The legitimate republic and political order in Rousseau: principles of composition and image of de state of equilibrium

Abstract

The article analizes Rousseau‘s Social Contract as a treatise on the principles of political law and the “legitimate republic” (State), which are important for the understanding of modern political bodies.  Within the background of the social contract theory and republican tradition, the authors center on the formal principles underlying the idea of “legitimate republic” as a complex whole and the principle of popular sovereignty.  They then proceed to identify the model of equilibrium as a nexus between the general theory and Rousseau’s more empirical hypothesis on the functioning of the State and the government.