- The Social Contract, originally published as On the Social Contract; or, Principles of Political Right (French: Du contrat social; ou, Principes du droit politique), is a 1762 French-language book by the Genevan philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau. The book theorizes about how to establish legitimate authority in a political community, that is, one compatible with individual freedom, in the face of the problems of commercial society, which Rousseau had already identified in his Discourse on Inequality (1755).