The Role of Legal Values

Societies must have an underlying organizing force, or else life would become—in the famous words of Thomas Hobbes—“solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” ¹ Yet the primary organizing force can vary: Some of the chief social constructs are: religious texts, ² traditions, ³ ideological constructs of the perfect society, ⁴ or a social contract among individuals. ⁵ Individualistic cultures like those found in the United States and other Western countries prefer social contract states that set up constitutional-legal frameworks, through which authoritative values (supported by the potential for force) are expressed. Lawrence Kohlberg, for example, described the social contract orientation as “the official morality of the American government and Constitution.” ⁶ In other words, legal values take on extreme importance in such cultures.