According to a number of Rights ethicists, to understand the origin of government we must imagine people in the joining together to make a?

state of nature / social contract

Explanation:

Theorists like Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, developed different theories about the state of nature and the social contract, although their underlying ideas shared some similarities.

The state of nature refers to a real or hypothetical condition of humanity before any political association, and the social contract would be also either a real or hypothetical understanding about the rights and duties of the rulers and the ruled people.