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The spread of new ideas across Europe

The Enlightenment

Enlightenment

Also known as The Age of Reason Individuals began to examine the standards by which rulers governed. The principles ofthis time held that everything, including government, was worth examination and scrutiny.

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Divine Right

•The doctrine that kings derive their right to rule directly from God and are not accountable to their subjects.

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Natural Rights

•Innate rights of humanity, such as life, liberty, equality, and the pursuit of happiness, that cannot be denied by society

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Laissez-Faire•An economic theory from the 18th century that is strongly opposed to any government intervention in business affairs.

•Sometimes referred to as "let it be economics.”

•People who support a laissez faire system are against minimum wages, duties, and any other trade restrictions.

•Laissez faire is French for "leave alone."

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Social Contract

•An agreement among the members of an organized society or between the governed and the government defining and limiting the rights and duties of each.

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Natural Law

A law applied to everyone and can be understood by

reason

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Absolutism

•A political theory holding that all power should be vested in one ruler or other authority.•A form of government in which all power is vested in a single ruler or other authority.

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Rationalism

•A system of rule in which monarchs held total power and claimed to rule by the will of God.

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Background: Age of Exploration

New discoveries around the world aroused curiosityExploration meant new scientific discoveries in

astronomy and mathematicsNew discoveries contradicted common beliefs...who

was right?

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Background: The Scientific Revolution

A new way of thinking about the world

Copernicus, Galileo, and Newton made new discoveries about the universe

Conflict with the churchThe Scientific MethodAllowed people to use

reason in understanding social problems

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Background: English Civil War

Political turmoil in EnglandRebellion against Monarchy beheading of

Charles ILed to new ideas about how the English

government should be run

The spread of Enlightenment philosophers’ ideas sparked changes in governments and society throughout Europe.

Encouraged by ideas such as natural law and social contracts, people challenged the structure of governments and society in existence since the Middle Ages.

What effects did the Enlightenment philosophers have on government and society?

By the early 1700s, European thinkers felt that nothing was beyond the reach of the human mind.

The discoveries of the Scientific Revolution of the 1500s and 1600s convinced educated Europeans of the power of human reason.

Natural law governed forces such as gravity and magnetism.

Could human reason be used to better understand social, economic, and political problems?

• This approach had been used to understand natural forces such as gravity and magnetism.

• In this way, the Scientific Revolution led to a new revolution in thinking, known as the Enlightenment.

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Different Views on Government: Thomas Hobbes

Leviathan Surrounded by the English

Civil WarConvinced that all humans

were naturally selfish and wicked

People must give up their rights to a strong ruler in exchange for law and order (absolute monarchy)

This agreement was called the “Social Contract”

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Different Views on Government: John Locke

Two Treatises on GovernmentMore positive view of human

nature: people could learn from experience and improve themselves

All people are born with natural rights: life, liberty, property

Government should only exist to protect these rights

The government’s power comes from the consent of the people. People have the right to overthrow government

What is philosophy? NOUN 1. examination of basic concepts: the branch of

knowledge or academic study devoted to the systematic examination of basic concepts such as truth, existence, reality, causality, and freedom

2. school of thought: a particular system of thought or doctrine

3. guiding or underlying principles: a set of basic principles or concepts underlying a particular sphere of knowledge

4. set of beliefs or aims: a precept, or set of precepts, beliefs, principles, or aims, underlying somebody's practice or conduct

5. calm resignation: restraint, resignation, or calmness and rationality in somebody's behavior or response to events

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New Philosophical Concepts: The Big Five

Reason: Truth discovered through logical thinking

Nature: What is natural is goodHappiness: A person who lives by nature’s

laws will be happyProgress: Progress society to lead to

perfectionLiberty: All men should have the liberties that

we take for granted

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New Philosophical Concepts: Major Players

Voltaire: fought intolerance through his writing and exposed government abuse with sarcasm.

Montesquieu: believed in multiple branches of government

Rousseau: Government should be formed through agreement of free individuals and humans are naturally good.

Enlightenment Ideas

Power needed to be separated and balanced so that individuals or groups did not become corrupt through those powers.

The people wanted a change from absolutism and the divine right of kings to constitutionalism.

Constitutionalism was the belief that the government contract should be written down, making clear what powers were given to whom.

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Enlightenment Ideas

The philosophers believed that the government "contract" and its supporting laws needed to reflect the "general will" of the people.

Laws should be agreed upon by both the ruler and those governed.

Assemblies of citizens should be formed with real power to influence the government and judge whether rulers acted properly.

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Enlightenment Ideas

Rulers and governments that abused their power and did not protect the rights of the citizens were corrupt and the people had a right to rebel and replace the ruler.

The ruler also had the right to expect that the citizens would respect the government and laws that were just.

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Enlightenment Ideas

Enlightenment thinkers believed that science and reason led to progress, that knowledge was attainable by man (not just a revelation by God), and that man wanted to free himself from the existing religious worldview through scientific understanding.

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Women and the Enlightenment

Most enlightenment thinkers still took a traditional view towards women

They thought women’s education should focus on how to be a wife and mother

BUT...women came up with their own ideas.

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Women and the Enlightenment

Mary Astell called used enlightenment arguments to criticize unequal relationships between men and women: “If absolute sovereignty be not necessary in a state, how comes it to be so in a family?”

Mary Wollstonecraft said that women deserved equal education, this would help them become better wives and mothers.