The Enlightenment refers to an intellectual movement that spans about 100 years from the 1680s to 1789. Enlightenment - influenced Europe and America. The war of all against all.
Life is nasty, bruitish and short.
Individuals surrender their rights to the sovereign in order to create a state whereby they can be protected from other individuals. Locke and Rousseau further developed this idea of a social contract, although in a somewhat different form than Hobbes. He believed in a certain original equality of all individuals, male and female, in the state of nature, where everyone had a right to autonomy and freedom. The organization of the State evolved as a result of free individuals consenting to be governed by an abstract authority in the interests of protecting private property. Locke believed that if each individual rationally pursues happiness and pleasure, this promotes cooperation so that in the long run individual and the general welfare coincide.