Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes, Chapter 16 summary
Chapter 16 of 65 · Part 1: Of Man · 7 min to read the chapter
In Chapter 16, Hobbes distinguishes people acting for themselves from representatives whose authorized actions belong to someone else, and explains how this determines responsibility for covenants. He extends representation to institutions, dependent people, and religious figures, then explains how individual consent and majority voting allow a multitude to act as one person.
What happens
- Hobbes distinguishes natural persons from artificial persons and connects representation with acting a role.
- He separates the actor who performs an action from the author who owns it and grants authority.
- Authorized covenants bind authors within their instructions, while fabricated authority binds the actor alone.
- He explains representation of inanimate things, people without reason, idols, and God.
- A multitude becomes one person through a shared representative authorized by each individual.
- He examines majority decisions, tied votes, obstructive vetoes, and authors who guarantee another person’s performance.
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Who is bound when an actor makes a covenant within the authority granted?
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