Lecture 6: Hobbes and Locke

Question 1

challenging natural authority with rational authority was huge for the repercussin on womanhood for 3 reasons:

Answer 1

• necessary to undermine the patriarchal role within the family and to establish an equal responsibility between mother and father over children
• challenging the natural authority of the state meant challenging the natural authority of the husband within the marriage / family
• using a contractual model places individuals in an original state of nature in which all the individuals are free and equals (revolutionary during that time)

Question 3

Hobbes

Answer 3

• argues that in the state of Nature all people are free and equal so there is no reason to believe some human beings are superior to others
• Aristotelian idea of natural hierarchy among individuals is challenged
• considers individuals from an bastract perspective, not from sex
• women participate in wars against all&raquo_space; women can ally among themselves
• authority of the husband but the bonds wihtin the family are voluntary&raquo_space; consent !!
• the family is a monarchy where the father is the monarch
• family is seen as a source of protection
• mother and fatehr are equal
• authority over children is found in care which is very contemporary as a thought

Question 4

inconsistency Hobbes

Answer 4

• believes in the end that men are naturally fit compared to women on matters such as labour and force

Question 5

Locke

Answer 5

published two treaties of government
**1. supports monarchical absolutism on women **
- challenging women’s subordination means attacking patriarchalism
- the human species was created in God’s image granting power over earth to both Adam and Eve > Eve was only submitted to Adam
- source private power in the family and power of the kings: patriarchalism
- domestic and political power have different natures&raquo_space; political power can’t be derived from the domestic ones denying that the fathers have absolute power over the family&raquo_space; power is limited by the contract
- interested in dismantling patriarchalism, not because he was worried baout women

2. denies that biological facts of fatherhood are correlated to the power of the king

> > more favourable to women than Hobbes
Lockian way of reasoning will be used often by future feminists

Question 6

inconsistency Locke

Answer 6

• he considers men stronger than women and that there are traditional and natural reasons to give men the ultimate power over family
• ## argument&raquo_space; one of the men will have the ultimate power