Thomas Hobbes lived in seventeenth century England. At this time, the issue of sovereignty was a huge part of politics and Hobbes was not a very popular man. He sought to achieve stability and peace through investigating the nature of social life. In the Leviathan, Hobbes attempts to explain the nature of power. He states it is in the nature of man to fight his neighbors, and unless there is a power over them prevent it, they will kill each other. “During the time men live without a common power to keep them all in awe they are in a condition which is called war; and such a war as is, of every man, against every man.” Only if all men put themselves under the absolute control of a central power can they avoid what Hobbes regards as their natural state.

According to Hobbes, any reasonable human being living in the state of nature will try to get out of it. The problem is that, according to Hobbes, to get out of the state of nature, each man must give up a part of his freedom to a central sovereign form of government. Only when men may enter into this kind of a social contract can they truly live in peace.

“As much as anyone can make use of at any advantage of life, before it spoils, so much by his labor he can fix a property in; whatever is beyond this, is more than his share, and belongs to others.”

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