Greek Philosopher Plato
Plato is one of the popular and widely read philosophers in the world. His thoughts have greatly influenced the western political mindset and discourse. Born in Athens around 427 BCE Plato accomplished a lot by writing a different treatise that shaped the world’s political thoughts before his death around 347 BCE.
He was a student to a great philosopher, Socrates and a teacher to a famous philosopher scholar Aristotle, who also taught Alexander the great. He was greatly influenced by his teacher, Socrates who always remains the profound character in his works. In other words, his thoughts are greatly influenced by Socrates while on the other hand, he also influences Aristotle.
His thoughts are significant historically and intellectually in the western political and social infrastructure.One of the popular works of Plato is the Republic. It is popularly known as the Socratic dialogue, which Plato sought to address the issues of justice. Plato was more infuriated with the way Socrates was treated before the authority.
On the same pedestal, Plato is concerned about justice and the city-state. His main investigation is whether the just man is happier than the unjust in Athens. In his argument, Plato proposes a state of the philosopher kings. He asks the society to promote education among young boys and girls so that leading them becomes easier. In other words, Plato only trusts educated leaders.
He is very uncomfortable with uneducated leaders since they would not be in a position to handle the intricacies of leadership. He identifies different sets of “constitutions that promote injustice in the society, which include democracy, oligarchy, timocracy, and tyranny.” Among the four, Socrates through Plato argues that tyranny is the worst regime.
Tyrants are harsher and know no language of diplomacy, but rely on wrath to instill fear in order to rule. His classical thoughts until influences political decisions in the contemporary society, not only in the west but in other parts of the world as well.From the Republic, readers are exposed to some of the social injustices fuelled by poor leadership. Plato makes it apparent that justice has been frequently used as an instrument to lure people to follow certain leaders while on the other hand, they are duped and manipulated.
He relates justice as it is communicated to the person led to a bull that is well fed, not for its welfare, but for the benefit of the owner. It is blinded to believe that the good care is meant to take care of its welfare. However, the truth of the matter is that the owner gives it good feeding in readiness for slaughter. The owner wants it to be fat so that it can produce a greater amount of meat.
From this standpoint, it means that the feeding is nothing meant to benefit the bull, but for the grander interest of the owner who intends to slaughter it. The same way, when people believe in justice as pronounced by their leaders, they sell themselves cheap for manipulation and tyranny. Plato is against justice that accused and executed Socrates falsely. Through his thoughts, the world has been on the lookout to shun bad leadership and dictators of history.
Therefore, his arguments have been promoted in different spheres of life to promote virtue and ethics among the people living together.
