Order and Disorder in "Robinson Crusoe" by Daniel Defoe

"Robinson Crusoe" is more than just a story about a man shipwrecked on an island. The island is paradoxical place, because it simultaneously becomes a heaven and a threat. It will overwhelm and conquer Crusoe if he does not make it his paradise. The psychological tricks are survival tactics. And as many philosophers wrote that man in this sort of state of nature was a social animal, that the bestial life of the solitary savage …

…but the influence that John Locke's ideology of classical liberalism had on Robinson Crusoe's actions are always there. Robinson Crusoe ended up on this island and to start from the most basic state of nature, and over time evolved into a ruler of his society. From that aspect one could argue that the novel Robinson Crusoe could be regarded as a single work concerned with the political evolution of society in the state of nature.