Studies in Platonic Political Philosophy

Author: Leo Strauss
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226777006
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 269

Book Description
One of the outstanding thinkers of our time offers in this book his final words to posterity. Studies in Platonic Political Philosophy was well underway at the time of Leo Strauss's death in 1973. Having chosen the title for the book, he selected the most important writings of his later years and arranged them to clarify the issues in political philosophy that occupied his attention throughout his life. As his choice of title indicates, the heart of Strauss's work is Platonism—a Platonism that is altogether unorthodox and highly controversial. These essays consider, among others, Heidegger, Husserl, Nietzsche, Marx, Moses Maimonides, Machiavelli, and of course Plato himself to test the Platonic understanding of the conflict between philosophy and political society. Strauss argues that an awesome spritual impoverishment has engulfed modernity because of our dimming awareness of that conflict. Thomas Pangle's Introduction places the work within the context of the entire Straussian corpus and focuses especially on Strauss's late Socratic writings as a key to his mature thought. For those already familiar with Strauss, Pangle's essay will provoke thought and debate; for beginning readers of Strauss, it provides a fine introduction. A complete bibliography of Strauss's writings if included.

Political Platonism

Author: Alexander Dugin
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781912079902
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 128

Book Description
Through a series of essays, course transcripts, and a single long interview, Dugin exposes the profoundest roots of the Western philosophical tradition, offering his view of why it has reached its final terminus, and his indication of where a new beginning must be sought.

Platonopolis

Author: Dominic J. O'Meara
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199257582
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 262

Book Description
Conventional wisdom suggests that the Platonist philosophers of Late Antiquity, from Plotinus (third century) to the sixth-century schools in Athens and Alexandria, neglected the political dimension of their Platonic heritage in their concentration on an otherworldly life. Dominic O'Meara presents a revelatory reappraisal of these thinkers, arguing that their otherworldliness involved rather than excluded political ideas, and he proposes for the first time a reconstruction of theirpolitical philosophy, their conception of the function, structure, and contents of political science, and its relation to political virtue and to the divinization of soul and state.Among the topics discussed by O'Meara are: philosopher-kings and queens; political goals and levels of reform: law, constitutions, justice, and penology; the political function of religion; and the limits of political science and action. He also explores various reactions to these political ideas in the works of Christian and Islamic writers, in particular Eusebius, Augustine, Pseudo-Dionysius, and al-Farabi.Filling a major gap in our understanding, Platonopolis will be of substantial interest to scholars and students of ancient philosophy, classicists, and historians of political thought.

The Platonic Political Art

Author: John R. Wallach
Publisher: Penn State Press
ISBN: 0271031026
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 482

Book Description
In this first comprehensive treatment of Plato’s political thought in a long time, John Wallach offers a "critical historicist" interpretation of Plato. Wallach shows how Plato’s theory, while a radical critique of the conventional ethical and political practice of his own era, can be seen as having the potential for contributing to democratic discourse about ethics and politics today. The author argues that Plato articulates and "solves" his Socratic Problem in his various dialogues in different but potentially complementary ways. The book effectively extracts Plato from the straightjacket of Platonism and from the interpretive perspectives of the past fifty years—principally those of Karl Popper, Leo Strauss, Hannah Arendt, M. I. Finley, Jacques Derrida, and Gregory Vlastos. The author’s distinctive approach for understanding Plato—and, he argues, for the history of political theory in general—can inform contemporary theorizing about democracy, opening pathways for criticizing democracy on behalf of virtue, justice, and democracy itself.

Eighteenth-Century Dissent and Cambridge Platonism

Author: Louise Hickman
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317228510
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 323

Book Description
Eighteenth-Century Dissent and Cambridge Platonism identifies an ethically and politically engaged philosophy of religion in eighteenth century Rational Dissent, particularly in the work of Richard Price (1723-1791), and in the radical thought of Mary Wollstonecraft. It traces their ethico-political account of reason, natural theology and human freedom back to seventeenth century Cambridge Platonism and thereby shows how popular histories of the philosophy of religion in modernity have been over-determined both by analytic philosophy of religion and by its critics. The eighteenth century has typically been portrayed as an age of reason, defined as a project of rationalism, liberalism and increasing secularisation, leading inevitably to nihilism and the collapse of modernity. Within this narrative, the Rational Dissenters have been accused of being the culmination of eighteenth-century rationalism in Britain, epitomising the philosophy of modernity. This book challenges this reading of history by highlighting the importance of teleology, deiformity, the immutability of goodness and the divinity of reason within the tradition of Rational Dissent, and it demonstrates that the philosophy and ethics of both Price and Wollstonecraft are profoundly theological. Price’s philosophy of political liberty, and Wollstonecraft’s feminism, both grounded in a Platonic conception of freedom, are perfectionist and radical rather than liberal. This has important implications for understanding the political nature of eighteenth-century philosophical theology: these thinkers represent not so much a shaking off of religion by secular rationality but a challenge to religious and political hegemony. By distinguishing Price and Wollstonecraft from other forms of rationalism including deism and Socinianism, this book takes issue with the popular division of eighteenth-century philosophy into rationalistic and empirical strands and, through considering the legacy of Cambridge Platonism, draws attention to an alternative philosophy of religion that lies between both empiricism and discursive inference.

Socratic and Platonic Political Philosophy

Author: Christopher P. Long
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107040353
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 229

Book Description
Socratic and Platonic Political Philosophy invites readers to participate in the practices of Socratic and Platonic politics.

Platonism

Author: Herbert Hrachovec
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
ISBN: 3111386295
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 516

Book Description
The clean separation between manifold phenomena and a systematic order that prevails in them is a basic feature of the rational-scientific orientation system. The first authoritative formulation of this premise is found in Plato. His discussion of constitutive forms of world events has initiated a broad development in the history of philosophy, which is also effective today in the preference for reason-guided analyses of often confusing circumstances. The authors of this volume address the lasting relevance of this idea within two interrelated areas of research, namely Plato scholarship and contemporary Platonism. Of particular interest is the relationship between Plato and Wittgenstein. Following this overall idea, this volume is divided into three sections: Plato scholarship, Platonism, and Plato and Wittgenstein. As the contributions show, Platonism proves to be not only a purely historical-exegetical field of research but rather a fruitful stimulus for contemporary discussions on logical, linguistic, and social topics.

Rousseau's Platonic Enlightenment

Author: David Lay Williams
Publisher: Penn State Press
ISBN: 9780271045511
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 356

Book Description
"In this sterling, deeply researched study, Williams explores how thinkers ranging from Hobbes to d'Holbach highlight various sets of ideas that Rousseau combated in developing his philosophical teaching. The account of Rousseau's predecessors who might be called Platonists is especially interesting, as is the account of those who qualify as materialists. Moreover, Williams provides a good overview of Rousseau's teaching, demonstrates a commendable grasp of the relevant secondary literature, and argues ably for the superiority of his own interpretations ... Clearly written and superbly organized, this book contributes much to Rousseau studies. An indispensable book for Rousseau scholars, this volume also will appeal to general readers and students at all levels."--C.E. Butterworth, CHOICE.

Kant's Platonic Revolution in Moral and Political Philosophy

Author: T. K. Seung
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 296

Book Description
For more than two centuries, Kant scholars have operated on the unquestioned premise that Kant's three Critiques offered a systematic exposition of his philosophy. But this unitary view, argues T. K. Seung, is gravely mistaken. In Kant's Platonic Revolution in Moral and Political Philosophy, Seung shows how each of the three works represents a major reformulation of the initial commitment to Platonism which Kant had made in his Inaugural Dissertation of 1770. For Kant, Platonic Forms are the basic ideas for constructing moral, aesthetic, and political norms and standards. This is the essence of Kant's Platonic constructivism, which Seung explicates with comparisons to other programs of construction, such as Hobbesian conventionalism and Hegelian historicism. Finally, he clarifies the link between constructivism and deconstruction.

Platonism

Author: Mauro Bonazzi
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1009253409
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 251

Book Description
The task of philosophy, the French philosopher Gilles Deleuze once wrote, is to 'overturn Platonism'. This might be true, if only we could define what Platonism is. In this clear and accessible book Mauro Bonazzi provides the first comprehensive introduction to ancient Platonism. He begins his story with Plato's Academy before moving on to the sceptical turn which occurred during the Hellenistic centuries. He then explains the theologically oriented interpretation of Plato typical of Middle Platonists and concludes with the metaphysical systems of the Neoplatonists. Platonism has often been regarded as no more than a trivial repetition of the same doctrines. This book, however, demonstrates how the attempts of Platonists over the centuries to engage with Plato's thought constitute one of the most philosophically challenging moments in the history of ancient philosophy.