does anyone read Rousseau works?

[communist panda]

is anyone a fan of Jean- jacques Rousseau works. I like "Discource on thet Orgin of inequality" the best because it was written to counter "The Federalist Papers". Marx was fan of his works and his writing was based on his.

[Roses in the Hospital]

Yeah, I've read the Social Contract as well as bits and pieces of his other stuff. While there's undoubtadly a lot of good ideas (and like you say Marx borrowed a lot from him) the biggest flaw of JJ's political thought is the 'general will' is ill defined - making it either too wishy-washy a concept to work, or (ironically) a possible excuse for authoritarianism. Also, Rousseau relies a bit too much on theology for my liking...

[communist panda]

Ya i agree with that he talks about 'general will' in a too well defined state. but its still a good read and does bring up severel key points.

[Hegemonicretribution]

He has raised interesting points before and although (as with almost all reading) there are fairly obvious drawbacks there is a lot we should take notice of. His ideas surrounding children's play are very interesting, and along with Illich and that famous piece of research (both researchers had similar names but I forget them...the piece about self fulfilling prophecy) should have had a bigger impact than they have.

[Scars]

Rousseau's works are amazingly important and I think that everyone should read them. He did influence Marx's thought and makes many of the same points as him over a hundred years prior. In addition to this, his works helped inspire the French Revolution- one of the high points of the worker's struggle.

[Bannockburn]

JJ is important for the history of western political thought. So is Locke, Hobbes and Marx. All good reads.