders of Communism, who are more human than their fellow citizens and those that disobey them, a price tag could be had. This is Stone Age morality.

I hope the consequences are clear. Human freedom and value – let alone equality and the freedom of expression and conscience – are perpetually contingent on an equivocal sociopolitical contract with no transcendent or objective qualities whatsoever. Now enter slavery. It is no longer deplorable, it just depends. Are they detrimental to society? Do they oppose or impose values by word of mouth or otherwise that could disrupt the value system of our society? Can we benefit, economically or otherwise, from slavery? In fact, it’s arguably useful for the greater society of well-to-do citizens. Human value is reduced to usefulness of societal advantages, it can go up and down, if beneficial or detrimental[11]. 

As usual, it all boils down to the sincere understanding of our presuppositions–––and moral truth is the ultimate presupposition. In fact, I would go as far as to argue you cannot have a presupposition without it because it is the basis by which a person harmonizes beliefs, attitudes, behaviours, all-in-all: choices. To view the social contract as a truly good thing, one must view it in objective terms, and yet it is, by nature, subjective. The social contract as a social and political consensus is not a long-lasting basis to determine or obtain moral obligations. It has the opposite effect because it is a reactionary and mutable framework with weak prescriptive qualities. Incentives, then, replace obligation and become self-serving political engines, especially for the dominant sociopolitical contract, pushing a narrative to influence (and destabilize) opposing contracts that underpin the belief, attitude, and behaviour of said consensus, leading to a societal infrastructure that can readily support abusive structures due to moral normalcy having higher value than moral truth. This disincentivizes free and open dialogue, a pillar of democracy, because normalcy is the standard to differentiate good from evil with no mutual trajectory. To resist normalcy is to resist morality. Yet it is morally normal to have competing contracts. If our conscience is tethered to consensus, our morality goes wherever the wind blows or is overtaken by the storm.

This is to be expected, of course. Social contracts are made up of the common views of the people who make up their society. Consensus requires a true source for obligatory motives. Like members of a body, each limb is responsible for different functions and tasks, but it ultimately takes orders from the brain. Without the brain (truth), the members of the body have no implicit obligation or understanding of consensus or explicit reason why they should be connected. This is also why religious pluralism is doomed to fail in the political arena. A society cannot have fundamentally opposing values and religious beliefs and expect to have a bond. A theological argument that echoes political repercussions: “Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation, and every city or house divided against itself will not stand.” (Matthew 12:25-28) The social contract requires a concrete foundation of objective moral law – a house built on the Rock – to sustain a moral culture that desires true goodness in all facets of life and not just concentrated in the sociopolitical sphere. When we have a visceral reaction to morally reprehensible acts of evil, such as genocide, slavery, sexual misconduct, sex trafficking, child abuse and the like, we are not merely expressing preferences but actual repulse and moral objection to such horrific deeds. In doing, we appeal to moral truth. How secularism remains cocksure that the social contract is good is open for interpretation.  

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Matlock Bobechko | June 21, 2022 – 9:00 AM EST

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[1] Gowans, Chris, "Moral Relativism", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2019 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = <https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2019/entries/moral-relativism/>.

[2] Thomas Jefferson, U.S. Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness”.

[3] Richard Moon, The Constitutional Protection of Freedom of Expression, 4. Emphasis added.

[4] A Consolidation of The Constitution Acts, 1867 to 1982. Department of Justice Canada. The Preamble to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms states: “Whereas Canada is founded upon principles that recognize the supremacy of God and the rule of law”, 53.

[5] Celeste Friend, Social Contract Theory. Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
https://iep.utm.edu/soc-cont/
Mills, Charles. 1997. The Racial Contract. Cornell University Press.

[6] Paul Gould, Cultural Apologetics: Renewing the Christian Voice, Conscience, and Imagination in a Disenchanted World (Grand Rapids, MI: 2019), 158-9.

[7] Kevin Donovan, Jesse Brown, “CBC fires Jian Ghomeshi over sex allegations” Toronto Star. Published on July 12, 2017.
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2014/10/26/cbc_fires_jian_ghomeshi_over_sex_allegations.html?rf

[8] It should be said, as well, that this spin on “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness” deeply misunderstands its original intention. Liberty was never intended to mean licentiousness. In context, liberty is born out of a life of virtue that is married to the freedom of expression and religious belief. The founding fathers of the United States as well as Canada expressed this belief very clearly and never intended to be a nation divorced from a moral Creator. John Adams said it well: “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious People. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”  If morality is baseless, then the founding documents are pieces of paper that can be blotted out with enough power behind the pen.

[9] Alexander Pruss, Two kinds of moral relativism, Alexander Pruss’s Blog. Published on Thursday, January 7, 2021.
http://alexanderpruss.blogspot.com/2021/01/two-kinds-of-moral-relativism.html

[10] Alexander Pruss, A vicious circularity in one kind of moral relativism, Alexander Pruss’s Blog. Published on Thursday, January 7, 2021.
http://alexanderpruss.blogspot.com/2021/01/a-vicious-circularity-in-one-kind-of.html

[11] The more sociable, beautiful, wealthy, healthy, intelligent, useful, popular, and gifted you are, it all adds up above (or below) someone else. Chinese Communist Party is currently testing human ranking schemes through cellphone applications–––the lower the ranking, the less societal privileges you obtain and vice versa.