One of the most influential minds in western philosophy is of Plato. Plato lived from 422-347 B. C, was born into an aristocratic family in the city of Athens. He was a student of Socrates and a teacher of Aristotle. Plato followed the basic ideas of Socrates, in which no laws are to be broken despite their relevance. He makes clear why laws should be followed and why disobedience to the law is rarely justified. Plato is considered a very essential figure in the contribution of philosophy and an essential figure to western tradition.
He was the prime founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning within the Western World. Plato has a range of teachings that have been used to instruct a wide spread of subjects. Some of these subjects taught included logic, religion, philosophy, and mathematics. Plato is famous for his many themes including Platonic love, theory of forms and others. There is not much to be known about his early education and lifestyle, but is acknowledged that he is from a wealthy and politically active family in Athens that was very well known in his time. He had many writings that explored justice, equality and beauty.
Plato was taught by some of Athens’ finest educators and he was the student of Socrates. After Socrates’ death, Plato traveled for 12 years all through the Mediterranean region. “When Socrates died, Plato left Athens, staying first in Megara, but then going on to several other places, including perhaps Cyrene, Italy, Sicily, and even Egypt. (Jones, 1917) Democracy is a topic extensively studied by political philosophers all around the world. Plato was one of these philosophers. Plato believed that “democracy […] is a charming form of government, full of verity and disorder; and dispensing a sort of equality to equals and unequals alike.
Plato wrote the Republic in 380 BC, in Athens that contains ideas about a society and citizens who lived within that society would act. According to Plato it was divided into three classes, they were rulers, auxiliaries, and then laborers. Democracy provided a sort of equality because, in Plato’s view, the different classes of citizens were equal, but only politically, not socially. This also did not apply to non-citizens, including metics and women (Breaugh, 2011) . The only form of equality that non-citizens received was equality before the law, which was unusual for the time.
However, non-citizens had no say in the laws that were being created, and could have no impact on political life in the polis. It is evident from reading analyses of the Republic that Plato advocated an aristocratic form of government. In the Republic, Plato defines justice as having a structure, where each citizen does the job that they are specialized in. Plato implies that philosophers are the most suitable people for ruling. Plato believes that philosophers are the most ‘just’ and rational men, and are therefore the best people to rule (SparkNotes Editors).
This is implying that these rulers must be aristocrats (rule of the best). Plato believed that Athenian democracy was unjust, since regular citizens could be elected to rule, without being specialized; and citizens in other professions could get involved with the business of ruling, which Plato also considered unjust. Plato also criticizes democracy since its main focus was freedom, not efficiency or justice. Understanding the context of the statement shows that there is irony contained in this statement (Spark Notes Editors). When reading the statement, there are two completely different tones that the reader gets.
There is a sense of sarcasm embedded in the statement, for example, “charming form of government…” or “dispensing a sort of equality…. ” It can be difficult to interpret Plato’s meaning and can be taken to have a different meaning. Democracy is one of the few forms of government that has variety. Since Athenian government used the lot system, there was a great deal of variety in the leadership. Another aspect that encouraged variety was the rotation and term limit principles (Manin, 1997). This meant that no one person could hold a position for a long period of time, which ensures a variety of people running the government.
This not only protected the citizens from self-interested rulers, but also ensured that there was a great deal of diversity, as a ruler only got to be ruler for a specific period of time, with a maximum number of terms (Manin, 1997). The variety of the different leaders running Athens also results in a variety of policies that were enforced during the period that they were ruling. The only downside to all this variety is that there is also a wide variety of the skill level and aptitude of the individual leaders, since most of the safe guards in place were mere formalities (Manin, 1997).
There is also variety that is not contained within the ruling group. Every citizen in Athens has the right to make a public proposal to the Assembly (Manin, 1997). Political participation was valued in Athens and since each citizen was unique, each citizen brought variety to the assembly. Athens valued variety, shown by their belief that the community shaped the individual, and that the individual shaped the community. There was a lot of variety in the Athenian democracy, since there was variety in the people in government, and because of the level of participation on the part of the citizen in the polis.
The system of government ensures that there is variety, as there definition of freedom is to be able to express original ideas (Doody, 2011). As Plato mentioned, for all the variety that is in the Athenian democracy, there is also disorder. There was a great deal of disorder involved in the transition from the aristocracy to a democratic system. Before the transition to democracy, there was a great deal of resistance and turbulence from the citizens (Doody, 2011). The people of Athens were tired of being ruled by a select few people, while the aristocrats were doing everything possible to maintain their complete control.
There were many close calls where civil war almost broke out in Athens. Legislators had to be hired to help diffuse the conflict. These men had to be citizens of Athens, who were impartial to the conflict, and had to leave once the conflict had been diffused. This was done to ensure that another conflict was not started, because of the legislator’s special status in society. There were multiple legislators that had to come in during the turbulent transition to democracy. The greatest turbulence was when the aristocracy fell, and the Athenians were establishing the working democracy (Breaugh, 2011) .
This is because of the unstable leadership, and the constant shifting of power. An example of this is Pisistratus, who ruled as a very popular tyrant; however, when he died, his sons died, which was a total disaster and resulted in Sparta taking over and establishing an aristocracy. This in turn led to even more and more intense conflict (Breaugh, 2011). In democracy, the disorder does not end when the transition to democracy is complete. Since the people of Athens have freedom of speech, there is always a uncertainty, that could cause disorder in the polis (Saxonhouse, 2011).
Disorder in the Athenian democracy can also be caused by the fact that each citizen had the right to publicly voice his or her opinions in the assembly (Manin,1997). If a citizen voices a very controversial opinion in the assembly, especially if that citizen has the power of demagogy (which is using the power of rhetoric to persuade the citizens to blindly agree with your side, gaining an advantage), could cause a great deal of turbulence and disorder to the polis (Breaugh, 2011) . Although the Athenian government had safeguards to protect the Athenian people, that did not prevent turbulence and disorder from effecting the Athenian polis.
The Athenian democracy valued freedom and equality. Athenian democracy was guided by the principle of isonomy. Isonomy basically means that everyone in Athens is equal before the law, and all citizens have equal participation in creating the law (Breaugh, 2011). Even though citizens are equal in the political sphere, they were not equal in other areas of the polis. The lower classes in Athenian democracy were equal in the sense that they had an equal to vote on the laws, and to have a say in issues that would impact the polis, but the lower class citizens had more to lose by participation, because of pay loss (Breaugh, 2011).
Therefore, until the Athenian government introduced compensation of these people, the lower class citizens would not exercise their right to equal participation. As Athenian democracy evolved, the lower classes of the polis participated equally in the assembly, and could possibly have a chance to rule. In the statement Plato says, “Dispensing a sort of equality to equals and unequals alike”. The classes were only part of what Plato meant. The people who were not citizens were also given a sort of equality, but not in the polis.
Although people who were not citizens of Athens could not participate in the political life in the polis, they had a ’sort of’ equality in Athens (Breaugh, 2011). Slaves had to be treated fairly, although they had no residency rights, or the right to legal advice. Slaves were considered part of the household; they could participate in religious ceremonies, and had basic legal rights. Unlike in most areas with slaves, they could buy their freedom back in the Athenian polis (Breaugh, 2011). Metics were a very important part of the Athenian economy.
The only reason that Metics were not allowed to participate was that it was believed that it was impossible to be economically prosperous, and have an active political life. Metics were equal in other aspects, including responsibilities to the polis, including military service. Metics however, could get citizenship, but it was highly unlikely. In order to become a citizen, Metics had to go through a long process, which included two committees (one of which had to have six hundred people present (Breaugh, 2011). The Athenian polis did, like Plato said have variety, both inside and outside of the ruling group.
The Athenian polis had plenty of disorder, before during, and after the transition to democracy. As Plato said, the Athenian polis does provide some form of equality to all people of Athens. This includes all classes of citizens, and even people who were not citizens. Unfortunately this form of ‘pure’ democracy vanished when the Macedonians took over Athens. Democracy only reemerged in Florence during the Renaissance. It took and improved many of the features, but did not use ‘lot’ in the same matter (Breaugh, Lecture 5). Then after the democratic revolutions, representative government formed, and the ‘lot’ system was never used again.