<P> The text was written in 1754 in response to a prize competition of the Academy of Dijon answering the prompt: What is the origin of inequality among people, and is it authorized by natural law? Rousseau did not win with his treatise (as he had for the Discourse on the Arts and Sciences); a canon of Besançon by the name of François Xavier Talbert (l'abbé Talbert) did . Rousseau published the text in 1755 . </P> <P> Rousseau's text is divided into four main parts: the dedication, the preface, an extended inquiry into the nature of the human being and another inquiry into the evolution of the human species within society . Also, there is an appendix that elaborates primarily on eighteenth century anthropological research throughout the text . Rousseau discusses two types of inequality: natural, or physical inequality, and ethical, or moral inequality . Natural inequality involves differences between one human's body and that of another--it is a product of nature . Rousseau is not concerned with this type of inequality because he claims it is not the root of the inequality found in civil society . Instead, he argues moral inequality is unique to civil society and is evinced in differences in "wealth, nobility or rank, power and personal merit ." This type of inequality is established by convention . Rousseau appears to take a cynical view of civil society, where man has strayed from his "natural state" of individual independence and freedom to satisfy his individual needs and desires . </P> <P> His discussion begins with an analysis of a natural man who bears, along with some developed animal species, instincts for self - preservation--a non-destructive love of self (amour de soi même)--and a "natural repugnance" to suffering--a natural pity or compassion . Natural man acts only for his own sake and avoids conflicts with other animals (and humans). Rousseau's natural man is more or less like any other animal, with "self - preservation being his chief and almost sole concern" and "the only goods he recognizes in the universe" being "food, a female, and sleep ..." Rousseau's man is a "savage" man . He is a loner and self - sufficient . Any battle or skirmish was only to protect himself . The natural man was in prime condition, fast, and strong, capable of caring for himself . He killed only for his own self - preservation . </P> <P> Natural man's anthropological distinction (from the animal kingdom) is based on his capacity for "perfectibility" and innate sense of his freedom . The former, although translated as "perfectibility," has nothing to do with a drive for perfection or excellence, which might confuse it with virtue ethics . Instead, perfectibility describes how humans can learn by observing others . Since human being lacks reason, this is not a discursive reasoning, but more akin to the neurological account of mirror neurons . Human freedom does not mean the capacity to choose, which would require reason, but instead the ability to refrain from instinct . Only with such a capacity can humans acquire new habits and practices . </P>

A discourse upon the origin and foundation of the inequality among mankind