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The influence of theories of the social contract, especially as they relate to the issues of natural rights and the proper functions of government, pervades the constitution making of the revolutionary era that began with the American Revolution and is indeed enshrined in the great political manifestos of the time, Jean-Jacques Rousseau's ideas of the social contract heavily influenced the American revolutionary generation. It was the idea that government exists with consent of the governed that led the revolutionaries to break free of Britain. Read extracts of the Social Contract from the Internet Modern History Sourcebook.
What is the social contract: an implicit agreement among the members of a society to cooperate for social benefits, for example by sacrificing some individual freedom for state protection.