By KATHLEEN CASSEDY
"The ideas of Plato's Republic are still with us, posing disturbing questions about democratic freedom," said classical scholar Martha Craven Nussbaum on March 6. Dr. Nussbaum presented "Plato's Republic: The Good Society and the Deformation of Desire" to an audience of several hundred in the Madison Building, followed by a lively discussion.
The Bradley Foundation lecture series, sponsored by the Rare Book and Special Collections Division, is funded by the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation to examine works that have been important to Western citizenship, statecraft and public policy.
Since 1995 Dr. Nussbaum has concurrently held appointments at the University of Chicago in the law and divinity schools. She has also taught at Brown and Harvard and serves on the board of the American Council of Learned Societies. She is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Dr. Nussbaum earned both her M.A. and Ph.D. in classical philology from Harvard University, and she has published extensively on Greek philosophy. Among her more recent works are The Therapy of Desire: Theory and Practice in Hellenistic Ethics (1994), The Fragility of Goodness: Luck and Ethics in Greek Tragedy and Philosophy (1986) and Citizens of the World: A Classical Defense in Radical Reform in Higher Education (forthcoming).
Even though Plato's Republic was written more than two millennia ago -- between 380 and 370 B.C. -- its influence is still relevant, Dr. Nussbaum said. She cited diverse current situations in which Platonic theories are evident, from illiberal regimes such as Singapore's to U.S. law.
Although former Singapore Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew does not call himself a Platonist, says Dr. Nussbaum, his programs -- which set controls on public and private behavior, promote high birthrates in the "alleged" intelligent classes and provide stratified education arranged by "wise rulers" - - are remarkably close to Plato's ideals as set out in The Republic.
"Lee holds that there is an þessential conflict' between political liberties and human well being. That political institutions must take responsibility for ordering and constraining choice, and this requires us not to care a great deal about liberty," Dr. Nussbaum explained. This view is often espoused during debates today on human rights and moral order, she added.
Dr. Nussbaum cited a 1983 Minneapolis ordinance allowing women who believe they have been harmed as a result of violent pornography to sue its purveyors or producers. The argument supporting this ruling follows Plato's belief that governments should respond to moral problems and constrain choices. The opposition claims "that any criticism of existing preferences and desires as deformed or diseased is intrinsically undemocratic," she said.
According to Dr. Nussbaum, Plato's Republic, the first great work of political philosophy in the Western philosophical tradition, provides a profound analysis of humans and their desires. It is also "a deadly assault" on democracy, since it denounces free speech, majority rule and other freedoms that democracies hold dear.
Because Plato believed that majority rule imposes its unordered whims by force, social norms should instead be shaped by "true wisdom." Justice, in Plato's view, "involves the correct ordering of the soul and its desires," Dr. Nussbaum said. To achieve this correct ordering one needs to live in a correct or ideal society, founded on five elements:
(1) Labor is divided by matching personality types and intelligence to occupations.
(2) The nuclear family is eliminated so that children will not love one group more than another, and the state also fulfills a parental role.
(3) Education is controlled and censored so that impressionable minds will not develop "deformed" desires.
(4) Women will receive an education equal to men and also be given other equal opportunities and roles in society.
(5) Because the state governs by reason rather than desire, it will be ruled by philosophers who have been carefully groomed and educated for this service.
Plato's conclusions are based on his diagnosis of human nature and human deficiency, Dr. Nussbaum said. "If we find his diagnosis compelling, as I believe we should, we are under heavy pressure to show to ourselves and to others why the repellent conclusions should not be drawn. That is why Plato has been over the centuries the best friend democracy could have: for he challenged it to know, and to justify, itself."
While most democratic societies do not adopt all of Plato's proposals for an ideal society, they do find many of his ideas and arguments valuable and relevant. Plato's Republic is important because it explains how "desire is in part a social artifact, that people's anger and grief and passion are shaped by the institutions and social norms in which they dwell," she said.
According to Dr. Nussbaum, in the United States Platonic precepts exist in judiciary and administrative governing bodies when they play the role of "enlightened philosopher."
Yet U.S. democracy greatly differs from Plato's view in the importance attached by Americans to personal liberty.
"It is no chance matter we are discussing, but how one should live," concluded Dr. Nussbaum, quoting Socrates from The Republic.
Kathleen Cassedy is a free-lance writer/editor working in the Public Affairs Office.