Political thought of plato and Aristotle 475 penultimul paragraph

Though perhaps not seriously, Plato held in the fifth book of the Republic that
inequalities were caused by families and property. The only way to get rid of such
inequalities would be to prevent parents from bringing up their own children and
thereby giving them unfair advantages. Communize families and property. Plato
also suggested a kind of genetic engineering to produce only elites, along with
governmental day-care centers and control of education to enforce them. Such
things are not wholly unfamiliar to us. Our age is rather more Platonic in this
sense than we want to admit.
As such, Platos concept of the Kallipolis must be the matter of critical scrutiny
can the just city be said to conform to modern values? One such value,
established throughout long years of struggle is equality that is, the equal
valuation of every individual. It is this ideal that has been identified both as
crucial to modern society and as missing in Platos thought. Platos view of justice
as doing ones own work and not meddling with what isnt ones own at first
glance does not allow for equality, for every part of the multitude must do what
their natural aptitude determines is to be their work and nothing else. (Plato,
1997, 433a)
This principle can also be incorporated into hierarchical, inegalitarian theories. It
indicates that equal output is demanded with equal input. Aristocrats,
perfectionists, and meritocrats all believe that persons should be assessed
according to their differing deserts, understood by them in the broad sense of
fulfillment of some relevant criterion. And they believe that reward and
punishment, benefits and burdens, should be proportional to such deserts. Since
this definition leaves open who is due what, there can be great inequality when it
comes to presumed fundamental (natural) rights, deserts, and worth and such
inequality is apparent in both Plato and Aristotle.
Aristotle's idea of justice as proportional equality contains a fundamental insight.
The idea offers a framework for a rational argument between egalitarian and nonegalitarian ideas of justice, its focal point being the question of the basis for an
adequate equality (Hinsch 2003). Both sides accept justice as proportional
equality. Aristotle's analysis makes clear that the argument involves the features
deciding whether two persons are to be considered equal or unequal in a
distributive context. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/equality/#PriEquJus

Democracy can be described as the rule of the free people who govern
themselves, either directly or though their representatives, in their own interest.
Why does Plato not consider democracy the best form of government? In the
Republic he criticizes the direct and unchecked democracy of his time precisely
because of its leading features (557a-564a). Firstly, although freedom is for Plato
a true value, democracy involves the danger of excessive freedom, of doing as
one likes, which leads to anarchy. Secondly, equality, related to the belief that
everyone has the right and equal capacity to rule, brings to politics all kinds of

power-seeking individuals, motivated by personal gain rather than public good.

Democracy is thus highly corruptible. It opens gates to demagogues, potential
dictators, and can thus lead to tyranny. Hence, although it may not be applicable
to modern liberal democracies, Platos main charge against the democracy he
knows from the ancient Greek political practice is that it is unstable, leading from
anarchy to tyranny, and that it lacks leaders with proper skill and morals.
Democracy depends on chance and must be mixed with competent leadership
(501b)

If ruling a state is a craft, indeed statecraft, Plato argues, then politics needs expert rulers, and
they cannot come to it merely by accident, but must be carefully selected and prepared in the
course of extensive training. Making political decisions requires good judgment. Politics
needs competence, at least in the form of todays civil servants. Who then should the experts
be and why? Why does Plato in the Republic decide to hand the steering wheel of the state to
philosophers?
In spite of the idealism with which he is usually associated, Plato is not politically naive. He
does not idealize, but is deeply pessimistic about human beings. Most people, corrupted as
they are, are for him fundamentally irrational, driven by their appetites, egoistic passions, and
informed by false beliefs. If they choose to be just and obey laws, it is only because they lack
the power to act criminally and are afraid of punishment (Republic, 359a). Nevertheless,
human beings are not vicious by nature. They are social animals, incapable of living alone
(369a-b). Living in communities and exchanging products of their labor is natural for them, so
that they have capacities for rationality and goodness. Plato, as later Rousseau, believes that
once political society is properly ordered, it can contribute to the restoration of morals. A good
political order, good education and upbringing can produce good natures; and [these] useful
natures, who are in turn well educated, grow up even better than their predecessors (424a).
Hence, there are in Plato such elements of the idealistic or liberal world view as the belief in
education and progress, and a hope for a better future. The quality of human life can be
improved if people learn to be rational and understand that their real interests lie in
harmonious cooperation with one another, and not in war or partisan strife.
If philosophers are those who can distinguish between true and false beliefs, who
love knowledge and are motivated by the common good, and finally if they are
not only master-theoreticians, but also the master-practitioners who can heal the
ills of their society, then they, and not democratically elected representatives,
must be chosen as leaders and educators of the political community and guide it
to proper ends. They are required to counteract the destabilizing effects of false
beliefs on society. Are philosophers incorruptible? In the ideal city there are
provisions to minimize possible corruption, even among the good-loving
philosophers. They can neither enjoy private property nor family life. Although
they are the rulers, they receive only a modest remuneration from the state, dine
in common dining halls, and have wives and children in common. These
provisions are necessary, Plato believes, because if the philosopher-rulers were to
acquire private land, luxurious homes, and money themselves, they would soon
become hostile masters of other citizens rather than their leaders and allies

(417a-b). The ideal city becomes a bad one, described as timocracy, precisely
when the philosophers neglect music and physical exercise, and begin to gather
wealth (547b).
Initially chosen from among the brightest, most stable, and most courageous
children, they go through a sophisticated and prolonged educational training
which begins with gymnastics, music and mathematics, and ends with dialectic,
military service and practical city management. They have superior theoretical
knowledge, including the knowledge of the just, noble, good and advantageous,
but are not inferior to others in practical matters as well (484d, 539e). Being in
the final stage of their education illuminated by the idea of the good, they are
those who can see beyond changing empirical phenomena and reflect on such
timeless values as justice, beauty, truth, and moderation (501b, 517b). Goodness
is not merely a theoretical idea for them, but the ultimate state of their mind.
Plato assumes that a city in which the rulers do not govern out of desire for
private gain, but are least motivated by personal ambition, is governed in the
way which is the finest and freest from civil strife (520d). Philosophers will rule
not only because they will be best prepared for this, but also because if they do
not, the city will no longer be well governed and may fall prey to economic
decline, factionalism, and civil war. They will approach ruling not as something
really enjoyable, but as something necessary (347c-d).
Objections against the government of philosopher-rulers can be made.

one can argue that there may obviously be a danger in the self-professed claim
to rule of the philosophers. Individuals may imagine themselves to be best
qualified to govern a country, but in fact they may lose contact with political
realities and not be good leaders at all. If philosopher-rulers did not have real
knowledge of their city, they would be deprived of the essential credential that is
required to make their rule legitimate, namely, that they alone know how best to
govern.
however, in Platos view, philosopher-rulers do not derive their authority solely
from their expert knowledge, but also from their love of the city as a whole and
their impartiality and fairness. Their political authority is not only rational but also
substantially moral, based on the consent of the governed. They regard justice as
the most important and most essential thing (540e).

For Plato, as for Solon, government exists for the benefit of all citizens and all
social classes, and must mediate between potentially conflicting interests. Such a
mediating force is exercised in the ideal city of the Republic by the philosopherrulers. They are the guarantors of the political order that is encapsulated in the
norm that regulates just relations of persons and classes within the city and is
expressed by the phrase: doing ones own work and not meddling with what
isnt ones own (433a-b). If justice is related to equality, the notion of equality is

indeed preserved in Platos view of justice expressed by this norm as the

impartial, equal treatment of all citizens and social groups.
The philosopher-rulers enjoy respect and contemplative leisure, but not wealth or
honors; the guardian class, the second class in the city, military honors, but not
leisure or wealth; and the producer class, family life, wealth, and freedom of
enterprise, but not honors or rule. Then, the producers supply the city with
goods; the guardians, defend it; and the philosophers, attuned to virtue and
illuminated by goodness, rule it impartially for the common benefit of all citizens.
The three different social classes engage in mutually beneficial enterprise, by
which the interests of all are best served. Social and economic differences, i.e.
departures from equality, bring about benefits to people in all social positions,
and therefore, are justified. In the Platonic vision of the Republic, all social classes
get to perform what they are best fit to do and are unified into a single
community by mutual interests. In this sense, although each are different, they
are all friends.
http://www.iep.utm.edu/platopol/#H4

aristotle
Roughly speaking, there are six kinds of constitution, three just and three unjust.
A constitution is just when it benefits everyone in the city and unjust when it
benefits only those in power. When a single person rules, a constitution is a
monarchy if the ruler is good and a tyranny if the ruler is bad. When a small elite
rules, a constitution is an aristocracy if the rulers are good and an oligarchy if the
rulers are bad. When the masses rule, a constitution is a polity if they rule well
and a democracy if they rule badly. Aristotle acknowledges that giving full
sovereignty to either the governing body or the laws might make room for abuses
of power and suggests that a polity is probably least susceptible to corruption,
especially when the laws are given higher authority than the governing body. He
proposes a principle of distributive justice, saying that benefits should be
conferred upon different citizens differently, depending on the contribution they
make to the well-being of the state.
In Books IV to VI, Aristotle turns from his theoretical speculations to a practical
examination of political institutions as they exist in the Greek world. He observes
that the needs of city-states vary greatly depending on their wealth, population,
class distribution, and so on. He examines the different varieties of states and
constitutions and makes a number of general recommendations. The greatest
tension in any state is the mutual resentment between the rich and the poor.
Consequently, a strong middle class keeps a state in balance and guards against
corruption and oppression. The three branches of civic government are the
deliberative, which makes the major political decisions of the state; the
executive, which runs the day-to-day business of the state; and the judicial,
which oversees the legal affairs of the state. Though it is not necessary to give

everyone equal access to public office, it is never wise to exclude entirely any
group from power. Constitutions are usually changed by a large, dissatisfied
faction that rises up against the people in power. To preserve a constitution,
Aristotle recommends moderation, education, and inclusiveness. The interests of
the rich minority and poor majority can be balanced by allowing both factions a
roughly equal amount of power. In such an arrangement, each individual rich
person would have more political power than each individual poor person, but the
poor and the rich as groups would be balanced against one another.
An ideal city-state should be arranged to maximize the happiness of its citizens.
Such a city would be large enough for self-sufficiency but small enough to ensure
fellow feeling. It should be located by the water to allow for easy sea commerce.
Young citizens serve in the military, middle-aged citizens govern, and older
citizens take care of religious affairs while noncitizen laborers take care of
farming and crafts.
Aristotles discussion of politics is firmly grounded in the world of the Greek citystate, or polis. He assumes that any state will consist of the same basic elements
of a Greek city-state: male citizens who administer the state, and then women,
slaves, foreigners, and noncitizen laborers who perform the necessary menial
tasks to keep the city running. Citizenship in the Greek world was a much more
involved responsibility than it is in modern representative democracies. All
citizens in a Greek city-state take part in government and hold various public
offices, which is why Aristotle takes public office as a defining feature of
citizenship. Because citizenship involves an active role in running the state, a
citizen identifies strongly with the city-state to which he belongs, to the point that
the Greeks consider exile to be a fate worse than death.
Aristotles Politics is sometimes classified as communitarian, because it places
the well-being of the community as a whole above the well-being of the
individual. Aristotle calls humans political animals because we cannot be fully
human without active participation in a city-state
Consequently, the interests of the individual and the interests of the state are
equivalent in Aristotles view.
One of the less attractive features of the Politics is Aristotles endorsement of
slavery, which, not surprisingly, rings hollow. His argument rests on the claim that
everyone needs to be ruled and those who lack the rationality to rule themselves
need to be ruled by others. Aristotle opposes the enslavement of other Greeks
because he believes that all Greeks are at least somewhat rational beings and so
their enslavement would be unjust. However, in typical Greek fashion, Aristotle
regards all non-Greeks as inferior barbarians, many of whom can only live
productively in a state of slavery. However, he also argues that slaves need
sufficient rationality to understand and carry out the orders of their masters. This
argument contradicts the argument that slaves deserve their lot because they
lack rationality entirely. If we follow Aristotles reasoning to its logical conclusion,
we can argue that slavery is always wrong because those who make capable
slaves necessarily have a level of rationality that renders their enslavement

unjust. Unfortunately, Aristotle himself was too caught up in the prejudices of his
own time to recognize that his argument refutes itself.

Everyone agrees, he says, that justice involves treating equal persons equally,
and treating unequal persons unequally, but they do not agree on the standard
by which individuals are deemed to be equally (or unequally) meritorious or
deserving. He assumes his own analysis of distributive justice set forth in
Nicomachean Ethics V.3: Justice requires that benefits be distributed to
individuals in proportion to their merit or desert. The oligarchs mistakenly think
that those who are superior in wealth should also have superior political rights,
whereas the democrats hold that those who are equal in free birth should also
have equal political rights. Both of these conceptions of political justice are
mistaken in Aristotle's view, because they assume a false conception of the
ultimate end of the city-state. The city-state is neither a business enterprise to
maximize wealth (as the oligarchs suppose) nor an association to promote liberty
and equality (as the democrats maintain). Instead, Aristotle argues, the good life
is the end of the city-state, that is, a life consisting of noble actions (1280b39
1281a4). Hence, the correct conception of justice is aristocratic, assigning
political rights to those who make a full contribution to the political community,
that is, to those with virtue as well as property and freedom (1281a48). This is
what Aristotle understands by an aristocratic constitution: literally, the rule of
the aristoi, i.e., best persons. Aristotle explores the implications of this argument
in the remainder of Politics III, considering the rival claims of the rule of law and
the rule of a supremely virtuous individual. Here absolute kingship is a limiting
case of aristocracy. Again, in books VII-VIII, Aristotle describes the ideal
constitution in which the citizens are fully virtuous.

References
http://www.ippr.org/publications/political-inequality-why-british-democracy-mustbe-reformed-and-revitalised