This week, I want to share a few thoughts derived from Plato’s Statesman. [1] The Statesman is one of Plato’s later dialogues. Those who study the dialogue sometimes believe it reflects a decline in Plato’s dialogical style and intellectual capacity due to age. Nevertheless, the Statesman represents the fully-developed thought of Plato on matters of political philosophy. One explanation for the character of the Statesman is that it represents a mature Plato, disinclined to restate the utopian idealism of the Republic and perhaps disillusioned by the bitter experience of a long life.

Who is the Statesman?

The Greek title of the dialogue is, “Politikos,” which we might accurately translate “Politician,” except that the term as used by Plato is better translated, “Statesman,” for Plato does not mean by his analysis to talk about the technique of the politician but of the qualities of the experienced, practical and moral leader of a polity. Plato wants to talk about the ideal leader not about the run-of-the-mill politician.

In English, the term “politician” refers to anyone who is active in political life. In English, the term “politician” often has a derogatory connotation. A politician is frequently described as someone who is solely concerned with gaining public office without reference to political or moral principles. It can even mean one who in any kind of organization gains advancement in ways that are morally questionable.

The role of rhetoric in the character of the mere politician is dealt with by Plato:

STRANGER: The members of all these States, with the exception of the one which has knowledge, may be set aside as being not Statesmen but partisans, —upholders of the most monstrous idols, and themselves idols; and, being the greatest imitators and magicians, they are also the greatest of Sophists.

YOUNG SOCRATES: The name of Sophist after many windings in the argument appears to have been most justly fixed upon the politicians, as they are termed. [2]

The term “sophist” refers to a person who uses the art of rhetoric in a deceptive or misleading way without concern for the truth or accuracy of what is being said. Much of modern political thought is pure sophistry, made worse by the lack of concern for truth in the media and other institutions of society.

On the other hand, in English the term “statesman” refers to a politician who is also accomplished in matters of the state—someone with a particular kind of practical and theoretical wisdom, knowledge, ability and expertise in directing political affairs, and especially where important policy issues are concerned. For example, Abraham Lincoln was a politician with the ability to be elected President, but also demonstrated the capacities of a stateman in directing the United states though the American Civil War. A statesman is concerned with advancing the public good regardless of short-term political gain or loss. In the Statesman, Plato is concerned with the qualities that mark a true “statesman,” not a mere “politician.”

Qualities of the Statesman

As indicated above, for Plato, as for us, the defining quality of a statesman is practical wisdom in the achievement of the end of a political unit, an end which for Plato is assumed to be what we would call a well-constructed and led political unit that is able to achieve for its citizens the safety, affluence, and order that is the goal of a wise leader.

For Plato, the art of the statesman is the art of the architect and builder, that is the art of envisioning and constructing a good society. This metaphor of builder is not, however, the only metaphor Plato uses, for the statesman is also like a ship’s pilot guiding it safely through a long voyage, or like a physician that prescribes a cure for a sick patient, or like a weaver who weaves a piece of clothing. Each of these examples involve practical occupations requiring knowledge, skill and experience for their accomplishment. Thus, for Plato, the statesman is one who has the required understanding, technical ability to govern, and experience to wisely lead the state. [3]

Of the moral qualities of a statesman, Plato outlines two contrasting qualities that must find a balance in the life of a statesman: Courage and Temperance. Thus, Plato remarks:

In like manner, the royal science appears to me to be the mistress of all lawful educators and instructors, and having this queenly power, will not permit them to train men in what will produce characters unsuited to the political constitution which she desires to create, but only in what will produce such as are suitable. Those which have no share of manliness (active courage) and temperance (wise calmness in action), or any other virtuous inclination, and, from the necessity of an evil nature, are violently carried away to godlessness and insolence and injustice, she gets rid of by death and exile, and punishes them with the greatest of disgraces.[4]

The wise stateman has the capacity for courageous action and the ability to moderate action in order to achieve the harmonious goal of society. Going back to my earlier example of Lincoln, Carl Sandburg described Lincoln as a man of “steel and velvet,” a reference to his moral, intellectual, and political will and strength, as well as his compassion for those who he led.

The most famous metaphor used by Plato to describe the Greek statesmen is the metaphor of the “statesman as weaver.” This particular metaphor is developed by Plato as a way of showing the contrasting qualities of the statesman:

The rest of the citizens, out of whom, if they have education, something noble may be made, and who are capable of being united by the statesman, the kingly art blends and weaves together; taking on the one hand those whose natures tend rather to courage, which is the stronger element and may be regarded as the warp, and on the other hand those which incline to order and gentleness, and which are represented in the figure as spun thick and soft, after the manner of the woof—these, which are naturally opposed, she seeks to bind and weave together in the following manner:…” (emphasis added). [5]

According to Plato, this spinning and weaving is the activity of the divine muse in human nature guiding the statesman in his activity for the common good. [6]

The education of the stateman is fundamentally concerned with creating the proper character so that the state will be in good hands. Educators will seek to moderate in their pupils the active and the passive virtues:

I said that there would be no difficulty in creating them, if only both classes originally held the same opinion about the honorable and good;—indeed, in this single work, the whole process of royal weaving is comprised—never to allow temperate natures to be separated from the brave, but to weave them together, like the warp and the woof, by common sentiments and honors and reputation, and by the giving of pledges to one another; and out of them forming one smooth and even web, to entrust to them the offices of State. [7]

The Status of Law and the Statesman

There is no area of the Statesman in which the weaknesses of the Greek notion of the relationship between law and politics is more evident than in the critique that Plato makes of the relative importance of law and the political leader. It is this weakness that may underlie the end of the city/state and the inability of the unified Hellenist Empire to survive the death of Alexander. The Greek ideal of leaders and leadership undermined the role of law and of the maintenance of constitutional order in Greek thinking, a deficiency that was only remedied by the emergence of Roman leadership and Roman law.

Plato’s lack of sympathy for the rule of law is boldly stated in more than one place. For Example, in one interchange between the Stranger (who I take to be Plato) and Socrates it is plainly said:

“STRANGER: And any individual or any number of men, having fixed laws, in acting contrary to them with a view to something better, would only be acting, as far as they are able, like the true Statesman?

YOUNG SOCRATES: Certainly.” [8]

The ideal of the statesman who acts contrary to law is was a danger to Greek polity—and it is a danger in contemporary America.  It is no coincidence that the emergence of what is sometimes called the “Imperial Presidency” in the years after Roosevelt, and what is often called the “Activist” Supreme Court coordinates with the emergence of a willingness on the part of elites to ignore the plain wording of the Constitution and of the law to gain an advantage or address an issue. The willingness to be governed by the will of an elite as opposed to law was a threat to Athenian democracy and it is a danger to our own.

I have had other opportunities to critique the “great man” theory of history and the tendency of modern politics to revolve around a discussion of the qualities of a leader as opposed to policy matters. [9] Both the moral qualities of a leader and his or her commitment to the rule of law and the order of the political system are important. It is a mistake to think that a good leader can overcome systemic issues without great sacrifice and the constant danger of failure.

Types of Polity

Plato, like Aristotle, divides the forms of government into three types, with each type having a counter-type. The three main types are monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy, with each type having a degenerate from: tyranny, oligarchy (plutocracy), and mob rule. Plato, like Aristotle, is tempted to seek the best form of government as the mean (aristocracy):

The government of the few, which is intermediate between that of the one and many, is also intermediate in good and evil; but the government of the many is in every respect weak and unable to do either any great good or any great evil, when compared with the others, because the offices are too minutely subdivided and too many hold them. [10]

Plato in the Statesman is still too tied to the ideal of a “philosopher king” that we will see when we look at the Republic, some time from now. This leads him to prefer an aristocratic form of government, ignoring the practical wisdom that is often not found in those born to privilege.

Limits of the Platonic Vision

The vision of Plato and Aristotle, as previously noted, was deeply formed by the Greek City/State and by the Greek ideal of the perfect “warrior king” exemplified in the Iliad. By the time of Aristotle, that ideal had simply come to an end, for by that time the city/state was a political form passing from history with the emergence of the Macedonian and then Alexandrian empires. The limitations of the Greek city/state as envisioned by Plato and Aristotle are a particular challenge for one who, like the author, is inclined towards a communitarian, “bottom up” polity. The fate of the city/state is a warning that local governmental units, as important as they may be, are not the only important units.  The proper construction and leadership of a nation such as the United States of America, which has a world-wide economy and a web of political and economic alliances that stretch around the world, is also a matter of supreme importance.

Just as the polity of the Greek city/state had to bend before the power of Rome, Macedonia, and the example of the great Eastern empires of the Middle East, local and regional governments must be adjusted for the reality of the post-modern world and the existence of the modern state. In the attempt to emphasize the importance of the family, neighborhood, city, region, state and national government does not mean that larger political unites are not important nor does it mean that international arrangements are unimportant. The point is that their health cannot be divorced from the health of smaller units of society.

I am not going directly on to deal with the Republic at this moment in time, but will return to it later on in this series of blogs. The next blog will be on Cicero.

Copyright 2020, G, Christopher Scruggs, All Rights Reserved

[1] Plato, Statesman tr. Jowett (Apple Books. https://books.apple.com/us/book/statesman/id498684133, downloaded on September 16, 2020). All references to Statesman in this blog are to this edition.

[2] Plato. “Statesman” previously cited.

[3] This is a place where I think Plato can become confused, for he emphasizes the mental qualities of the statesman in the beginning of his dialogue, sometimes to the detriment of a focus on practical wisdom.

[4] Plato. “Statesman.” Apple Books. https://books.apple.com/us/book/statesman/id498684133 (downloaded September 16, 2020). I have added the parentheticals “courage” and “gentleness” which are in my mind better words to describe the qualities desired.

[5] Plato, “Statesman” Apple Books. Previously cited. I do not have the time to go into detail concerning this metaphor and how it is used by Plato, but it is one of the unique features of the dialogue and unique to the Greek weaving industry.

[6] “The meaning is, that the opinion about the honorable and the just and good and their opposites, which is true and confirmed by reason, is a divine principle, and when implanted in the soul, is implanted, as I maintain, in a nature of heavenly birth.” Plato, “Statesman” Apple Books. https://books.apple.com/us/book/statesman/id498684133

[7] Plato, “Statesman” Jowett tr. Apple Books. https://books.apple.com/us/book/statesman/id498684133 (downloaded September 17, 2020).

[8] Plato, “Stateman” previously cited.

[9] See, G. Christopher Scruggs, Centered Leading/Centered Living: The Way of Light and Love (The Tao Te Ching for Christ-Followers) rev. ed. (Cordova, TN: Booksurge, 2016), xxvi-xxvix, 114-119.

[10] Plato, “Statesman” previously cited.