THOMAS HOBBES' VIEW ON RIGHT AND LAW IN “LEVIATHAN” – CONTENT AND HISTORY LESSONS
Abstract
The question of “right” and “law” as well as the relationship between them are a part of the Social contract theory proposed by Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679) - one of the three great representatives of the 17th-century English materialistic empiricism, who “systematized the materialism of F. Bacon” [1, p.196]. Social contract theory refers to the origin of the state; accordingly, a state comes into being as a result of men's agreement to change from the state of nature to civil society. The political context of England in the civil war period following the bourgeois revolution in 1642 led T.Hobbes to the view that, in the process of transitioning from the state of nature to civil society, to overcome the "war of all against all", individual members need to renounce their powers and voluntarily turn these powers over to the sovereign to ensure peace, stability and security. “Law” replaces “Right” in many ways, while “Right” is constituted on the basis of awareness and observance of “Law”, “a bad peace is still better than war”. This view is controversial; but still, it has left remarkable historical lessons for the current era
