Chapter 7 Plato's State 1 7 1

co mmunal way of life where ' adultery' has no application

Plato ' s S tate because there is no monogamous marriage . Why does Plato
mov e so fast from honouring to flouting moral consensus ? One
a ns we r is that the conclusion ofBook 4 gave an account ofj ustice
After having shown that j ustice is worth having for its own sake, in th e in dividual, and that there Plato is concerned with human
Socrates is about to proceed to the demonstration that j ustice nature as it is ; he wants his proposed account to be such as
is worth having for its conseq uences too . But we do not get this plausibly to have application in people's lives ; whereas in
till Books 8 and g, for he is interrupted by Thrasymachus and Book 5, in talking of the state, he feels free to talk of idealized
Polemarchus, who reappear unconvincingly from Book 1 to conditions where human nature is likewise idealized . He is not
demand a j ustification of the community of wives and children interested in 'partial compliance theory' or in adj usting actual
that had been casually mentioned at 423e-424a. Socrates difficulties and conflicts of interest. Several times in Book 5 he
obliges ; what starts as a comparatively minor digression brings makes clear that in discussing various proposals he is simply
to the fore the ideal, impractical-seeming side of many of skipping the matter of their practicability. He assumes that
Plato's provisions for the state ; and this raises the q uestion of the what is for the best is possible, this being the ideal state ; and
feasibility of any of these provisions. This q uestion is given a then considers all in one go the question of whether such a state
lengthy answer which leads to the claim that j ustice involves is feasible at all (at 47 1 c ff. ) .
philosophical insight, a claim made i n some of the Republic's Plato's political proposals are often misunderstood through
most famous passages . Before broaching these matters it is being inflated . He is not trying to put forward a whole 'political
helpful to give an overall look at Plato's treatment of social, as philosophy' dealing with all matters important for the r.e lati�n.
well as individual, j ustice. of individual and state. We have only a sketch of the ideally
Books 5 to 7 are formally a digression from the m ain just city, presented in an unsystematic way ; the bitty passage
argument ; Plato m akes this point very insistently and we would from 4 1 2 b-42 7d gives us a basis for the account of the virtues,
be wrong to ignore it. But at once we run up against a problem, and the Book 5 passage ( 449a-47 1 e) takes up only some of the
obscured by the fact that we are formally turning aside from points in it. Plato says so little about the city except in so far as
the main argument. After trying to show that his account of concerns its j ustice, that we know virtually nothing about the
j ustice in the individual person can meet the constraint of citizens' way of life (a lack that has been filled in by different
ordinary moral i ntuitions, Plato goes righ t ahead to discuss scholars in very different ways) . O ne indication of this is that
without warning proposals for communism of property and it is only from a single, very off-hand reference (433d) that we
destruction of the nuclear family - proposals that he knew know that there are slaves. It seems extraordinary that Plato
would outrage all his contemporaries . The contrast is very should not treat this as a matter even worth discussion ; he
great ; at 443 Socrates reassured his hearers that the Platonically assumes it as an economic fact of life not relevant to j ustice, the
j ust man would not do the commonly u nj ust act of committing conditions for which only exist among free people who can
adu ltery ; but now we abruptly find that j ustice requires a shape their own lives. Plato presu mably thinks this way because
he is assuming normal Greek life as his background ( a life in
which the need for slaves was not q uestioned ) ; Plato's ideally
just state is not a full detailed picture of a Perfect City, but an
implementation of what would be needed , in his view, to make
existing ci ties just.
If we are cautious, and avoid the romantic and polemical
e mb ellishments that often mark discussions of ' Plato's political
1 72 Plato's State Plato's State 1 7 3
philosophy ' , the Republic can be seen to contain seminal ( and l a ck fr eedom, not that they will be free in some ' t.igher' sense in
very controversial) opening moves in many important political which higher, perfect freedom is service to some hi g her, more
debates . i nformed w i l l .
Now fo r a Greek t h e paradigm of lacking power while
E Q.U A L I T Y AND RIGHTS
a n o ther has it, is being his slave, and Plato actually says that
Plato's society has offended and continues t o offend many, in this respect the producing class are slaves of the Guardians . A
because he is frankly and unapologetically in� lit aria1!:._ But.
_ lo ng later passage m akes this clear (sgoc-d ) : We should be
there is no one simple way in which i t is clearly true that all ru led by reason , and a man whose own reason is weak must be
citizens either are or should be eq ual ; so we have to look with ru led by another' s :
some care at the ways in which people are unequal in Plato's
' Th e refor e , in ord e r t h a t such a man be ruled by a princi?le s imi l a r to that
state before pronou ncing generally on his attitude to inequality . which rules the best m a n , we say h e must be enslaved to the best man, who
The three classes, Guardians, Auxiliaries, and the productive has a divine ruler within h i mself. It is not to h arm the slave that we believe
class, live different kinds of life and have different education h e m ust be ruled, as Thrasymachus t h o ught subjects should be, but because
and upbringing. ( Plato, though, is so uninterested in detail for it is better for everyone to be ruled by divine i n tell igence It is bes t that he
s ho uld have this within h i mself, b u t if he h as not , then i t must be imposed from
its own sake that it is not really clear how much, if any, public
o u tside, so t h a t , as far as possible, we s h o u l d a l l be alike and friendly and
education as he describes it is available for the producers. ) Two governed by the same p rinciple.' (Grube . )
things about this class system even in the abstract strike us as
offensive. Plato says openly that t h e producers w i l l , like daves, lack all
Firstly, i t is a difference not only in status but in an entire way autonomy over their own lives. A slave cannot decide what to
of life . The producers presumably live normal family lives ; the be or how to live or what goals are appropriate . Here we must
Guardians live communally without nuclear families or refrain from thinking that this implies that the producers will
children . ( For these purposes 'Guardians' includes Auxiliaries ; be humiliated i n melodramatic fashion , or interfered with in the
the politically crucial divide is between the producers and those details of day-to-day life . The Guardians are not interested in
who control them . ) The Guardians' education, being a total playing Big Brother. The producers' private thoughts and
character-training, separates them in attitude, interests, tastes, actions are ofleast, not most, importance in the state. We should
and pursuits at every point from the producers. The latter are think perhaps of an Athenian slave living apart from his
left within bounds to go their own way, whilst all the Guardians' master, who might well be comfortably off and run his own
activities, public and private, are focussed on a single end business without interference, indis t inguishable on the surface
( 5 I gb-c ; cf. 424a-42 5 c ) . In spite of Plato's emphasis on the from a free man. The crucial point was that he was not free to
city's unity there is no common culture. The values of ' the city' change his way oflife , or to take important decisions that would
are the values of the Guardians, and the prod ucers, whose work displease his m aster.
supports them , do not share them ; in fairness, they are not Plato does, then, insist on the most extreme inequality of
expected to make sacrifices for them or figh t for them. power that there could be. ( I n so doing, we should note, he has
.
Second l y, the divide is one of absolute power. Right at the entirely divorced power from wealth ; the powerless Productive
start the pto ducers were forbidden to follow their desires against Cla ss own all the property and have all the money ; cf. 4 1 6d-
the city's interests ( 3 74b) and since then there have been 4 1 7b, 4 1 9e-42oa . ) But it is wrong to conclude righ t away that
references to the rulers using force and lying to maintain he i s a monstrous totalitarian, or is j ustifying tyranny. His ideas
con trol . The producers can change jobs, but if they try to claim a re more interesting than that.
any kind of political power this is suppressed (434a-b) . Plato Firstly, the passage quoted shows that according to Plato
is at least honest here ; he says openly that the prod ucers wi ll even this extreme of being in another's power does not mean
 1 74 Plato's State Plato's State 1 7 5
that the people cannot be 'friends' . (The Greek word philoi does This point leads us to the second . Plato has been accused of
not imply, as 'friends' does, person al liking, only a certain p la n ning a 'caste state' and sanctifying privilege and
solidarity such as is normally fel t in a common enterprise . ) op pr ession . But he does not think that any actual people should
Why should the person powerles \ in Plato's state resent it ? He h av e the power that his Guardians have . Rather, the Guardians
or she is not capable of exercising political power and the rulers a re to have power because they are wise, and the prod ucers are
are ; fu rthermore, they are so constituted that, trained as they to l ack it because they are weak in reason . No-one is to have
are, they will never misuse their power. It is to the slaves' p o wer merely by virtue of birth , only because of their aptitude.
advantage to be ruled by someone who knows their own best So Plato's endorsement of the Guardians' absolute power is
interests, since they are incapable of recognizing what these are. condi tional on there being any people who are wise - and he
The obvious answer to this is that i t is not in human nature means ideally wise, the people who are both naturally fitted to
not to resent being in another's power, regardless of whether rule and are the prod ucts of a long ed ucation such as he has
this is recognized as being prudentially or morally the best thing. described . 'Those who are wise should have a bsol u te power over
A person who did not so resen t i t would be lacking in a sense of those who are not' does not imply that anyone should have
self-respect and self-worth, and however well-off they were we absolute power, unless they really are ideally wise people, given
would despise them, j ust as we despise U ncle Tom however that the world is as it is. So he is not advocating drastic in­
sincere his lack of resentment at his position . Plato, although equali ties ofpower in the real world, only saying that the ideally
writing in a society that was highly conscious of the importance just socie ty demands them .
to the i ndividual of self-assertion, still seems to think that those Plato has m uddied his own argument here, and called forth
who are dominated because they are l acking in intelligence will much unnecessary polemic, by his further claim that the
be in a good state if they are ' friends' with the people who quali ties on the basis of which power should be uneq ually
control the shape of their lives. He is not sensitive to the idea distributed are mostly inherited , and by h is elaboration of
that all people, whatever their intellectual repertoire, have a eugenic proposals . This is unfortunate i n m any ways. I t makes
capacity for self-respect and autonomy which is lost if they are the class system look like a simple-minded practical proposal,
so totally in someone else's power as to be their 'slave' . He rather than a claim about what the ideal society would require ;
does not see this loss on the part of the productive class as a and it leads people ( including Aristotle) to ask unanswerable
degradation of something that poten tially has worth - and to questions about how it is to work . The q uestions are unanswer­
that extent he is writing off, as of no value, the capacity of the able because there is not enough background to settle them,
members of the productive class to run their own l ives. He and because Plato is unsure what to ascribe to heredi ty and
writes it off because they might not do it very rationally ; they what to environment and training. Sometimes the system looks
might m ake a mess of it, and others would do i t for them in a meritocratic : children are to be brought up according to
more co-ordinated and effective way. H e sees nothing to be apti tude regardless of their class of origin ( 4 1 5b-c, 423c-d ) .
gained in their doing it for themselves. H e cannot see that But it is obvious that Plato believes that on the whole the classes
anything of worth is lost when the highest moral attainment of will ' breed true' . Unfortunately this is partly based on the false
the m aj ority of his citizens - the only virtue that is distinctively belief that acq uired characteristics can be inherited , since he
theirs - is deference to their betters . Plato h as been accused of thinks each generation 's upbringing will improve the natures
treating the producers as ' h uman cattle' , and this is not true ; of the next (424a) . Book 5 contains a down-to-earth ( not to say
but they are i n an importan t sense an oppressed class , because bru tal) eugenic programme ; but it is very odd . What the
their lives are so structured that, while they contain variety of br eeders' aim ough t to be, surely, is intelligence, since it is
activity and no local interference, they contain no basis for re ason that makes for the gulf between Guardians and others .
self-respect. B ut in fa c t Plato breeds fo r brawn, not brains ; it i s courage in
I 76 Plato's Stale Plato 's Sta te 1 77
battle, not proving theorems, that wins extra sex so that 'good a p p ly only to those recognizing that convention. Are there any
specimens' will improve the ' herd ' . The repellent stock­ ri gh ts which all people eq ually have ? More narrowly : in
breeding talk is irrelevan t to the basis of the class system . We do Pla to' s state, are there any rights which all the citizens equally
best to ignore the confused eugenics and regard the class h ave simply because they are ci tizens ? (This is more manage­
system as an abstract expression of the idea that social j ustice able than the former question , since Plato does not think that
req uires that the wise have absolute power over the less gifted . there are rights which all have merely by virtue of being
I t is not a blueprint for existing societies to use to j ustify human ; cf. 47oc-4 7 1 b . ) By now it is clear that the answer is :
existing inequalities, or bring about related inequalities by in a sense, yes, and i n a sense, no. All have equal rights in that
making the existing system more meritocratic. I t has there is no arbitrary discrimination , no unfairness due to lack
application only in the idealized condi tions of the perfectly j ust of impartiali ty. The Guardians are not exploiters ; the
society. prod ucers have a right to those benefits from the common
I t is easy to see why Plato thinks that such extreme workings of society which are needed for them to function best
inequalities of power are j ustified : unless the Guardians had in making their contribution to the common good . I f any class
control over the others, they could not run the city as they saw is exploited it is the G uardians, for it turns out that they would
best ; so reason would not rule in the city and it would not be find greatest fulfilment in doing things which they do not have
j ust. But even allowing for the sake of argument that this is a right to spend their time doing. I t should be stressed, because
true, can these inequalities allow the citizens to be happy ? And it is often implicitly denied, that all classes are protected in
do they not violate the rights of the m ajority ? freely having and doing what is necessary for them best to fill
Plato thinks that the inequalities are compatible with all their social role - and this by no means i m plies uniformity of
being 'friends' - so life is not to be soured by invidious privileges. individual needs and tastes .
But he gives the citizens' happiness little thought . If all goes But there is no substantive equality i n the Republic over and
well in the whole city, then 'we must leave it to nature to provide beyond i m partiality . Most of the citizens, because they are
each group with i ts share of happiness' ( 42 1 c) . He sees a taken to lack the rational capacity to organize their lives in their
problem only with the happiness of the rulers ; one to which we own and society's best i nterests, are put totally under the
shall return . He does not concentrate, as we would , on control of those who do have this capacity. The Guardians are
individual happiness ; he thinks instead of the h appiness not constrained by a constitution, bill of rights, or code of
appropriate to one as a member of a certain class. laws - the function of laws is to pu t the Guardians' plans into
But if some are the slaves of others do they not lack any rights ? practical operation, not to serve as checks on them. The only
Plato has no word corresponding to ' rights' ; so though we can constraint on the Guardians ' treatment of others is their
ask the q uestion we must do so carefully. disinterested moral character ; when the c haracter-training
Quite generally, if I have a right to something, then I am fails, the result is that the majority are enslaved in the worst
protected in having it, or doing it, by some moral or legal fashion (s47b-c ) , the process not being h indered by any
sanction ; no-one may i n terfere with my freedom to do or have institu tional check. We are likely to think that Plato is both too
it, even if such interference would promote some desirable end. pessimistic in thinking that human nature is so unequally
Some rights are uncontroversially created by legal or social gifted i n reason, and too optim istic in thinking that those who
convention ; interesting and disputed questions arise about are so gifted could be so disin terested as to rule well with no
rights when they are not backed u p by existing sanction but are external sanctions on their rule. But even if we agreed with him
held to belong to people whether this is recognized or not . Such on b oth of these points, we would still miss any sense that all are
rights are typically connected with e q uality : they belong equally eq ual in respect of human worth, whatever their intellectual
to all, unlike rights created by legal or social convention which or pra ctical attainment. Most of the citizens in Plato's state
I 78 Plato's State Plato's State I 79
have no rights if that is taken to mean that there are constraints of an ag e to be fathers and mothers as parents . Emotions now
on people's behaviour based on common humanity, not ti ed to individuals will be spread over society ; time and energy
contributions to the common good . Theories of eq uality and will not be uselessly spent in petty competition and duplicating
human rights are grounded on the claim that there are some e ffo rt (cf. 464c d ) ' Privatization' of feelings of pleasure and
- .

rights which all have equally, j ust because we are all equally p ai n breaks up the city's unity, whereas if all think of the same
human, and which are not gained or lost by virtue ofrationality th in gs as ' mine' all will be happy or sad together (462c,
or moral goodness or social contri bution. There are some things 463c-464a) . The best city is the one most closely resembling
that cannot be done to people, however wicked or useless, an i ndividual, which suffers when one of i ts members does, j ust
because humans are 'ends in themselves ' , in Kant's phrase, as th e whole person suffers pain when his or her finger h urts .
and not things to manipulate. Human beings have a special (46 2c-d) .
kind of value which all have equally j ust because i t does not These statements, especially the last, have led many to
vary wi th talent or excellence. Such ideas are no doubt vague, as cri be to Plato an 'organic theory of the state' : the idea that
but we h ave a clear enough notion of them and their import to the state is i tself a kind of organic entity, a super-individual,
worry at their total absence in Plato's state . Even if we believed, w hile individual people are merely i ts parts with no genuine
with Plato, that there is no need to worry about what the sep arate life of their own . This often goes with claims that
Guardians will do to the others, still i t is disturbing that i n the Plato's state foreshadows certain kinds of totalitarianism and
state there are no rights which antecedently limit what may be fascism which regard individuals as incomplete parts of a
done to people in the interests of producing either efficiency or higher unity, the state, in serving which they find their only true
morality. self-fulfilment.
But again we must make distinctions before rushing into
FRAT E R N I T Y AND U N ITY condemnation . Plato does undeniably subordinate individual
Plato offends us by the extreme divisions in the state ; ironically, interests to the common good ; but this is not an enti ty over and
he also offends us by h is insistence on the degree of unity the above the varying kinds of goodness of the varying kinds of
state must have . The difficulty here is resolved by the fact that, people. The state is nothing over and above the people making
especially in Book 5 , the extraordinary measures to create unity it up, or rather i t is the context i n which different kinds of
apply only to the Guardian class ; the state's unity depends on people can attain the excellence appropriate to them. Similarly
the unity of this class ( 465b, 545d-e) . the city's happiness is j ust the happiness of all the citizens.
Unity has already been stressed (pp. r n3-5) ; in Book 5 When Plato contrasts the h appiness of the whole city with
unity is s tressed, not as a contingent advantage, nor, explicitly, other happiness, the contrast is always the happiness of one
as constitutive of what a state is, but as a city's greatest good class in it, not the happiness of all the citizens (4 1 9e-42 1 c) .
(462a-b ) . In fact, it is so great a good that to ensure it the I ndeed, he thinks that if all the citizens were m ade happy in an
Guardians are denied nuclear fa milies and private lives. They inappropriate way, then so would the city be (42oe) . Later
live, eat, and train communally ; at i ntervals they m ate ( this ( s 1 9e-520a) i t is repeated that the happiness of the city ( as
seems the best word for it) and the children are brought up in opposed to that of one class) precisely consists in all the
communal creches and nurseries. These measures do not citizens' m utually sharing the benefits they can bring.
spring from modern preoccupations with the tensions of the But has not Plato's whole argument in the long parallel
nuclear family ( though cf. 465b-c ) . With optimism about the tr eatm ent of s tate and soul assumed that the city has its
possibilities of human nature so extreme as to be impressive , c ha racteristics and virtues in its own right - that ' the city is
Plato j ustifies them as increasing the whole state's unity. b rave' precisely does not reduce to ' there are brave citizens in
Guardians will regard all contemporaries as siblings, and all i t ' , but is a fact about the ciry and its internal structure ?
1 80 Plato's State Plato 's State 1 8 1
Two points are relevant here . Firstly, even if the state is a Pl ato does not sacrifice individuals to a reified State. But we
brave, wise, etc. entity, this does not make i t an organic entity. ha ve seen that he does not hesitate to sacrifice the needs and
City and person are structurally similar, which is why it is i nte res ts of actual people to those of the ideal i ndividuals of his
illuminating to compare the city to a person ( cf. 462 c-d ) . We t h e ory of human nature . He began by setting up the state as a
may fault the comparison and think that i t misleads Plato ( as me ch a nism for bringing it about that all the natural needs of
Aris totle does, at Politics I I , 1 -6 , in complaining that Plato hu man nature, in its different forms, would be harmoniously
aims at a degree of unity inappropriate for a s tate and proper fu l filled . But he ends u p imposing on people demands that
only to an individual ) . But a state that can be effectively mo st of them will see as externally sanctioned and not fulfilling
compared to a person is not being thought of as itself a kind of th eir nature as they see it. We have gon e from an attractive
person ; the comparison would fall through for lack of two picture of the co-operative fulfilment of joint needs to a much
different kinds of thing to compare . darker picture in which all are compelled to joih in fulfilling
Secondly, although Plato does insist that t h e state i s brave, needs which most of them do not recognize as their actual needs.
wise, etc. in its own righ t, and can legi timately be a subject for The villain here seems to be Plato's belief that only a few have
such predications, this commits him neither to the substantive t h e qualities necessary for excellence, so that rational
metaphysical claim that the state is an entity distinct from the attainment of excellence will i nvolve forcing mos t people to go
citizens making it up, nor to the substan tive political claim that along whether they like i t or not.
the city as a whole has interests that take precedence over the
WOME N ' S P LA C E
interests of the citizens . Modern political theories have debated
both these issues extensively, but Plato does not raise them, and The most shocking suggestion i n Book 5 t o Plato's
does not even seem aware of them. He clearly subordinates contemporaries ( and to Plato scholars until very recently) is
individual desires and interests to the common good , bu t the the proposal that women should be Guardians . This is not
common good is j ust the collective harmonization of the desires j ust a product of the 'community of wives and children' , which
and interests that individuals ought to have, those they would would have been entirely possible without m aking the women
have if they were 'doing their own' . There is nofurther common G uardians ; and i t is often thought to be a feminist proposal
good imposed on the citizens once all are doing their own. ahead of i ts time, an affirmation of women's righ ts, and a
And , while he raises questions about whether there are entities protest against their subordination, not to be taken up until
distinct from anything we can experience ( the Forms) , he does Mill's The Subjection ef Women . In fact it is not : if we look at the
not suggest anywhere that the city might be such an entity. proposals we see illustrations of the points discussed above, for
There is no room i n Plato's metaphysics for the city as an entity Pla to' s i nterest is neither in women's rights nor in their
distinct from all the citizens. preferences as they see them, but rather with production of the
We may well find a gap here. I f the state's moral q uali ties common good , and a state where all contri b u te the best they
belong to it in i ts own righ t, and are not red ucible to those of its can according to their aptitude. This, he thinks, will best fulfil
citizens, then there surely is a genuine problem about its women 's natures - but not their natures as they perceive them .
metaphysical status. Plato does not want the state to be a Form, Athenian women i n Plato's day led suppressed and powerless
that is, one of the en tities he does think are distinct from what we l iv es . They were not legal persons ; an heiress, for example,
experience. But if it is not a Form , and yet not j ust a collection p ass ed with the property to her nearest male relative, who was
of individuals (since i t has qualities in its own right) , what is the ex pect ed to marry her to preserve the family estate. Respectable
state ? We can easily see how the Republic suggests a theory of women were kept i n a separate part of the house, and never
the state as an entity distinct from the ci tizens, and perhaps an went out ( even shopping was done by men) except on festivals .
organic enti ty. All the same, it does not contain such a theory . They saw no men other than their nearest male relatives, and
 1 82 Plato's State Plato's Sta te 1 83
husbands ; they had virtually no interaction with the social, I t i s o bvious from the references to women in his writings that
political , and romantic life of men . Women were not even he has a low opinion of women as they are, and thinks them
men's primary sex-obj ects ; what we think of as a man's 'love­ c a pa ble neither of liberating themselves nor of having opinions
life ' and 'sex-life' centred on young boys, whose social and worth considering.
psychological life he could share, whereas he would share Nor is Plato concerned with women's rights ; as we have seen,
virtually no in terests with his wife . Seldom have the sexes been he lacks the notions of equal human worth and dignity that
so segregated in every aspect of life, or women relegated to such st a nd behind theories of human rights. H e sees women merely
a marginal and passive role. Plato's proposal that the sexes as a hu ge untapped pool of resources : here are half the citizens
share the same way of life is truly revolu tionary . I t is the point sitting at home wasting effort doing identical trivial jobs ! The
at which he goes furthest in claiming that ideal j ustice would state will benefit if women do public, not private jobs (if this
req uire society to be unimaginably different from the existing does not flout nature, as it does not) . Benefit to the state is the
society . Yet Plato's proposals are not aimed at relieving the sole, frequen tly repeated ground for the proposals (456c,
misery and humiliation of women forced to live such an 457 a,b,c, 452d-e) .
appalling life . The present set-up is said to be 'contrary to This is important, since it means that the proposals have
nature' not because i t is thought of as intolerably warping no thing to do with women's freedom to choose their own way
people's lives, but because women could, in Plato's view, of life . Plato would feel j ustified in com pelling them to serve
contribute to the common good as men do, even though as t h e state, rather than their families, even against their will ( the
things are they achieve little . Plato's whole argument depends issue does not arise in the Republic, but i t is admitted at Laws
on the claim that the nature of women does not demand that 78oa-c) . And if the state could for any reason no longer be
women have different occupations from men (453e-455a) . benefited by the con tribution of women , there would be no
Socrates reminds his hearers that they had accepted that each reason not to push them back into the home. (Again, this does
person should do the job they are fi tted for by nature. But the not arise in the Republic, but later, in the Laws, where Plato no
only natural differences between men and women are biological longer thinks that mryone can serve the common good dis­
(454d-e) : the male begets, the female gives birth . And this is interestedly, as is demanded of the Guardians, he shows no
not a relevant difference for determining occupation, any more compunction in submitting women to all but a few con­
than baldness is relevant to whether someone should become a temporary modes of repression ; see Laws 780-7 8 1 , 80 4-6,
cobbler. 8 1 3- 1 4. ) Moreover, we should notice that even in the Republic
This is an admirable argument as far as i t goes ; for Plato has the proposals are limited to Guardian women ; Plato sees no
removed any possibility of treating women as inferior as a class, need to improve the lives of the prod ucer-class women, who
and for disregarding the merits of an individual j ust because can make no distinctively useful contribution to the common
she is a wom an . But the argument suffers from being too good . And he sneers at the prospect of equality between the
generally stated . What does coun t as a relevant difference in sexes i n any actual society as corrupting the natural hierarchy
nature ? We are entitled to ask this, since so much hangs on it, (536b ) . He does not, then, think that it is wrong in itself for
and since biological differences have been honestly thought women to be subj ected to men, only that under ideal conditions
relevan t to aptitude for doing some jobs . But it is not clear what it co nstitutes an irrational waste of resources. No feminist could
Plato would answer ; he is relying on a very general and a priori be happy with an argu ment implying that there is nothing
theory of human nature rather than respecting actual facts wro ng with any actual society that oppresses women.
about people . He never points to the unhappiness caused by And the proposals have two further d efects .
the low status of women in his d ay ( he thinks of the effect of F irstly, Plato com bines his argument with a belief that even
freeing women from seclusion as liberating the man, 465b-c) . u nd er ideal conditions women are not as good as men. At
 1 84 Plato's State
455a-d he argues that there are no occupations for which on l
women are fitted, because men are better at them all, eve
·
�• Plato's State 1 85
low sta tus) . What Plato should be arguing for is what he once
re cogn iz es at 54oc : sex is irrelevant to the highest intellectual
women's traditional preserves like cooking. Men are bet te , a nd m oral studies, and women can take their rightful place as
equipped mentally and physically, and can beat women in a l E equ als with men in a society where virtue and all excellence is
fields ( 455a) . (He does allow that not all men are better than al� a tta in ed in challenging and co-operative study and there is no
women . ) This is an insulting way to claim that there are nq p re miu m on aggression and pushiness. I n most of Book 5 Plato
specifically female competences. And Plato never even argue! di sap poi ntingly forgets this, and spends his time claiming,
that there are no specifically male competences, though h� irre le va ntly and grotesquely, that women can engage in
claims this (455d ) . The argument is incomplete : it is left op en fi gh tin g and other 'macho' pursuits nearly as well as men.
for an opponent to claim that even if men and women c an
naturally do the same things, men are always better at the m ,: IS THE IDEAL ST ATE POSSIBLE ?

so that in a state with such a premium on excellence men wiU The discussion of the more outrageous proposals brings to the
still take all the front-rank positions, and women, while they surface, at 4 7 1 e, the issue that can no longer be postponed : can
will not always come bottom, will bring up the rear. This is no � the ideal state be realized in practice ? Opinions differ about
an argument that springs from serious consideration of ·
this perhaps more violently than about any other issue. The
women's talents and capacities. Republic was ' meant by its author not so much as a theoretical
I f we take into account the previous argument against treatise, but as a topical manifesto' - Popper, The Open Sociery
j udging all women inferior as a class j ust because they are and its Enemies, vol i, p . 1 5 3 . 'These are not so much the
women, then Plato might be envisaging a few exceptional machinations of a totalitarian monster as the dreams of an
females even if most women are inferior to men in intelligence, impractical theorist . ' - Guthrie, Histo ry ef Greek Philosophy,
character, and tastes ( and Plato believes this ; he accepts and. vol. iv, p . 469 .
even exaggerates offensive contemporary sexist stereotypes. Cf. Plato does waver on this issue ; but that is because the
469d , 43 r b-c, 563 b, 55 7 c ; Cratylus 392 b-d ; Timaeus 42 b-e, Republic does not have a single aim. It answers the question,
90-9 1 a . ) But in fact Plato does not stress this possibility . He. whether j ustice is worth my while ; but i t also pictures the ideally
does once later ( 54oc) include women amongs t the front rank j ust state . Doing the latter seems pointless if it is avowedly
of Guardians, and twice (454d, 455e) suggests that they could impracticable ; but an ideal of j ustice is none the worse for

�
be doctors. O therwise he envisages them only in traditiona� being non-realizable in practice if i ts purpose is to inspire the
nurturing roles (46ob) and as soldiers. By far the bulk of hi� individual person to be as j ust as he or she can be. At 4 72a-e,
references to women Guardians concern fighting and athlet · and right at the end of Book g , the end of the main argument,

�
training (45 2 a-b, 453a, 458d, 466c-d, 467a, 468d-e) . I n th" Socrates says that i t does not matter if the j ust society is an
he is following the initial metaphor of watchdogs that intr . ·· unattainable ideal, as long as it does serve as an ideal for the
duced the discussion (45 r d ) : female dogs live like the male · just person to try to realize in his or her life . None the less,
except for breaks for giving birth ; why is this not the case wit throughout Books 5 and 6 , he argues at length that the j ust
humans ? Aristotle obj ects in the Politics that the analogy is no. society could come about - cf. 502c : it is hard but not impossible .
apt because animals don ' t have to do housework ; but we nee Evidently he thinks that his political ideal is discredited,

�
not go that far to find something unsatisfactory with thei whatever its value fo r personal virtue, if i t can be shown to be
metaphor ( see pp. 80-2 ) . Plato is confused . As with the: hopelessly impracticable. Plato wants us to read the Republic
eugenic proposals, he argues vigorously, but for the wro �ot as an enjoyable fantasy, but as something to affect how we
thing. Physical training is not what distinguishes the Guardia •. hve, and for this he has to show that the j ust city, the society of
(in the Laws women train, but this m akes no impact on the· · good p eople, is not impossible in principle. He does not have to
1 86 Plato's State Plato's State 1 8 7
show more than that ; it is not, for example, necessary for him b y su pposing him to have an actual person like Alcibiades in
to have detailed advice as to how to go about it. m in d . as some romantically suppose) .
The task is all the same hard , for the j ust state is not brought The more Plato stresses ( as he does in Book 6 ) the philosopher
about by progressive legal reform, but only by a total change in ru ler' s unique blend of all possible intellectual and moral gifts,
people's hearts and minds, such as needs a long training to devel oped to their fullest pitch (484-48 7 ) , the less plausible i t is
produce. Because Plato downgrades so much the role of th at he or she could exist anywhere but as a result of upbringing
institutions in producing a j ust state, and emphasises exclusively in the ideal state. Plato can show only that it is possible in
the need for the rulers to have characters of a certain kind , he p ri nc iple, though practically unlikely, to break into the circle.
is in a bind . The j ust state can only be brought about by just The j ust state remains more effective as an ideal to s timulate
people, but j us t people are the products only of a j ust state, such virtue in individuals than as a blueprint for any real society.
as nowhere actually exists . ( This is brought out even more by We find here, unnoticed explicitly by Plato, a divergence
the insistence that the j ust ruler must be a philosopher, even between j ustice in the state and j ustice in the individual - a
though we have yet to see quite how unusual a philosopher respect in which the uniform account he wants breaks down.
would be. ) For while perfectly j ust people can exist only in the ideally j ust
One reasonable response to this would be gradualism : we, state, and the ideally j ust state can exist only when people are
being products of an imperfect s tate, cannot produce a perfectly perfectly j ust, the effect of this is not the same on social and
j ust state, but we can try to improve what we have and hand on individual justice. Plato seems on the whole reconciled to
our reforms to a progressively better educated generation. leaving the just state as an ideal, whereas he wants individuals
Plato rej ects this move entirely. The j ust man in a bad society, actually to improve by reading the Republic and using it as an
he thinks, can only save his own soul (496a-49 7a) ; he is not ideal to which to conform themselves. This suggests that while
called on to improve the lot of others . Plato never argues for for him justice in the state is an all-or-nothing affair, individual
this . Presumably he thinks that his reforms are so drastic that justice is a matter of degree : one can be more or less j ust, and can
tinkering will never produce them, and might produce more improve gradually. In allowing this Plato is making another
harm than good . He rests his hope on breaking into the circle : concession to common sense, which holds that j ustice, and
perhaps somewhere, some time, a j us t man might arise even in goodness, in people is a matter of degree. I t was left for the
an unj ust society ( 502a-c) and have the power to stop tinkering Stoics, bolder than Plato, to insist that j ustice in the person too
and start afresh ( 5ooe-50 1 c ) , even if this means the desperate is an all-or-nothing affair : either you are perfectly j ust or you
step of taking over only the under-tens, to bring them up under are not j ust at all .
an education that will make them j ust (54 i a) . It is sometimes One final important point. The knowledge required in the
thought that Plato had in mind, in his picture of the philosopher ruler, absence of which makes existing states go
miraculously virtuous tyrant, a particular ruler who decided badly, is practical knowledge . The ruler is like a skilled pilot
to become a philosopher, Dionysius I I of Syracuse ( at least in (488a-489a) or a doctor (489b-c ; cf. 382c-d ; 389b-d ) as
the very tainted tradi tion that comes to us in the pseudo­ op posed to current rulers who are like an animal-keeper who
Platonic Letters) . But this is highly unlikely, and would spoi l has learned only through experience how to cope with his
the point : Plato h as at most to show that the philosopher ruler animal's moods (493a-e ) . Now a pilot or doctor needs
is possible in principle, not that one will shortly come along. In intelligence and rationality, but theirs are practical skills
fact he does not think i t likely that any will come along in the developed in experience. The analogies suggest ( plausibly
foreseeable fu ture, since the truly j ust and intelligent person is enough ) that the rulers will be people with practical wisdom
the most likely to be corrupted by society (494a-495b ; again and experience. When we turn to Plato's account of what their
Plato is talking about what is likely, and nothing at all is gained knowledge is, we are in for a surprise.
1 88 Plato's State Plato's State 1 89
FURTHER READING
sh a ring virtually no act1v1t1es with men. See Dover, Greek
Popula r Morality in the time of Plato and Aristotle, and his excellent
Much has been written o n Plato's political theory, ofte n Greek Homosexuality, which gives a chilling picture of what we
intemperately . would call 'gender roles' in ancient Athens .
T h e earliest criticism is Aristotle, Politics I I , 1 -6 (often I ssues of eugenics and population policy are discussed in a
surprisingly crass and literal-minded , much below Aristotle's spe cial issue of Arethusa, vol . 8, no. 2 , Fall 1 9 75, including
best) . Mulh ern , ' Population and Plato's Republic' , and Fortenbaugh,
I n the twentieth century Plato has often been attacked as a ' Pl ato : Temperament and Eugenic Policy' .
precursor of totalitarianism . Cf. R ussell , ' Plato and Politics' ; Plato's readiness to sacrifice actual individuals' wants to their
Crossman, Plato Today ; and Popper, The Open Society and its i dea l , enlightened wants is illuminated by three excellent
Enemies, vol i . These 'liberal-democrats' are attacked, sometimes discussions of a related topic, Plato's conception of the
effectively, by R . Barrow in Plato, Utilitarianism and Education, individual as obj ect of certain attitudes oflove and attachment :
a vigorous but philosophically undisciplined defence of some of Vlastos, ' The I ndividual as Object of Love in Plato' , Platonic
Plato's ideas . Bambrough ( ed . ) , Plato, Popper and Politics is a Studies ; Kosman, ' Platonic Love' in Werkmeister ( ed . ) ,
collection of articles relevant to the Popper controversy . Facets of Plato's Philosophy, Phronesis Supplement 2 ; Nakhnikian,
A brief article by Versenyi, ' Plato and his Liberal 'Love in Human Reason' in Midwest Studies in Philosopky, vol.
Opponents ' , Philosophy 1 9 7 1 , distinguishes substantive issues lll.
of moral philosophy from disputes about cognitivism in ethics ;
the issues are confused i n much of the above literature.
The issue of Plato's alleged 'organic theory of the state' is
excellently discussed in J. Neu, ' Plato's Analogy of S tate and
I ndividual : The Republic and the Organic Theory of the State',
Philosophy 1 9 7 1 .
M uch the best d iscussion of Plato's theory ofj ustice ( to which
this chapter is very indebted ) is Vlastos, 'The Theory of Social
Justice in the Republic' , in H. North ( ed . ) , Interpretations of Plato,
and forthcoming as part of a larger work on Plato's theory of
j ustice.

Specific issues
Plato's proposals about women have prod uced m uch good
recent work, including Wender, ' Plato : M isogynist, Paedophile
and Feminist ' , Arethusa 1 9 7 3 ; Calvert, ' Plato on Women' ,
Phoenix 1 97 5 ; Okin, ' Philosopher Queens and Private Wives ' ,
Philosophy and Public Affairs 1 9 7 7 . My article, ' Plato's Republic
and Feminism ' , Philosophy 1 976, is helpfully criticized in Lesser,
' Plato's Feminism ' , Philosophy 1 9 78. My account of the position
of women in ancient Athens may be found controversial , but
there can be no doubt that, although working-class women
( perforce) led free lives, the ideal of female behaviour was a life