contractualism
nounEtymology From contractual + -ism.
1
Government, Politics A political theory based on the idea of a social contract between a ruler and their subjects.
- the customary part of the ceremony in which the monarch was presented before the people in his regalia for popular acclaim was removed altogether for fear that it be interpreted as incipient contractualism.2002, Colin Jones, The Great Nation, Penguin, published 2003, page 301: