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2023 | Buch

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Regime and Education

A Study in the History of Political Philosophy

herausgegeben von: Ian Dagg

Verlag: Springer International Publishing

Buchreihe : Recovering Political Philosophy

Enthalten in: Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik" , Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

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This volume is an inquiry into the history of political philosophy by way of the general theme of education. Each contributor addresses the relationship between a particular political philosopher’s broad teaching on the best political order and that political philosopher’s teaching about education. The unifying contention of the work is that each political philosopher considered in the volume promotes a certain kind of political regime and therefore a particular mode of education essential to that regime. Each chapter, written by a separate contributor, is distinguished from the others primarily by the political philosopher being considered. The book has a chapter dedicated to each of the following political philosophers: Plato, Xenophon, Aristotle, Machiavelli, Bacon, Locke, Rousseau, Tocqueville, and Nietzsche. The volume provides a survey of educational models by some of the greatest thinkers of the West, while continually demonstrating that the two themes of politics and education are inseparable.

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Frontmatter

Introduction

Abstract

This chapter provides an introduction to the work as a whole. The first part begins by comparing the investigation of the endless variety of peoples with the stable number of regime types as discussed in Nietzsche’s Thus Spoke Zarathustra. It then briefly addresses the question of why regime analysis, so prominent among the Greeks, has fallen into disrepute today. The first part ends by suggesting that there is something wrong, not only with our understanding of political fundamentals, but also with our understanding of civic education. As a whole, the book aims to provide an inquiry into the history of political philosophy by way of the theme of education. The second part of the chapter introduces the reader to the structure of the work. Each paragraph is dedicated to a single chapter, each of which is dedicated to the relationship between a particular political philosopher’s broad teaching on the best political order and that political philosopher’s teaching on education.

Ian Dagg

The Limits of Regimes: Education and Character Formation in Xenophon’s Political Thought

Abstract

This paper will examine Xenophon’s account of civic or republican education, the education necessary for producing good citizens, as he represents it in the Education of Cyrus. Xenophon’s goal in recounting this education is twofold. First, Xenophon shows the necessary limits regimes face in trying to shape the lives, habits, virtues, and beliefs of their citizens. For in this fictional Persian Republic, a kind of embellished Sparta, the tension between human nature and the demands of citizenship comes to light. Xenophon shows readers that the hold regimes have over their citizens is not as strong as other classical authors might lead us to believe. In addition, by pointing to the problematic character of civic education in even the best regime, Xenophon signals what a true education in virtue would entail.

Gregory A. McBrayer

The Beautiful and the False: An Introduction to Plato’s Hippias

Abstract

Plato’s Hippias Major and Hippias Minor feature conversations that are at worst unserious and at best merely preparatory. Why should we take these dialogues seriously, or their title character? To answer these questions, the author proposes viewing the two dialogues in light of Republic 2–3, whose subject matter—education in the noble or beautiful and the noble lie—appears to inform the subjects of these two dialogues—the noble and lying, respectively. Viewed in this light, Hippias emerges as the type of poet considered in Republic 2–3, namely, the poet who unreflectively imitates his own creations. What emerges is an analysis of the philosophic limits of the city’s formative education and, more subtly, the relation of Plato’s own literary exemplar, Socrates, to Homer’s Achilles and Odysseus.

Alex Priou

The Connection Between Moral Virtue and Politics in Aristotle’s Ethics

Abstract

Aristotle claims that the study of ethics, or practical virtue, is a political study. Given his general tendency to separate moral virtue from politics in the Nicomachean Ethics, however, it is a puzzle why he so emphatically subordinates ethics to politics. This paper seeks to solve this puzzle by closely following Aristotle’s account of what moral virtue is over the course of the Ethics. It argues that despite moral virtue’s apparent independence from politics, it is nevertheless rooted in opinions formed by the effect of political authority. The role of the political community in shaping our moral outlook is the deepest reason for Aristotle’s claim that the city is “architectonic” and that the study of virtue is political in character.

John Hungerford

Machiavelli’s Revolutionary Classical Education

Abstract

Machiavelli did not treat education in terms of the formation of the soul, or as a theme distinct from politics and religion. Consequently, there are few sustained academic accounts of his teaching on the subject. This essay attempts to fill this gap by elucidating Machiavelli’s various references to education in terms of his understanding of regime. In this way, it seeks to connect Machiavelli as a proponent of a new movement in education with the same author as inheritor of an intellectual tradition. Through examination of passages in Discourses on Livy and Florentine Histories, the essay argues that Machiavelli shows how a traditional education in the classics can be revolutionary when combined with a focus on the circumstances of the present, and that he in fact aims to provide such an education in his writing.

John Peterson

Bacon’s Transformation of Philosophy: An Introduction to the Education of Bacon

Abstract

This essay discusses Bacon’s attempt to transform the way we think about philosophy and education in The Advancement of Learning. Bacon aimed to establish modern natural science by neutralizing Aristotelian metaphysical inquiry and taming Christianity in a way that appears consistent with Scholasticism. He does his best to blur the distinction between creation out of nothing and an eternal whole. Furthermore, he transforms Aristotelian notions of causality. These transformations lead to a rehabilitation of rhetoric in the face of Platonic critiques of rhetoric. Bacon defends a Machiavellian appetitive politics of acquisition supported by productive natural science. His transformations are motivated by the thought that Christianity represents a political and spiritual tyranny. The new natural science, once established, will undercut Christianity in the name of making the earth a paradise of bodily pleasure and health through the use of advanced technology.

Ian Dagg

Liberalism’s Approximation to the Rule of Wisdom

Abstract

This chapter examines the Lockean approach to political rule, where political rule is understood as necessarily absolute. In the Second Treatise, Locke argues against absolute rule in one sense while admitting its necessity in another more profound sense. The necessity of absolute rule in this latter sense, where there is no possible impartial judge between the ruler and ruled, makes virtue among the rulers and ruled more urgent or more obviously necessary than it would be if a fool-proof solution to political strife and injustice were possible. Locke establishes the kind of virtue he expects to rule in the Lockean commonwealth in his Second Treatise. In Thoughts Concerning Education he sets out his practical advice for the education of young gentlemen, such that they might come to possess the virtues necessary to rule in the Lockean commonwealth of the Second Treatise.

Cole Simmons

Education and Regime in Rousseau’s Social Contract

Abstract

This essay examines the civic education provided by Rousseau in The Social Contract. After rejecting a variety of claims to legitimacy, Rousseau concludes that the foundational condition of legitimacy is the thoroughgoing suppression of individuality. While Rousseau claims that all regimes justify themselves on grounds of the divine origin of law, he deflates this justification for the purpose of establishing his own natural religion. Rousseau also deflates the importance of the question of regime. By focusing on the amount of territory a political organization holds to determine what regime would be best for it, Rousseau suppresses the claims to justice implicitly or explicitly made by different types of regimes. Finally, he discusses a number of Roman institutions as a way of showing how his astonishing demands on the political order can be diluted within the realm of practical politics.

Ian Dagg

Tocqueville’s Defense of Aristocratic Literature

Abstract

Despite making clear in Democracy in America that the instruction of democracy is “the first duty imposed on those who direct society in our day,” Tocqueville says very little in his work about education in the ordinary sense of the word. This essay seeks to make up for this reticence by providing a coherent account of Tocqueville’s understanding of education and its function in democratic times. To that end, I look at Tocqueville’s account of (1) the study of Greek and Latin literature, (2) the ideals of literature in democratic times, (3) Plato’s teaching on the human soul, (4) Plato’s teaching on politics as he presents it in the Laws, and (4) the moral virtues depicted in aristocratic literature. I aim to show why Tocqueville regarded aristocratic literature as a critical source of knowledge for statesmen and men of letters seeking to contribute to the instruction of which he speaks.

Antonio Sosa

Nietzsche and Political Education

Abstract

Understanding Nietzsche’s relation to political education requires understanding Nietzsche’s relation to politics. For Nietzsche politics is a lesser thing than education, understood as culture. As a lesser thing, politics is to be subordinated to culture is properly to be regarded as one of culture’s instruments. The aims of culture extend beyond the borders and lifespan of particular polities. Culture aims at the production of human greatness as embodied in particular human beings. But the aims of culture extend beyond any particular individuals understood as culminations of completions. Culture is open ended in its aims and insatiable in its desires. This is because culture is an expression of the fundamental desires of life, and life itself is insatiable.

Michael W. Grenke

Backmatter

Titel: Regime and Education
herausgegeben von: Ian Dagg
Verlag: Springer International Publishing
Electronic ISBN: 978-3-031-37383-1
Print ISBN: 978-3-031-37382-4
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-37383-1