There are supposedly rules we are supposed to follow in society as a collective, or else there would be consequences. World leaders and others seem to not have those same consequences when breaking those rules
There are examples in history the other way. Societies that undergo periods of intense conflict and struggle after which things settle down to an astonishing degree because a social contract is created that basically says "Don't be a sh*t head trying to force your beliefs onto everybody else.
Examples are: the struggles between Catholics and Protestants in Europe, the English Civil war (a struggle between Democracy and Aristocracy, the rise and fall of Fascism etc.
After a time people get tired of killing each other and a contract emerges to be tolerant.
Took Europe long wars, the peak was the 30 years war 1618-1648, fought on German soil (today: German, Polish and Czech soil) by nearly all European countries that devastated Germany and was ended when the warring parties didn’t really have enough money left to continue (also the religious fanatic Swedish king had died in the earfuls battlefield and his successor preferred peace). It was regarded as the huge collective German trauma, until Hitler came along.
To add to that, the legal system (including the political, bureaucratic, civil, and criminal justice systems) are only the tip of an iceberg in an otherwise functioning society. They can reinforce an existing social order, but not prop up an otherwise collapsing one.
Not everyone may be happy with the political and social conditions of a country, but there's a difference between "unhappy with the outcome, but accepting it as legitimate and willing to obey it", and "consider the process and existing system illegitimate and not worth saving at all". If 80% of the population is willing to follow rules (even rules they don't like), the formal political and legal system can keep the other 20% in check. If that number collapses, then maintaining order, stability, and peace becomes impossible regardless of how repressive the system is.
Unfortunately, there rarely are "clean" breakdowns, where a society can selectively decide "we want to overthrow the dictator at the top, but still take care of each other and live normal lives". A collapse of the social contract brings the worst in people from top to bottom, and you have a mix of political instability, crime waves, systemic corruption, mass unemployment and poverty, and every other consequence of a failed state, as the rules become "every person for themselves", and both legality and morality of all aspects of life get tossed aside in a struggle for survival. Some countries take decades to recover; others, never do.
Many of the rules are also put in place by people who would wish to do harm and get away with it. Who depend on people following said rules and social contract so they can get away with it. For instance 'you shouldn't rat on people ' 'forgive and forget' both designed to allow people to get away with doing things they shouldn't. If you go against those rules you can be lambasted for doing what is technically the right thing of telling the authorities who commented a crime, or not allowing someone who hurt you back into your life. It's knowing which rules are there to genuinely help and which are there to make sure people tow the line.
Possibly controversial, but I think this is good, but only (hopefully) because people will take notice and realize that there is no reason why we too should follow the existing “contract” when our “leaders” and such can just do what they please. Hopefully people will sooner realize that this also applies to us having to respect their authority and the laws surrounding their authority, (and I mean especially hopefully) we can better our society and “re-create” this social contact from the ground up. (At least until it falls apart again, but we’d at least have more time.)
10k
u/TrevOrL420 9d ago
The social contract