Hobbesian state of nature

  Hobbesian state of nature 

 Hobbesian state of nature says how a land without laws and nature will lead to the perils of all human beings. All states practice Hobbesian sense of rationality in their respective state practices. Hobbes is of the opinion that state is an indispensable aspect for the existence of a political society. In the absence of state, the political society would disintegrate into chaos, violence and  mistrust among all individuals. Due to rapid changes taking place inn the British and west European society,Hobbes concern was how to prevent this chaos he begin to think about  how humans would behave without any government and laws and tries to find a way out, he felt the need to create a stable nation during the civil war and he went on and studied the nature of human beings in a pre-political state and invites us to imagine a place where higher authorities, governments, customs  and kinds of influence of these artificial entities that alter human behaviour with two purposes, 1) why government and law is necessary at all and 2) to identify what would be the most appropriate political organisation or regime is the  most eminent to mankind. Hobbes state of nature depicts a pre-civil and pre- political supposed time when there were there were no rules in the society, no order to regulate behaviour of individuals and no societies and organisations existed, he terms this as a “state of natural state”. An imaginative state of life where human nature was selfishly and uncompromisingly  coexisting with one another. Man existed wild and free, they were selfish in nature and mostly lived solitarily, they undertook only those activities that give them pleasure and refrained from the ones that gave them pain or discomfort. According to hobbes everyone behaves in such a way to expand our pleasure and reduce our pain  and therefore expanding our felicity.  As there was no such restrictions in an individual’s right to everything, no laws and regulations, people were free to kill anybody without any fear of consequences, hence everyone lived with their guards up, with fear of getting attacked at any place and time. There was a “state of warre” situation and chaos conflict and mistrust were the essence of that period of time. Life in such a dangerous and chaotic state was almost unbearable as life had become violent and lifespan and gone short. This fear and insecurity had compelled the people in society to come together and discuss about remedies to counter this torturous situation. These groups of people the a formed a contract and mutually accepted to live together in peace and harmony. They then collectively gave power to a certain group to exercise powers over the people in order to enforce the agreed conditions which will allow them to live fearlessly and uphold the principle of “no harm”. The need for appropriate government and laws could be extrapolated, therefore state of nature is a kind of interpretative device, where the idea of state of nature is theorised and imagines and then prescribed an appropriate form of government in congruence of human state of nature. As a whole state of nature was “poor, short, brutish and nasty” due to the absence of laws. Life in state of nature with conflicts of all kinds will eventually lead  to the perils of all the citizens and therefore begin to think about a way out.