A Fictitious Social Contract as the Basis of a Real Society

Abstract

In this paper the authors present the social contract theory as being fictitious and they propose, in contrast thereto, a hypothetical government contract. Also, they conclude that the debate between advocates of the social contract theory and natural law is a failed attempt at dialogue since both theories have fundamental flaws which «complement» each other. In the last section the authors endeavour to present a tempered version of a contract theory in the form of a hypothetical government contract applied to an economic contract between stakeholder groups, as a theory and a set of principles which can, theoretical difficulties put aside, be a solid heuristic tool in resolving the practical issue of balancing the demands of various interest groups within business enterprises and in resolving conflict situations between these groups.