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The Civil State In John Locke’s Political Philosophy: Its Relevance To Nigerian Democracy
CHAPTER ONE -- [Total Page(s) 4]
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CHAPTER ONE
1.0 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
1.1 General Introduction
John Locke was born on August 29, 1632 in Warrington, Somerset. His father, John Locke senior, was a lawyer and a small land owner. The family had a puritan and a parliamentary background. He studied at the famous Christ Church, Oxford. He studied sciences, especially medicine under Sir Robert Boyle and was later admitted into the household of the Lord Aschey as his physician and secretary. He later opened up a new chapter in his life and became involved in political affairs of the day.
One of the bases of his political thought was his teaching on the civil state which he best called civil society. In order to demonstrate what a civil society is, he traced its origin to the state of nature from where men unite together to go into civil state. He stated that,
This is done wherever any number of men, in the state of nature, enter into society to make one people, one body politic, under one supreme government, or else when anyone joins himself to, and incorporates with any government already made….1
From the state of nature, people enter into civil state through consent, to surrender their right of enforcing the law of nature to the society for them to setup a lawful form of government they thought fit2.
Democracy being a system of government under which the people exercise the governing power either directly or through representatives duly elected by them3, is taken to be one of the forms of government which people in the civil state may choose to set up. There is need therefore, to explore the ideals of the civil state by John Locke, and to bring out its relevance to the practice of democracy in the Nigerian setup.
1.2 Statement of the Problem
In the light of the above explication, it is good to ask the basic question:
what are the problems of Nigerian democracy? Some of the problems are: the failure of leadership, inadequate checks and balances of the arms of government, lack of security of life and property, and violation of human rights. These problems among others make Nigerian democracy to be in shambles. Every Nigerian is in one way or the other affected by this difficult situation facing the Nigerian State, and it is every one’s duty to make maximum effort towards solving these problems for the actualization of the ideals of democracy in Nigeria. Therefore, the ugly situation of Nigeria democracy is the problem that motivates the research.
1.3. Purpose of the Study
Following the afore-mentioned problems, the aim of the study is to first of all explore John Locke’s teaching on the elements of the civil state, and to demonstrate the necessity of this teaching in solving the problems facing Nigerian democracy. In other words, this work seeks for the relevance of John Locke’s notion on civil State, to the practice of democracy in Nigeria.
CHAPTER ONE -- [Total Page(s) 4]
Page 1 of 4
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