Rousseau and Revolution

Why Rousseau Mistrusts Revolutions 23
against Mazarin in 1649. We need to keep in mind that the Duke of Beaufort
was called ‘the king of Les Halles’ (‘Les Halles’ was the former central market
of Paris). This nickname refers to his closeness to the common people
whom he gathered to his side in the struggle against the ruling power. In
this passage Rousseau condemns without compunction ‘all the nonsense of
which a clever knave or an insinuating talker could persuade the people of
Paris or London’ (ibid., Book IV, chapter 1). He thus highlights the risk
that popular revolts can readily be made to serve the ambitions of potential
tyrants.
Nor does Rousseau approve the second major English revolution of the
seventeenth century, the ‘Glorious Revolution’. This revolution, of which
Locke was the theoretician and which partially carried out Locke’s program,
did not lead, in Rousseau’s eyes, to the establishment of a more legitimate
regime or to the abolition of servitude. Contrary to most eighteenth
century French philosophers, Rousseau had no admiration for the English
regime. By contrast, he describes it in harsh terms as a fraud, as a counterfeit
version of the power of the people: ‘The English people thinks it is free;
it is greatly mistaken, it is free only during the election of the Members of
Parliament; as soon as they are elected, it is enslaved, it is nothing’ (ibid.,
Book III, chapter 15).
The Institution of the People
These few remarks by Rousseau about revolts and revolutions in the modern
era are very illuminating. The real problem, for him, is not to know
whether a people is capable or not of revolting against a tyrannical power.
Revolution is only one of the possible means to establish democracy, but
that it is neither necessary nor infallible. The true condition for democracy
is what Rousseau calls the ‘institution’ of the people.
This complex notion has two meanings. In the fi rst sense, the institution
of the people is giving them political status, placing them in the situation of
wanting and deciding for themselves. This situation, which Rousseau
describes as the arrival of ‘a nascent people’ (ibid., Book II, chapter 7), is
the result of variable, unpredictable historical circumstances. It could be
(as with the Corsicans and the Poles) a war of liberation. It could be (as with
the Hebrews and the Romans) the creation, out of a wandering and disorganized
group, of a nation guided by a general will. It could also be, as was
the case with the Genevans guided by Calvin, an internal reform through
which people adopt new laws and a new form of life. Whatever the case may