Just and Unjust Ruler in Plato's Republic - Article Example

The nature of the just and unjust ruler in Platos Republic The problem of government is one of the most complex and controversial issues facing humanity. A lot of people for thousands of years try to understand how the state should be “ideally” organized. However, some people believe the best is strong, the state with good economy, in which each person feels completely free and happy. Thus the problem of public, state system develops into a problem of understanding the benefits of human values and individual freedom. These issues are discussed in the work by Plato “Republic”. The work “Repiublic” represents two opposite concepts – the concept of Thrasymachus and Plato. They are extremely opposite and that is why they make the reader to think upon the problem. The doctrine, created by Plato is multifaceted and extensive. It covers the questions about nature and about human and the soul of human, and the cognition, and about the socio-political system, and the language, and art, sculpture, painting, music, eloquence, and education. The socio-political philosophy of Plato, his theory of politics, is the integral part of Plato’s philosophy. The world of ideas is an ontological framework and the semantic context of world affairs and phenomena, according to Plato’s idealism, therefore, the idea emerges as guidelines, standards, model and an example of organizing. The socio-political issues are reflected in several works by Plato: “Republic”, “Laws” and “Politics”. In these works he discusses the model of ideal and the best state, according to the philosopher; it is a perfect reflection of the essence, the implementation of the ideas of the world. Highlighting the project of an ideal, just state, Plato speaks about the connection of the cosmos as a whole, the state and the individual human soul. The three principles of human souls are rational, violent and lusting. These principles are very similar to the state three beginning - deliberative, protective and business, and the latter correspond to the three classes - the rulers, warriors and producers (craftsmen and farmers). (Marinoff,2000) “What is justice?” - Plato asked in his most famous work “Republic”. In this dialogue he describes a dinner at the house of merchant with the presence of Socrates and several other characters. From time to time Socrates interferes into a conversation, and the company agrees that there is no reason to discuss the notion of justice without regard to society. Socrates then begins to describe his idea of a just society. The early dialogues by Plato in which Socrates is present, usually contain the ideas of Socrates. In the middle and later dialogues there is some transformation, and the ideas uttered by Socrates belong to Plato. “Republic” is the most remarkable dialogue of the middle period, and the description of a just society. Plato expresses his ideas on various issues, such as freedom of speech, feminism, birth control, private and public morality, the relationship of parents and children, psychology, education, public and private property and many others. Those are the themes which one wants to avoid any pleasant dinner. But the dialogue “Republic”, as we shall soon see, was not a pleasant conversation during the dinner. And the type of society proposed therein, also was not too pleasant. Plato’s point of view on the above-mentioned issues is so much different from that what modern society shares. In Plato’s ideal state there are no property and marriages (they were allowed only among the lowest classes). Children would be taken away from their mothers shortly after birth, to bring them all together. After that, they would consider the State as their only family, and all their fellow citizens - brothers and sisters. To twenty years old they would be trained at the gym and maintaining the morale of music (the Ionian and Lydian music was forbidden, permitted only military marches to strengthen the courage and love for the fatherland). (Huard, 2006) All this allows thinking about Plato’s own childhood. Diogenes Laertius wrote that father of Plato was madly in love with his mother, but he could not win her heart. Although Plato was born in marriage, his mother soon married her second husband, and Plato was almost certainly brought up by the relatives. Therefore it is not surprising that he devoted a little time and attention to family life. (Marinoff,2000) In Utopia philosopher develops the idea that the twenty-year boys and girls, who have not shown themselves quite adept in music and gymnastics should be separated from the others. He considers them incapable for mental work, so they should be kept in society, being farmers and merchants. The best disciples continue to study geometry, arithmetic, astronomy for ten years. Those who are tired of mathematics are sent to the army. And now there are only the elite. Another five years, until they are thirty-five years old, they are honored with great honor - to study philosophy, then fifteen years, they will learn practical device the government, immersed in worldly life. Reaching the age of fifty years old, they might be enough wise to manage the state. (Huard, 2006) These philosophers and rulers were supposed to live together in a common home and having no ownership. They could sleep with those with whom they wanted. There was the complete equality between men and women (although in another dialogue Plato wrote that “if the soul of man has lived a bad life in the body of a man in the next incarnation it gets into the body of a woman”). Living together and having no personal interests, elites would have been higher than bribes, and their only concern was to be the implementation of fairness and justice in the state. Among them there was chosen the head of state - the ruler-philosopher. Thus, the rulers-philosophers, rule by the fate of all other people. They not only determine the ability of people, but also the regulation of marriage, have the right to kill young children with disabilities (here, as in some other cases, Plato takes as a model polity of contemporary Sparta). Even for a small ideal city-state (nine miles from the coast), where Plato had intended to exercise this utopia, it looked like a cure for the disease. In the best case it would be unbearably boring for all the poets and playwrights, because those who played the wrong music had to be cast out, as well as legislators. It would be a totalitarian nightmare, which quickly got to all the usual unpleasant methods necessary to maintain such a regime. (Marinoff,2000) All of these shortcomings seem obvious. Even for Plato, his project was in some places really contradictory. He writes that poets should be expelled, while he uses a lot of excellent poetic images in the course of the narrative. In addition, the worship of gods, mythology and religion were banned, even though Plato himself had included in his work a few myths, and the elite “philosopher-rulers” is like the caste of priests. He also invented his own ideal of God, which is irreconcilable and should be revered (though it is impossible to prove his existence). In fact, the image of Plato’s ideal state is a product of his era. Athens is not so long ago were conquered by Sparta in the Peloponnesian War. Neither democracy nor tyranny brought peace, and Athens desperately needed government, which has been able to establish order (some commentators actually believed that when Plato speaks of justice, he often has in mind something more like an order of magnitude). Seemingly correct solution was to create a strictly controlled state, like that which existed at that time in Sparta. Unlike Athens, Sparta was a harsh, economically underdeveloped society, which in order to survive, it was necessary to raise caste blind obedience of soldiers that can only follow orders and fight to the death. Their task was to terrify the ever rise up and rob the poor of the city more skilled and economically developed neighbors. Plato either ignored it or did not want to take into account. In the spirit of Socrates that “only good people are happy” Plato came to the idea that “only unfair are unhappy”. Plato is one of the great thinkers of antiquity. His works enrich the spiritual culture of mankind. The basis of Plato’s ideas was philosophical idealism, the Plato impressed greatly the thinkers, who prone to idealism. In the teachings of Plato, they saw a sample for their own idealistic theories and hypotheses. Between the idealism of Platos philosophy and religion there is an inextricable relationship. But in this regard there is a feature that gives it a character of purely ancient beliefs. The religious sources of Platonic philosophy are inseparable from the mythology, and mythology itself bears an imprint of Platos dialectic. The other side of the content of Plato’s philosophy, which became a source of a long philosophical influence, was his dialectic. The idealist dialectics of Plato is the predecessor of the idealist Hegelian dialectics, its philosophical prototype. Plato was a pioneer in the field of philosophical extensive coverage complex of politico-legal issues and the development of many of them marked by the stamp of his creative genius. Plato was one of those truth-seekers and the heroes of thought, which become eternal companions of mankind and his contemporaries of the new and new eras and generations of people in their continuing search for truth and justice, in the relentless pursuit of a more reasonable and perfect life. Justice is when each is engaged in their own business and do not interfere in the affairs of others. In addition, equity requires a corresponding hierarchical subordination of these principles in the name of the whole: the ability to reason (i.e., philosophers, holders of power) ought to prevail; fierce ones (i.e. warriors) - to be armed protection, subject to the first top, both of these start managing the start lusting (artisans, farmers and other producers), which by its very nature craves wealth. The ideal state of Plato is a fair rule of the best and noble. To the ideal (aristocratic) state structure, Plato contrasts the other four. In his treatise “Republic” Plato wrote that the main cause of damage to societies and nations (who once, during the “golden age”; had the “perfect” system) lies in the domination of selfish “interests” implicated in the actions and behavior. Accordingly, the main disadvantage of Plato classifies all existing states into four varieties in order of worsening the state, “distorting” the perfect type of growth of “vested interests” in their system. Timocracy is the power of fame, according to Plato, still retained the features of perfect system. It appears when there is private ownership of land and houses are converted to free slaves. This leads to the degeneration of the ideal of the aristocracy and the emergence of timocracy. The people of this state differ by greed, brutality and avarice. Pleasures, Plato writes, are made in secret, running from the law, as children of the old father, because they educated the violence rather than persuasion. Plato hated the war, especially among the Greeks. People have already noticeable desire for enrichment, and with the participation of wives Spartan life becomes a luxury, that causes the transition to the oligarchy. Oligarchy is the system, based on property qualifications. In the oligarchic state there is a clear division between the rich and the poor, who do not participate in the management and that allow a completely carefree life of the ruling class. There are two states inside one: one is poor, another is rich. The poor appear to hate rich, and it leads to revolution in the state and to the democracy. Democracy, according to Plato, is carried out when the poor, winning, some of his opponents would destroy; expel the other, and the remaining get the same civil rights and public appointments. In this state there would be complete freedom and frankness and the opportunity to do what you want. In such a society there is a possibility, a man who has no ability to control can come to power, if only he is a leader in the crowd. However, democracy further reinforces the fragmentation of the poor and wealthy classes of society, having uprisings, bloodshed and power struggles that can lead to the worst system of government - tyranny. (Huard, 2006) Tyranny according to Plato’s view is if some action is too strong, it leads to the opposite result. So here: the excess of freedom in democracy leads to a state, never having the freedom of living at the whim of one man - a tyrant. From the very greatest freedom there is a cruel slavery. The tyranny is the worst type of government, where there is lawlessness, destruction of more or less prominent people, the suspicion of free thought and numerous executions under the false pretext of betrayal, purification of the state of all those courageous, generous, rich. (Huard, 2006) Plato, creating a “perfect” state based on reason, was one of the most horrible totalitarian states, examples of which we see all too often described in contemporary literature in the genre of dystopia (J. Orwell, “1984”)? In order to answer this question, we must understand that Plato understood the words “ideal state”. First, this state, organized by the best, and secondly, (and this is important) is the idea of the state. Apparently, Plato believed that all the evil people are due to the lack of generality, the permanent strife, lack of good leadership. All this occurs in time of peace, on the contrary, during the war there is unity and order, and a common goal. During the war, people have much in common, and they are due to the order, the wise chiefs and the regulation of life can achieve what is impossible to make a living as a fit and not doing their job. (Huard, 2006) The opposite idea belongs to Thrasymachus. Thrasymachus, in essence, argues that the world belongs to the strongest, and they set the laws of justice. And these laws are working for their own benefit and not for the people, who are at the bottom of the hierarchy. Democratic government sets its own laws, but these laws are working in their own interest. Tyrannical rule also sets its own laws and these laws are also working in their interests. Power is power. And whatever it is, it always acts in its own interest. Therefore Thrasymachus claims: equity is that the adequacy of existing authorities. This argument is with a very subtle irony about the power, including the one that prevails in our country recently. Thrasymachus considers Socrates to be a simpleton because he talks about some abstract, unpractical justice. Real life is unknown to wise, so they go on a fruitless argument. Thrasymachus asks - Do not you know that unjustice is stronger than justice? Thrasymachus says that to do injustice is usually good but to bear it is bad. However, when you suffer from unjustice, it is bad sometimes. Therefore, when people taste both of them, that is, and act unjustly, and suffer from unjustice, then they found it appropriate to negotiate with each other, and to create unjustice, and not to suffer from it. The legislation and mutual agreement appeared. The establishment of law received the name of justice and fairness – that’s what is the origin and essence of justice. Thus, it occupies a middle position - in fact to create unjustice remain unpunished, it is better, and to endure unjustice, when you can not repay – it is the worst. Justice also lies in the middle between these extremes. No one does not happen just on their own will but only under duress since everyone does not believe justice to be good. Everyone man himself thinks injustice is much more profitable than justice. If a person possesses such a power they do not wish to be treated unfairly and will not touch someone’s property. The whole system of Plato’s philosophy is remarkable for his theory of the state and of society in general. The progress of science found a failure of the majority of his views in various fields of human knowledge: an attempt to tear away the veil that separates the world of the senses from the transcendental, and thus solve the highest problems of existence and knowledge is recognized in the present. According to Plato, the material world is only a copy, a shadow world of the ideal world. The material world is between the world of ideas, understood as a real being (the real world, which creates a world of things), and non-being. The very same area of ideas seemed to be uniform, and it formed a hierarchy. Thus, according to Plato, there is the idea of a higher order - a fine idea, just. Then there is an idea of expressing the physical phenomena and processes, the idea of fire, movement, color, sound. Third set of ideas is a level of creatures (animals, people). Next is the idea of objects. All of Eidos dates back to the idea of good - to a single initial. This idea of “one” is close to the idea of God. God is not just being alive; he is the perfection of benefits. Wanting everything to be the best, he creates a world after his own image, i.e., according to the idea of the most perfect creature. Plato is the founder of objective idealism, its most prominent representative. The heir of Socrates and the pre-Socratics, the founder of the Academy and the teacher of Aristotle, Plato stands in the center of philosophical thought. For several centuries, going on a thorough study of his philosophy, which represents a foundation for further development of the whole of European philosophy. It is known that when creating their philosophical concepts, Plato turned to the works of his predecessors, but that does not distanced him back, on the contrary it allowed to raise the ancient philosophy to a higher level. Of course, at different times, from Plato was treated differently: for instance, in antiquity Plato was called the “divine teacher; in the Middle Ages, Plato was the forerunner of Christianity, and in the Renaissance he was the political utopian. Reference List Bloom, Allan. 1968. The Republic of Plato, Translated With Notes and an Interpretive Essay. Basic Books, Inc. Brickhouse , Thomas C. 1996. Platos Socrates. Oxford University Press, USA. Hegel Georg Wilhelm Friedrich . 1995. Lectures on the History of Philosophy, Volume 1: Greek Philosophy to Plato (Lectures on the History of Philosophy Vol. 1). University of Nebraska Press. Huard Roger L. 2006. Platos Political Philosophy: The Cave. Algora Publishing Marinoff, Lou . 2000. Plato, Not Prozac!: Applying Eternal Wisdom to Everyday Problems. Harper Paperbacks. Read More