How did pride and jealousy arise in Rousseau’s account of early society?

In Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s account of human development, pride and jealousy were not inherent to the original state of nature, which he described as a peaceful, solitary, and morally neutral condition. Instead, these vices emerged only as humans began to form societies.123

According to the Discourse on the Origin of Inequality, the transition began when individuals started living in families and associating with neighbors in "nascent societies". As people began to interact regularly, they started comparing their abilities and achievements with one another. This process of comparison gave birth to the "destructive passion of jealousy".1

Furthermore, as individuals began to demand consideration and respect from their peers, their innocent self-love (amour de soi) transformed into a corrupted form of vanity or pride, known as amour-propre. In this state, each person desired to be esteemed above everyone else, marking a pivotal step toward vice and social inequality. Rousseau argued that this development fundamentally altered human nature, leading to a state where individuals became alienated from their original innocence and increasingly driven by social competition.145