Consent, Contract and Territory

Abstract

There is an obvious natural affinity between the theory of contract law and the political theory based on social contract or consent. Both reflect liberal premises; both treat voluntary assumption of responsibility as the central foundation of obligation. Both are theories of exchange; exchange of private property in the one context, and exchange of political rights and obligations in the other. Although one deals with political relationships and the other with legal ones, both are based on the obligated individual's promise. While the consent theory of political obligation is not founded literally upon any strictly legal obligation, it gathered strength historically in a society increasingly oriented towards the market transactions that made such legal obligations important. Contract law and contractarian political theory came of age together.