ABSTRACT
Students in search of theories of international politics will find Jean-Jacques Rousseau's views useful in the interconnected areas of empirical or causal theory and of normative theory. For revolutionary system of international politics confirms the sharp and gloomy analysis of Rousseau, whose pessimism was all too easily discounted in the moderate system that died at Sarajevo. For many reasons, Rousseau's writings on international relations should interest students of Rousseau and, more generally, of international relations. Rousseau's judgment of the effects of civil society differs from Thomas Hobbes'; their similar descriptions of man's predicament before the appearance of the state conceal conflicting notions on the origins of this predicament and totally different emphases on what is evil about it. The differences between Hobbes and Rousseau on the subject of world politics are as serious, and rather paradoxical. Rousseau makes a fundamental distinction between kinds of violent conflicts: only organized violence among consolidated groups deserves to be called war.
