Throughout, quotations are in italics.

I wanted to put up a little bit more, but since Ben wrote on this, and since I am running a little low on time, I'll just put this up now.

In the second Discourse, we saw how political systems actually developed (according to Rousseau). In the Dedicatory Letter to that second Discourse, as well as in the Social Contract, Rousseau gives some ideas about how these systems should look if they are to preserve the benefits of the state of nature while still promoting the excellences of the civil condition. In particular, Rousseau is deeply interested in preserving FREEDOM and EQUALITY while allowing for society. Ben's leading comment also has some important stuff to say about how all this works. Here I'll focus on a few little points that Ben did not emphasize, and add some relevant passages from the parts of the Social Contract that we did not read.

I am going to focus here on the Social Contract. You should also think about how this relates to the Dedicatory Letter.

The central problematic of the Social Contract is laid out in its famous opening line:
Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains. One thinks himself the master of others, and still remains a greater slave than they. How did this change come about? I do not know. [But think about this in the context of the second Discourse!] What can make it legitimate? That question I think I can answer. (I.1)

The problem is to find a form of association which will defend and protect with the whole force the person and goods of each associate, and in which each, while uniting himself with all, may still obey himself alone, and remain as free as before. This is the fundamental problem of which the social contract provides the solution. (I.6)

The advantage of making this transition is immense. (See section 8.)

As Ben pointed out, the basic idea of the social compact is that since everyone plays a part in making the laws, the laws express the "general will," the will of all people. Thus every person obeys himself, since he is a legislator as well as a subject. Or rather, all the people obey all.

Instead of destroying natural equality, the fundamental compact substitutes, for such physical inequality as nature may have set up between men, an equality that is moral and legitimate, and that men, who may be unequal in strength or intelligence, become every one equal by convention and legal right. (I.9)

Some more important passages that you do not have in your reading . . .

If we ask in what precisely consists the greatest good of all, which should be the end of every system of legislation, we shall find it reduce itself to two main objects, liberty and equality -- liberty, because all particular dependence means so much force taken from the body of the State, and equality, because liberty cannot exist without it.
. . . by equality, we should understand, not that the degrees of power and riches are to be absolutely identical for everybody; but that power shall never be great enough for violence, and shall always be exercised by virtue of rank and law; and that, in respect of riches, no citizen shall every be wealthy enough to buy another, and none poor enough to be forced to sell himself, which implies, on the part of the great, moderation in goods and position, and, on the side of the common sort, moderation in avarice and covetousness. (II.11)

Note how Rousseau seeks to preserve the LIBERTY and EQUALITY of the state of nature, but in a higher form. Note how different this is from the way that political societies developed in the second Discourse. Compare this, too, to the picture of Geneva painted in the Dedicatory Letter.

The social contract establishes a whole people as Sovereign. Thus everyone is ruled by everyone. Whenever Rousseau talks about the "Sovereign" in these passages, he means the combined voice of all the people. As we will see later, this comes through voting.

The social contract sets up among the citizens an equality of such a kind, that they all bind themselves to observe the same conditions and should therefore all enjoy the same rights. Thus, from the very nature of the compact, every act of Sovereignty, i.e. every authentic act of the general will, binds or favors all the citizens equally; so that the Sovereign recognizes only the body of the nation, and draws no distinctions between those of whom it is made up. What, then, strictly speaking is an act of Sovereignty? It is not a convention between a superior and an inferior, but a convention between the body and each of its members. It is legitimate, because based on the social contract, and equitable, because common to all; useful, because it can have no other object than the common good, and stable, because guaranteed by the public force and the supreme power. So long as the subjects have to submit only to conventions of this sort, they obey no one but their own will.
. . . . . . . . .
When these distinctions have once been admitted, it is seen to be so untrue that there is, in the social contract, any real renunciation on the part of the individuals, that the position in which they find themselves as a result of the contract is really preferable to that in which they were before. Instead of a renunciation, they have made an advantageous exchange: instead of an uncertain and precarious way of living, they have got one that is better and more secure; instead of natural independence they have got liberty . . .. Their very life, which they have devoted to the State, is by it constantly protected . . .. (II.4, 207)

The people, being subject to the laws, ought to be their author: the conditions of society ought to be regulated solely by those who come together to form it. (II.6, 212)
--> need for fixed public assemblies to ratify laws (III.13, 262-63)
--> people cannot be "represented" by others when it comes to basic laws.

Inasmuch as the individuals have subjected themselves only to the sovereign, and the sovereign authority is nothing other than the general will, we shall see how each man who obeys the sovereign obeys only himself, and how one is more free under the social pact than in the state of nature. (Emile, 461)

A Remaining Problem . . . Citizens must want a free society
In many passages, Rousseau worries about the fact that people in non-ideal societies often do not even want to have freedom and equality. Many prefer comfort and safety to liberty. Think about how this fits with the picture of the unjust origin of government in the Discourse.
(If you're interested in this, see II.7; III.14-15.)
"The question 'What absolutely is the best government?' is unanswerable as well as indeterminate . . .. Subjects extol public tranquility, citizens individual liberty." (III.9, 255)

Practical concerns: Majority rule
There is but one law which, from its nature, needs unanimous consent. This is the social compact; for civil association is the most voluntary of all acts. Every man being born free and his own master, no one, under any pretext whatsoever, can make any man subject without his consent . . ..
If then there are opponents when the social compact is made, their opposition does not invalidate the contract, but merely prevents them from being included in it. They are foreigners among citizens. When the State is instituted, residence constitutes consent; to dwell within its territory is to submit to the Sovereign.
Apart from this primitive context, the vote of the majority always binds all the rest. This follows from the contract itself. But it is asked how a man can be both free and forced to conform to wills that are not his own. How are the opponents at once free and subject to laws they have not agreed to?
I retort that the question is wrongly put. The citizen gives his consent to all the laws, including those which are passed in spite of his opposition, and even those which punish him when he dares to break any of them. The constant will of all the members of the State is the general will, by virtue of it they are citizens and free. When in the popular assembly a law is proposed, what the people is asked is not exactly whether it approves or rejects the proposal, but whether it is in conformity with the general will, which is their will. Each man, in giving his vote, states his opinion on that point; and the general will is found by counting the votes. When therefore the opinion that is contrary to my own prevails, this provides neither more nor less than that I was mistaken, and that what I though to be the general will was not so. (IV.2)

This notion of how consent actually works is tricky. In a world in which there is no way to escape some political system or other, does residence really imply consent? Why would that be?

And is majority rule really the most sensible way to determine the general rule? Is it really fair that minority points of view should have to submit or get out? Mightn't there be some other, fairer, way? What if the majority, as in Algeria, supports a government that denies some basic liberties, such as freedom of speech and freedom of religion? Are people living under such a government really free? Hm . . .