MECHANICSVILLE, Va. (Originally written: Nov. 14, 2019; Revised: May 9, 2025) — In these days when Ayn Randian-style egoism holds sway over one of our major political parties—in something like an Invasion of the Body Snatchers-style takeover—it is good to revisit social contract theory and how at least some buy-in to that theory can help build a strong and arguably free society.
The simplest phrasing of social contract theory is that “actions are morally right just because they are permitted by rules that free, equal, and rational people would agree to live by, on the condition that others obey these rules as well.” (Shafer-Landau 2018, 195-6)
Rawls outlined three principles of justice that form the foundation of the social contract:
First: each person is to have an equal right to the most extensive scheme of equal basic liberties compatible with a similar scheme of liberties for others.
Second: social and economic inequalities are to be arranged so that they are both (a) reasonably expected to be to everyone’s advantage, and (b) attached to positions and offices open to all. (Rawls 1999, 72)
Rawls subsequently refers to the first principle as the principle of equal liberty and to the second as the principle of equality of opportunity. Rawls subsequently argued that inequalities can only be justified if the conditions of the third principle, the difference principle, are met:
Assuming the framework of institutions required by equal liberty and fair equality of opportunity, the higher expectations of those better situated are just if and only if they work as part of a scheme which improves the expectations of the least advantaged members of society. The intuitive idea is that the social order is not to establish and secure the more attractive prospects of those better off unless doing so is to the advantage of those less fortunate. (emphasis mine; Rawls 1999, 83)
Scene from It’s a Wonderful Life (1946)
Frank Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life is an excellent vehicle with which to examine the social contract theory. The fantasy juxtaposes a world influenced by the protagonist, George Bailey (played by Jimmy Stewart)—a man who spends his life giving up some of his dreams to help others—against one built by the antagonist, Mr. Potter (played by Lionel Barrymore) a Randian-style egoist who embodied a Milo Minderbinder-style ethos: Instead of “What’s good for M&M Enterprises is good for the country,” Potter’s motto would be, “What’s good for Mr. Potter is good for Bedford Falls.”
In the case of the latter world, all notions of a social contract are abandoned. Capra suggests that Potter’s view leads to what Hobbes would call a state of nature—where there is no authority nor law save that of every man for himself.
Hereby it is manifest, that during the time men live without a common Power to keep them all in awe, they are in that condition which is called Warre; and such a warre, as is of every man, against every man. …
Whatsoever therefore is consequent to a time of Warre, where every man is Enemy to every man; the same is consequent to the time, wherein men live without other security, than what their own strength, and their own invention shall furnish them withall. In such condition, there is no place for Industry; because the fruit thereof is uncertain: and consequently no Culture of the Earth; no Navigation, nor use of the commodities that may be imported by Sea; no commodious Building; no Instruments of moving, and removing such things as require much force; no Knowledge of the face of the Earth; no account of Time; no Arts; no Letters; no Society; and which is worst of all, continuall feare, and danger of violent death; And the life of man, solitary, poore, nasty, brutish, and short. (Hobbes 1909, 96-7)
In Potter’s world, everyone but Potter is worse off as a result of his greed. Potter, already wealthy, acquires more wealth at the expense of the rest of the residents as he—with no one to check him—is able to rig the game in his favor. Like a vampire, he sucks the life out of the community, rendering the lives of the others “solitary, poore, nasty, brutish, and short.”
While George Bailey’s world is imperfect, it is much better because of the sacrifices George Bailey made on behalf of others in the community, doing right by their fellow citizens, creates benefits that ripple far beyond the borders of the town. Bailey’s sacrifices—some big, like giving up his honeymoon, some small—give rise to the kind of world that where most of the people can experience what the Framers of the Constitution called “the blessings of liberty.”
The movie was filmed by and for members of the “Greatest Generation,” those who survived the Great Depression and then went on to defeat the most extreme embodiment of Potter’s worldview—the Axis powers—in World War II. In the movie, George Bailey’s sacrifice for his brother as a youth cost him a chance to serve in the war; but his brother lived, served, and in turn saved hundreds of lives by his own heroism in action. (In real life, Jimmy Stewart put on hold a lucrative Hollywood career to fly in the Eighth Air Force’s bloody bombing campaign over Europe.) By doing what he considered his duty, Stewart (as his brother did in the film) helped make possible a world in which justice rather than exploitation and genocide prevailed.
In Potter’s world, the residents of Bedford Falls are treated as little better than vermin, without hope of autonomy or betterment; in Bailey’s world, they are treated as partners in a great effort to make a better world for others as well as themselves. Whether or not the people in Bailey’s world consciously buy in to the social contract, or whether their accession is more intuitive, the fact is that, when they pull together and make collective sacrifice, they create a better world for all (except maybe Potter) by avoiding surrender to him and his desire to become overlord of them all.
The competing visions could not be any more divergent: buying in to the social contract embodied by Bailey creates a world with more freedom, justice, and happiness; slipping into the state of nature embodied by Potter creates a world of oppression, viciousness, and misery. While some critics thought—and still think—that Capra’s vision was pollyannesque, I find Bailey’s world preferable to Potter’s, even if it means I have to sacrifice a bit of my freedom to realize its potential.
Editor’s Note: This piece was originally written for an ethics class at J. Sargeant Reynolds Community College and submitted on Nov. 14, 2019.
Literature cited
Capra, Frank. 1946. It’s a Wonderful Life. Starring James Stewart, Donna Reed, Lionel Barrymore, Thomas Mitchell, Henry Travers, Beulah Bondi, Ward Bond, Frank Faylen, Gloria Grahame. Produced and directed by Frank Capra. Screenplay by Frances Goodrich, Albert Hackett, and Frank Capra. Additional scenes by Jo Swerling. Based on a story by Philip Van Doren Stern. United States: RKO Radio Pictures.
Hobbes, Thomas. 1909. Hobbes’s Leviathan: Reprinted from the Edition of 1651, with an Essay by the Late W.G. Pogson Smith. edited by A.R. Waller. Oxford, England: Clarendon Press.
Rawls, John. 1999. A Theory of Justice. Revised ed. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Belknap Press.
Shafer-Landau, Russ. 2018. The Fundamentals of Ethics. Fourth ed. New York: Oxford University Press.
When suitably inspired I will write something, maybe about a breaking story in science, maybe about my career as a scientist (specifically, a biogeographer). I may wage war against the forces of ignorance from the dubious bully pulpit of this blog. Or I may just tell some war story from my past in which I should have ended up dead as a result of my own stupidity.
The Social Contract and It’s a Wonderful Life
Posted by AbyssWriter on 11/14/19 • Categorized as Commentary,Ethics,Film Criticism,Social Contract Theory
MECHANICSVILLE, Va. (Originally written: Nov. 14, 2019; Revised: May 9, 2025) — In these days when Ayn Randian-style egoism holds sway over one of our major political parties—in something like an Invasion of the Body Snatchers-style takeover—it is good to revisit social contract theory and how at least some buy-in to that theory can help build a strong and arguably free society.
The simplest phrasing of social contract theory is that “actions are morally right just because they are permitted by rules that free, equal, and rational people would agree to live by, on the condition that others obey these rules as well.” (Shafer-Landau 2018, 195-6)
Rawls outlined three principles of justice that form the foundation of the social contract:
Rawls subsequently refers to the first principle as the principle of equal liberty and to the second as the principle of equality of opportunity. Rawls subsequently argued that inequalities can only be justified if the conditions of the third principle, the difference principle, are met:
Frank Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life is an excellent vehicle with which to examine the social contract theory. The fantasy juxtaposes a world influenced by the protagonist, George Bailey (played by Jimmy Stewart)—a man who spends his life giving up some of his dreams to help others—against one built by the antagonist, Mr. Potter (played by Lionel Barrymore) a Randian-style egoist who embodied a Milo Minderbinder-style ethos: Instead of “What’s good for M&M Enterprises is good for the country,” Potter’s motto would be, “What’s good for Mr. Potter is good for Bedford Falls.”
In the case of the latter world, all notions of a social contract are abandoned. Capra suggests that Potter’s view leads to what Hobbes would call a state of nature—where there is no authority nor law save that of every man for himself.
In Potter’s world, everyone but Potter is worse off as a result of his greed. Potter, already wealthy, acquires more wealth at the expense of the rest of the residents as he—with no one to check him—is able to rig the game in his favor. Like a vampire, he sucks the life out of the community, rendering the lives of the others “solitary, poore, nasty, brutish, and short.”
While George Bailey’s world is imperfect, it is much better because of the sacrifices George Bailey made on behalf of others in the community, doing right by their fellow citizens, creates benefits that ripple far beyond the borders of the town. Bailey’s sacrifices—some big, like giving up his honeymoon, some small—give rise to the kind of world that where most of the people can experience what the Framers of the Constitution called “the blessings of liberty.”
The movie was filmed by and for members of the “Greatest Generation,” those who survived the Great Depression and then went on to defeat the most extreme embodiment of Potter’s worldview—the Axis powers—in World War II. In the movie, George Bailey’s sacrifice for his brother as a youth cost him a chance to serve in the war; but his brother lived, served, and in turn saved hundreds of lives by his own heroism in action. (In real life, Jimmy Stewart put on hold a lucrative Hollywood career to fly in the Eighth Air Force’s bloody bombing campaign over Europe.) By doing what he considered his duty, Stewart (as his brother did in the film) helped make possible a world in which justice rather than exploitation and genocide prevailed.
In Potter’s world, the residents of Bedford Falls are treated as little better than vermin, without hope of autonomy or betterment; in Bailey’s world, they are treated as partners in a great effort to make a better world for others as well as themselves. Whether or not the people in Bailey’s world consciously buy in to the social contract, or whether their accession is more intuitive, the fact is that, when they pull together and make collective sacrifice, they create a better world for all (except maybe Potter) by avoiding surrender to him and his desire to become overlord of them all.
The competing visions could not be any more divergent: buying in to the social contract embodied by Bailey creates a world with more freedom, justice, and happiness; slipping into the state of nature embodied by Potter creates a world of oppression, viciousness, and misery. While some critics thought—and still think—that Capra’s vision was pollyannesque, I find Bailey’s world preferable to Potter’s, even if it means I have to sacrifice a bit of my freedom to realize its potential.
Editor’s Note: This piece was originally written for an ethics class at J. Sargeant Reynolds Community College and submitted on Nov. 14, 2019.
Literature cited
Capra, Frank. 1946. It’s a Wonderful Life. Starring James Stewart, Donna Reed, Lionel Barrymore, Thomas Mitchell, Henry Travers, Beulah Bondi, Ward Bond, Frank Faylen, Gloria Grahame. Produced and directed by Frank Capra. Screenplay by Frances Goodrich, Albert Hackett, and Frank Capra. Additional scenes by Jo Swerling. Based on a story by Philip Van Doren Stern. United States: RKO Radio Pictures.
Hobbes, Thomas. 1909. Hobbes’s Leviathan: Reprinted from the Edition of 1651, with an Essay by the Late W.G. Pogson Smith. edited by A.R. Waller. Oxford, England: Clarendon Press.
Rawls, John. 1999. A Theory of Justice. Revised ed. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Belknap Press.
Shafer-Landau, Russ. 2018. The Fundamentals of Ethics. Fourth ed. New York: Oxford University Press.
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