Abstract

_"The Government of Poland_ is the only finished work in which Rousseau himself dons the mantle of legislator, applying the principles of the _Social Contract_ to the real world around him. _Poland_ teaches us much about the mysterious art of the _Social Contract's_ 'legislator,' how he transforms each individual into part of a larger whole. Only in... _Poland_ do we find what this crucial transformation entails and what it presupposes. But probably the greatest lesson to be learned from... Poland concerns Rousseau's understanding of the proper relationship between theory and practice.... Time and again we see Rousseau advising the Poles to do things which are in gross violation of the strict principles of political right he had elaborated in the Social Contract." --Richard Myers in _Canadian Journal of Political Science_