<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" standalone="yes"?><rss version="2.0" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/"><channel><title>The Republic on Greg Gauthier</title><link>https://gmgauthier.com/tags/the-republic/</link><image><url>https://gmgauthier.com/tags/the-republic/img/avatar.png</url><title>Greg Gauthier</title><link>https://gmgauthier.com/tags/the-republic/</link><width>32</width><height>32</height></image><image>https://gmgauthier.com/tags/the-republic/img/avatar.png</image><description>Recent content in The Republic on Greg Gauthier</description><generator>Hugo -- gohugo.io</generator><language>en-us</language><copyright>Copyright 2024. All rights reserved.</copyright><lastBuildDate>Thu, 05 Jul 2018 22:14:25 +0000</lastBuildDate><atom:link href="https://gmgauthier.com/tags/the-republic/index.xml" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml"/><item><title>Musings on the Problem of the State</title><link>https://gmgauthier.com/post/musings-on-the-problem-of-the-state/</link><pubDate>Thu, 05 Jul 2018 22:14:25 +0000</pubDate><category>Blog: [philosophy politics]</category><enclosure url="https://gmgauthier.us-east-1.linodeobjects.com/blog/img/plato-and-aristotle.jpg" type="image/jpg"/><description><![CDATA[ 
                    
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                    <p>Socrates, in <em>The Republic</em>, argues that a society must be ordered, and that the just and ordered polity requires a just and well ordered soul. But, not all souls will achieve the rational ideal, says the anarchist. He has a point. However, this leaves both the advocate of a state and the political anarchist with a problem. An anarchy of disordered souls is pure chaos. A state of disordered souls is a tyranny. Plato solved this dilemma simply by putting the most just and ordered souls “in charge” of the polity. But, of course, this is no solution at all for the voluntarist. He thinks there can be no such thing as a just society, over which a state rules, because rule is unjust by definition. Plato, of course, had much more to say about this. We’ll return to him shortly. In the meantime, a history lesson is necessary.</p>
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