Rousseau’s critique of nature and the transformation of man

Much of the scholarship on Rousseau leads us to believe that Rousseau took either an exalted or an ambivalent view of nature, and that his political philosophy can, therefore, be explained as an attempt to correct or redeem men with nature as the example. On other interpretations, Rousseau simply accepted the extent to which modernity had removed us from nature and he attempts to give man a new consciousness that would make his existence within society both tenable and morally plausible. In this article, I argue that Rousseau’s political philosophy presented what counts not simply as a low view of nature but as a critique and correction of nature. I suggest that this interpretation gives us further insight into some of Rousseau’s political philosophy—in particular, Rousseau’s distinction between the private and the public in his attempt to radically transform man and society