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Plato's Totalitarianism

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In his book The Open Society and its Enemies, Karl Popper criticizes that Plato’s philosophy set forth in his work The Republic is Totalitarian in nature. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the adjective “totalitarian” is defined as, “Of or pertaining to a system of government which tolerates only one political party, to which all other institutions are subordinated, and which usually demands the complete subservience of the individual to the State” (“Totalitarian”). By this definition and through a detailed analysis of his work, one can discern that Plato and his philosophy in The Republic are not as thoroughly totalitarian as Popper suggests. While Plato does advocate for the government of Kallipolis, the morally perfect city he …show more content…

Plato’s analysis in Book IV of the legislation needed to create Kallipolis, his idea of a truly just city, reveals that he was not as completely totalitarian as Popper suggests, in that Plato gives particular attention to keeping religion unlegislated by the government. Near the middle of Book IV, with the drawing up of imaginary legislation coming to a close, Adeimantus asks if there are any areas of citizen life left to legislate to which Socrates responds, “For us nothing, but for the Delphic Apollo it remains to enact the greatest, finest, and first of all laws” (427b). Here, Plato reveals his belief that religion must remain untouched by the government and instead be regulated by the religious authority already established. Further in the passage, …show more content…

Throughout Book II and Book III, Socrates argues repeatedly for the censorship of art, music, and stories. However, this censorship seems to be only in effect over the guardians rather than the general population. The commencement of the conversation about education and censorship illustrates this point with Socrates asking, “but how are we to bring [the guardians] up and educate [them]” (376c). Here, Socrates sets up the discussion that follows to be one pertaining to the education of the guardian class of Kallipolis specifically and not the rest of the population. Socrates expresses that, “[they] want the guardians of [their] city to think that it’s shameful to be easily provoked into hating one another,” so they, “mustn’t allow any stories about gods warring, fighting, or plotting against one another” (378b-c). This passage further illustrates that censored stories will only be used in the education of the guardian class to cultivate in them morality and perfection. Socrates does not care if the general populace exhibits these specific traits, only that the guardians do, thus making the oppressive tactic of censorship only necessary for a small portion of the populace. Later on, in Book III, Socrates further expresses that this censorship is only for the guardians in stating

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He knew if the society engaged in war, soldiers would be a necessity to the state. Socrates would not have wanted a citizen to go against his guardians, who were risking their lives protecting the state. His ideal of forbidden speech/literature is similar to the idea of clear and present danger. By limiting what type of speech is allowed in the state, these certain characteristics exhibited were favored by both the United States and Socrates. Therefore, the information available to citizens needed to be controlled by the state.

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Comparing Socrates words in the Republic for the philosopher to rule to the words of the Apology where philosophy is viewed as something that is punishable by death, this is where the defense or importance of philosophy is realized. For if the philosophers were the ones to rule, nobody would question whether or not what they were doing was right or wrong because the philosopher-kings make the rules through wisdom and knowledge. Plato wants to paint a portrait of the philosopher as not only something the city should want to have, but also as someone who would be fit to rule above all others. This contrasts, again, to the points made by the jurors to Socrates in the Apology for they saw Socrates as someone who brings the city

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Jazmin Lara Professor Lehavi Political Science 5 29 May 2018 Title Karl Popper claims that Plato’s work “Republic” is a recipe for totalitarianism. For the reasons being that Plato believed in ideas such as the physical world being imperfect, instead of believing that “there is a god” he believes in “the perfect good”, and believing in how the happiness is achieved by doing justice. Plato believed in how many people could learn, but many do not choose to educate themselves because they simply felt no desire to do so. As well as Plato believing on how the truth will always come within one’s soul.

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Here is my first piece of evidence to support my point. “I happen to be a gift of the god to the city; and this is how you can tell: Unlike most people, I have neglected all my own interests, and I’ve put up with this private neglect for so many years, while always attending to your business.” (Lines 108-111) In the quote stated above, Socrates claims that even with the annoyance people found in him, he pursued in his mission to help the people. Even though he had to give up his interests and hobbies, he did not give up his mission and focused on his work with the people all those years.

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Making enemies and becoming the topic of conversation, the Athenians began to view Socrates as a threat to their beliefs and way of life and sought to end it. In order to end this, Socrates was accused of blasphemy (Mod1SlideC7). Socrates’s accusers took him to court and after Socrates did not play their game by asking to be sent into exile, and in the end, he was sentenced to death. After reading the textbook and Plato’s writing influenced by Socrates, I realized that in the period of his life Socrates was indeed truly a threat to the Athens society, because he looked for answers that no one else bothered to find which challenged their culture.

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“May it be for the best. If it so please the gods, so be it.” (Cooper 44). Socrates states that if it pleases the gods then thats whats supposed to happen. Socrates has his morals that he grew up with and so does everyone else.

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Socrates sees himself as wiser than other men including the politicians, craftsmen, and poets because he did not go around thinking he knew what he did not know. As a result of this, his character reflected someone who saw himself as superior to others and instead of feeding that ego, he could have been a joined politics and have an influence on the Athenian democracy. If he had done this, people like Meletus and his later accusers would have taken his criticism in a positive way. Socrates has the right to criticize the democracy of Athens because, in his perspective, verdicts are passed in the court by jurors with respect to whoever seems good to him. The democracy of the people was biased because, even if a person was wrong in court, he would not receive the right punishment her deserved because of his relations with the jurors.

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In addition, according to Aristophanes Socrates was grouchy, impatient and a bad teacher. Socrates in the clouds is a Sophist who is the general overseers of a school. In the school Socrates does not really teach his students that being unfair is bad. He teaches them that they can make an argument out of every single thing whether good or bad (he teaches them how to make the worst arguments the best ones). Aristophanes see this as being a bad teacher because he is corrupting the minds of the young.

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Failure during the Peloponnesian War caused Greeks to question democracy and traditional Greek values. Plato disagreed with the way the state was run, especially after Athens’ loss at war. He discusses the meaning of justice and outlines how the ideal state should be governed in The Republic. He believes that the ideal state should be governed by a class of guardian rulers, who were trained as philosopher-kings. These rulers are the only members of society who could understand the Form of the Good and would be able to rule justly and logically.

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“If you can feel that staying human is worthwhile, even when it cannot have any result whatever, you 've beaten them.” George Orwell’s works were designed to challenge his readers and to question the totalitarian countries, specifically Russia. Hieronymus Bosch, a Renaissance painter and artist of The Last Judgment, connects his painting to George Orwell’s 1984 by being a pessimistic painter during a time period of totalitarianism due to World War II, showing how life differed throughout time of war, and showing a repressive and power-driven theme throughout his painting. Born in India, George Orwell was an English novelist, essayist, and critic who is known for his dystopian-like novels, showing readers the negative effects of individuality

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I believe Plato’s Republic is important because it alludes to both the good and bad that is democracy. In this prompt Scott Christiansen quotes Plato saying that democracy is a “charming” form of government because it is diverse and gives equality to those who are poor and rich. These words describe democracy in a positive light; however, soon after Plato begins to delve deeper into why democracy is not all melted pots and campfire songs. Plato proceeds to say that democracies usually evolve into a form of government where chaos between the rich and the poor is prominent. This disorder and disagreement between both diverse groups ultimately leads to the search for a leader that will protect ideologies held by these groups.

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In Plato’s Republic, Socrates comes to the conclusion that we need to have a strong just society that is in the right order. In Books IV, V, and VI, Socrates explains that every society needs to be built on justice, everyone needs to have an occupation, and what a male and female household should look like. These are my prerequisites to what I consider essential to create a just society. Because without these qualities in an established society, you can hurt an entire civilization. And to Socrates argument, with an ideal king will come forms of co-operated citizens of a city.

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