Plato’s Republic in the People’s Republic of China

Abstract

Of all the ancient philosophical and political texts that characterize the Western classics, Plato’s Republic stands at the forefront. Its topic, broadly speaking, is the nature of the ideal city-state, whose outline emerges as the outcome of a dialogue between Socrates and several Athenian and non-Athenian interlocutors. This ideal city-state depends (for Socrates) on a correct understanding and application of justice, which will provide the basis for all the subsequent arguments. But before Socrates launches into the description of the ideal and just citystate, he takes a fateful step: he asserts that whatever justice is in the individual, so it is too in the city-state. In striking contrast to modern, Rawlsian definitions of justice, Socrates ties justice in the individual to the proper hierarchy of three elements Plato takes to constitute any human soul: the rational, spirited, and appetitive elements. These elements are generally in competition with each other for control of the soul; the rational and spirited elements may sometimes work together, but the appetitive is more or less unredeemable. Justice in the soul