The Role of Civil Societies essays

The Role of Civil Societies essays What makes a society civil? This is surely one of the most important questions to ponder in macro-political theory. For so much else depends on our view of civilized behavior. The meaning and purpose of society, what we ought to do, and what we hope to accomplish - all these are fundamentally affected by what we think is the true behavior of civilized people. Yet even within the most popular views of civil society, there are differences aplenty. Rival beliefs about society and civility are typically embodied in various ways of life and in different political systems. Among them, we shall narrow our focus to the popular views of Locke, Tocqueville, and Marx. Of his most famous writings, Lockes Two Treatises of Civil Government gives us a theory of natural law and natural rights which he used to distinguish between legitimate and illegitimate civil governments, and to argue for the legitimacy of revolt against tyrannical governments. Locke equated "the law of nature" with "the rule of morals." He wrote of a God who "show[ed] Himself to us as present everywhere, exhibiting Himself to the eyes of men... in the regular course of nature." His equation underscored his belief that "man alone" could not have "come into the world subject to no regulation, without a purpose, without a law, without a model for his life." Gods pronouncements and His creative power remained relevant in the role of civilized society. According to Locke, God patiently succumbed to a different structure than what most people may have imagined. The mandate men received from God was not to act reflexively and reform themselves according to Gods standards, but to "be fruitful and multiply and replenish the Earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the foul of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the Earth." This grant did not, however, give Adam (and hence r...