Plato's Republic: City Analysis

In the republic there are five different cities described: Aristocracy, timocracy, oligarchy, democracy, tyranny. Each of these cities retains its own unique attributes. And like a selection of families, each will have its members interact in different ways. As I sit here drafting this final paper, it has been asked of me to pick my family for my next life. I am to explain my answer, and tell what I would see in each of their households. To do this, we are going to examine each city/family type and point out there errors as well as their lustering features.

To begin, we examine the city type that Socrates proves to be the best: the Aristocracy. The republic describes this type of city as “the city of necessity” and in book X this type of life/city/soul

Here we have a family where the parents’ first and last goal is victory and honor. The Republic presents people of a timoarchy as sprit leading reason leading desire. Whenever Socrates describes a timocrat, he refers to them as “honor lovers”545b I would assume that most Timocrat familys would have only one child. This kid would then be subject to long extensive days of practice, work, and education so that they may be the “most” successful kid in the world. My freshmen year at UNK I made friends with a music student form Tokyo Japan. I was often told horror stories about his families strive for success. He was the second born in his household and his job as a kid was to play the cello in competition his older sister. As his story goes, he was basically disowned when he turned sixteen because he was not preforming on the same level as his sister (she is apparently a world renowned musician). Thought I will also assume that this is a strange case for a timocracy, it is the closest example I can find in my real life. None the less, the kids will grow to be timocrats like there parents. For these souls, winning is everything, and as long as they are working to become better at their craft they are

The constitution that is the worst for acquiring true happiness. Here we have a home were the parents maintain true power, and the children are merely subjects. For this one, I don’t have a solid personal example, but I imagine it would resemble the family from The Sound of Music in the beginning. The father is a well of navy man who tranes his children to act like glass figures. They come to the sound of a whistle, and they recite greetings like a script. The kids are in fear of making him mad, or upsetting him, and the father is always unhappy with his home and work state. I think that in a tyranny household it is not love that keeps everything together, or entertainment. But rather fear. Socrates explains that the tyrant will have to do away with all of them he intends to rule until he’s left with neither friend nor enemy of any worth.567b I am a big fan of this line form the republic because it describes a city, but in a family aspect it has an interesting notion. You can’t actually get rid of your kids, but you can push them away, and be overbearing until they finally had