Rousseau defines the general will as the common interest abstracted from individual interests, differing from the 'will of all' which is merely the sum of particular wills; conceptually, the general will emerges when one cancels out the opposing 'pluses and minuses' of private interests, leaving only the net remainder that expresses the common good.

By Jean-Jacques Rousseau, from Du contrat social

Key Arguments

  • He states there is "often a great deal of difference between the will of all and the general will;" they are not equivalent.
  • The 'will of all' is characterized as an aggregate of private perspectives: "the latter considers only the common interest, while the former takes private interest into account, and is no more than a sum of particular wills," indicating that simply totaling preferences does not yet yield the general will.
  • He provides a quasi-mathematical model: "but take away from these same wills the pluses and minuses that cancel one another, and the general will remains as the sum of the differences," suggesting that conflicting self‑interested components offset each other, revealing the underlying shared interest.
  • This model implies that the general will is not another particular interest but the structural residue that remains after mutual cancellation of divergent private advantages, reinforcing its conceptual independence from any factional or individual will.

Source Quotes

Our will is always for our own good, but we do not always see what that is; the people is never corrupted, but it is often deceived, and on such occasions only does it seem to will what is bad. There is often a great deal of difference between the will of all and the general will; the latter considers only the common interest, while the former takes private interest into account, and is no more than a sum of particular wills: but take away from these same wills the pluses and minuses that cancel one another, and the general will remains as the sum of the differences. If, when the people, being furnished with adequate information, held its deliberations, the citizens had no communication one with another, the grand total of the small differences would always give the general will, and the decision would always be good.

Key Concepts

  • There is often a great deal of difference between the will of all and the general will; the latter considers only the common interest, while the former takes private interest into account, and is no more than a sum of particular wills:
  • but take away from these same wills the pluses and minuses that cancel one another, and the general will remains as the sum of the differences.

Context

Middle of Book II, Chapter III, where Rousseau refines his core definition of the general will in contrast to the 'will of all' and introduces his famous 'pluses and minuses' account as an analytical device.