Background/Context: As of 2006, "social justice" is frequently appearing as the centerpiece of numerous educational settings and spaces, such as article and book titles, teacher activist organizations, teacher education policy documents and mission statements, and scholarly conferences. Unfortunately, the organizations and individuals employing…

Jean-Jacques Rousseau's educational and political thought is compared to that of John Locke. Rousseau's theories, as expressed in "Emile," are placed in the context of some of that author's other works to show how his educational theories can seem practical in terms of his views on social and political inequality. (PP)