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Marquis De Condorcet

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The belief that societal progress is necessary to remedy public ills has maintained its popularity over the course of many years, but different thinkers have taken various approaches as to the best means for this development. The Enlightenment thinker the Marquis de Condorcet and former Soviet Union ruler Vladimir Lenin were two men of drastically different backgrounds who possessed dissimilar views about the nature of social evolution. Whereas Condorcet remains optimistic about the capability of democratic progress throughout his work The Progress of the Human Mind, Lenin insists in his State and Revolution that only socialistic evolution will be able to aid society, which ultimately suggests that social development is not limited to one path but rather is shaped by the desires of the people. …show more content…

This optimistic view of indefinite improvement helps to establish his firm belief that achieving this particular political system is the best goal for society. Condorcet has faith in the idea of “the human race, emancipated from its chains” proceeding forth with “all his efforts to assist the progress of reason and the establishment of liberty” (Condorcet 460). A key component of democracy is the notion that people should have the liberty to participate in their government and embrace their human rights, so by striving to establish liberty and reason, mankind is therefore spreading democracy. Although this system will take time to develop, Condorcet is just as optimistic about the certainty of progress as he is about democracy’s role in the

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