Philosopher Kings in Plato’s Republic
The famous proposal that philosophers must become kings, or kings genuinely practise philosophy, is often treated as Plato’s prescription for an ideal state.
Socrates actually has to make philosophy attractive to interlocutors whose interests lie in glory, high office, and other trappings of a good reputation. Once again, he adapts his argument to the interests of his interlocutors. The philosopher’s relationship to the guardians can be understood by such interlocutors through the familiar relationship between an expert breeder and hunting dogs, while philosophy itself can be made appealing by associating it with kingship.
The following extract considers the philosopher-king in the context of Socrates’ dialectical engagement with his timocratic interlocutors.
Philosopher kings
The philosopher-king becomes acceptable to the timocrat once he is portrayed as having the same relation to the city’s guards as an expert dog breeder has with regard to hunting dogs. Just as the dog breeder must keep the good of the hunt in mind, so the philosopher-king must breed his guards with the good of the city in mind. By such a tortuous route, Socrates finally engages the timocrats in a discussion purportedly about philosophy and philosophical concerns. The timocrats are seduced by the notion that philosophy is the key to kingship or at least guardianship (this is especially true of the upward-looking timocrat, Glauco). Socrates, of course, is not seriously advocating philosophy as a means to kingship. It is purely another dialectical ploy designed to keep the attention of the timocrats long enough for their logos to win out over the thumos, and thereby replace their timocratic psychic constitution with an aristocratic one. Socrates, as usual, exploits what interests his current interlocutors, and kingship is at the extreme of any timocratic desire for either reputation or for high office.
Extract from Chapter 6, ‘The Digression’, in Ivor Ludlam (2014), Plato’s Republic as a Philosophical Drama on Doing Well, pp. 179–180.
For more details, click here
