The origin of the state in social contract theorists in the context of evolutionary psychology: Hobbes and Rousseau

People, who lived as hunter-gatherers for a long time, settled down with the agricultural revolution and the first city states emerged in the Sumerian civilisation between 4000 BC and 3500 BC. The state later manifested itself in the form of kingdoms, empires, feudal order and nation states in the historical process. Although it is not known how the organised political structure called the state emerged, many thinkers have developed various theories about the origin of the state. These theories include family theory, biological theory, conflict theory, economic theory and social contract theory. One of the most important of these theories is undoubtedly the social contract theory. The three most important representatives of the social contract tradition are Thomas Hobbes, John Locke and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. These three thinkers have shaped their political philosophies by putting human nature at the centre. In their social contract theories, based on human behaviour in the called state of nature in which there was no state, explained why it was necessary to transition to a society with a state. In order to understand human behaviour in politics, it is necessary to take a holistic perspective not only on political philosophy but also on contemporary research in other disciplines such as social psychology and evolutionary psychology. In this context, I will examine the human behaviour described by Hobbes and Rousseau in the state of nature in the light of evolutionary psychology data, which claims that the origins of the mechanisms underlying human behaviour are based on the evolutionary pressures faced by our hunter-gatherer ancestors in the period known as the evolutionary adaptation environment.