Locke's Two Treatises of Government › Legacy and Connections

Locke's influence on later political thought has been profound, though scholars debate its exact shape. The American founders knew his work, and many drew on it, though they also engaged with other traditions like classical republicanism and Scottish Enlightenment thought. Jefferson's Declaration shares significant themes with Locke, though whether Jefferson drew directly on Locke or on a broader tradition Locke helped shape remains debated. The tradition of classical liberalism, from Adam Smith through John Stuart Mill to contemporary libertarians, builds on foundations Locke helped establish, even as each thinker transformed the inheritance in their own way. The social contract tradition continued through Rousseau, who pushed Locke's ideas in more democratic and communitarian directions, and Kant, who gave the theory a more rigorous philosophical foundation. In the twentieth century, John Rawls revived social contract thinking, using it to derive principles of justice rather than principles of legitimate government. Locke also influenced traditions that seem opposed to liberalism. Marx's critique of capitalism engages seriously with Lockean property theory, arguing that the conditions of legitimate appropriation cannot be satisfied under capitalism. Even to reject Locke, you must reckon with him. The tensions within Locke's thought continue to generate debate. Is he primarily a theorist of limited government or of property rights? Does his theory support or undermine egalitarianism? How should we read his views on toleration alongside his exclusion of Catholics and atheists? These questions keep Locke scholarship vital. Beyond the West, Locke's ideas have traveled globally. Constitutional democracies around the world incorporate Lockean principles. Debates about human rights often invoke natural rights language that traces back to Locke. The global spread of liberal democratic ideals, and the backlash against them, is part of Locke's ongoing legacy.