Jean-Jacques Rousseau's views on the education of children, as expressed in his Discourse on Political Economy, are based on his belief that the stability of society is paramount and that the truth, whatever it might be and wherever it might lead, is secondary at best, and even dangerous to society. Accordingly, he favors an educational system which is run by the state and which places the needs of the state above all other considerations, including the needs of the individual or the rights of parents to educate their children at home. The child is to be raised and educated, according to Rousseau, as an obedient, loyal citizen of the state, and not as an individual human being who was created to seek and find the truth and to develop himself or herself in any way which might contradict the needs of the state. This state-centered education, says Rousseau, should begin with
laws for infancy, teaching obedience to others: and as the reason of each man is not left to be the sole arbiter of his duties, government ought the less discriminately to abandon to the intelligence and prejudices of fathers the education of their children, as the education is of still greater importance to the State than to the fathers. . . . (Rousseau).
The father may die, says Rousseau, but the state remains. Of course, states pass away as well, through revolution, for example, but once the old state falls, as it did in the French Revolution, those running the new state, such as Rousseau, for example, begin to think and speak as if the new state were eternal. Rousseau believes that the new state which he loves will never make the same mistakes which the old state made. His educational theory is based on the supremacy of the state over the individual and the family.
As a result of this philosophy, he would certainly not favor home schooling, for such schooling could be given by a parent who believes in values which could lead to trouble for the state...