16th century

The sixteenth century marks an important stage in the changing language of political legitimacy. In the account given here, writers of the period inherited a medieval idea of society as a contract between the people and their rulers, while the larger development of social-contract theory was moving toward a different model: a compact among the individuals who make up the state. The century matters less as a self-contained episode than as a hinge between these accounts of political obligation.

The Older Contract Between Rulers and People

The social-contract doctrine that took hold in medieval political thought described society as founded on an agreement between the people and the government. Writers of the sixteenth century continued to use this model, which could draw support from Old Testament accounts of political covenant. Its central image was a relationship between a ruler and a people, rather than an original compact among all the individuals who would form a political community.

This model could support sharply different conclusions. It might be used to claim that a people had surrendered itself once and for all and must accept whatever treatment its rulers imposed. But the account more commonly associated with the doctrine rested on mutual obligations: the ruler, too, was bound by the compact to govern constitutionally. An appeal against royal conduct could thus be framed as a demand that the terms of the original agreement be honored, extending older appeals to the realm’s established customs.

A Transitional Place in Contract Theory

The book distinguishes two broad forms of definite social-contract theory: one locates the foundational agreement between people and government; the other locates it among all the individuals composing the state. Historically, modern theory passes from the first form to the second. Sixteenth-century political writing belongs to the earlier model, while the contrast with later individual compact theories reveals the direction of the transition.

The difference changes where political obligation is understood to begin. In the ruler–people model, the contract explains the terms on which government may rule and the obligations that constrain it. In the individual compact model, the foundation lies instead in the agreement that brings the members of the state together. The sixteenth century is therefore presented as part of a history of changing political concepts, not as a single, uniform doctrine.

Political History and the Question of Right

The discussion places this historical sequence within a methodological distinction. One approach collects facts about political societies and draws generalizations about what happens; another seeks the universal principles that might justify human association. Historical examples can inform the latter inquiry, but they cannot by themselves establish political right. A fact, however common or longstanding, does not become a rightful basis of authority simply because it occurred.

That distinction shapes the book’s treatment of political theory. Its concern is not primarily to describe the institutions of existing states, but to identify principles capable of grounding legitimate society. The sixteenth-century contract doctrine thus has a double significance: it is part of the historical passage from one conception of political agreement to another, and it illustrates why the history of political arrangements must be distinguished from the argument about what makes rule legitimate.