Special people of Political Science

Plato's Republic

Plato believe the most perfect items are the forms, which are the way in which the soul is organised into 3 parts. Reason is usually in control as one form dominates, this is where you get access to reality which is seen as the perfect state to be in. Spirit consists of courage, ferocity and aggression. This is seen as amoral as it wants honour but does not know how to find it. And the 3rd part of the form is Desire, which is a constant craving from one desire to another, this form is best when controlled by desire. The Spirit state is an aggressive state which is given to the military glory and power. Desire is seen as democracy that is dominated by money, whereas Reason is dominated by people who are guided by Reason (Philosophers).

Plato's cave analogy is one that is well know to Philosophers, as it explains that there is a better 'real' world out there that consists of the perfect things. It comes from a myth that prisoners were kept in a cave and that all they could see were shadows on the wall. A prisoner was allowed out of this cave one day, and was amazed at the beauty of the 'outside world', the sun, the birds and the trees. He reported this back to the other prisoners who didn't believe him as they believed their 'cave world' was the only one that existed. This is applicable to philosophers such as Plato, as they believe that our world is a bad copy of the perfect world that exists out there.

Locke 1689

Locke is often referred to as 'father of liberalism' - an influential enlightened thinker who was considered by Russel to be 'apostle' of the revolution of 1688. He was similar to Hobbes when talking about the 'social contract' which emerged according to Locke as a state of nature. However he believes that taxes could only be leveled if the people's consent was secure. This later became a key argument used by the American revolutionaries. President and congress in the USA, was independent from one another however the Supreme Courts are independent of both. The separate legislature and executives was crucial in Locke's eyes in order to prevent abuse of power, it was known if the executive falls to fulfill their duty they will be 'at war' with the people and must be consequently removed by force.

Locke was believed to be 'founder of empiricism' a belief that when you are born you are like a blank slate free of innate ideas or principles. All ideas are derived from 2 sources - sensation and perception of our own mind, or an 'internal sense'.  Hobbs and Locke disagree with a contract between the divine leader and the citizens. Locke opposed to Hobbs as he viewed the state of nature as nice and friendly where people could get on in society as laws are natural to us which is where he believed the idea of 'social contract' derives from. It was believed that everyone knew what was right and wrong as it came from God. However, he did agree that ownership of property could cause disputes between citizens. Therefore he agreed that a judge would be needed who could decide between disputes (preferably the Government or State). It was agreed by the citizens that the government would be the best option as they had limited power by law. It was insisted that taxes could only be taken with peoples (parliament) consent. Citizens were able to rebel if the Government didn't respect the law. Locke's influential ideas lead to the concept of government having to also follow the law which lead to everyone in society being more equal.

Locke has a theory which kind of contradicts itself as he believes in the 'divine right of kings' but not in hereditary succession. This however can be interpreted into today's society and has the most relevance for our democracy as although he believed you could only be ruled by one power, we today have both the monarchy and the government together. We can apply Locke's idea by using it to analyse the way in which we still have the government as the overruling power which leaves the monarchy today less associated with the decisions and laws that go on in the house of Commons and house of Lords. Therefore one ruler is still dominate in our society today which follows Locke's idea. He said that paternal power was only temporary and shouldn't be used as a basis of succession.

Machiavelli (1467-1527)

Machiavelli was believed to be the beginning of political science and is best know for his famous work ‘The Prince’ which was written in 1913 when he was in retirement (where he remained until his death) due to being arrested for obtaining a minor post in the Florentine government in 1498, where he was put on diplomatic missions until the restoration of the Medici in the year 1512. At the same time of writing ‘The Prince’ he also wrote ‘The Discourse’, which was more republican and liberal and was considered that you would have a one sided view of the doctrine if both books weren’t read.

His book ‘The Prince’ was designed to please the Medici, where at the time of it being written one had just become Pope. The book was the idea a guide on how to guide rulers, where it informs them of how principles are won, held and lost. This book was to become the key work of the Renaissance period as it brought a new attitude to humanism in which Machiavelli agreed with ‘man is the measure of all things’

The book discusses the idea of princes and how they should rule in order to become popular and succeed. He said that He also decided that the best were founders of religion, then the founders of monarchies or republics, then literary men. He believed religion should have prominent place in the state – as a social cement, and that a Prince should seem to be religious as he decided the nearer people are to the Church of Rome which was the head of their religion, the less religious they actually are. His criticisms of the Church on his day are that by its evil conduct that undermine religious belief. The power of the Pope’s he believed prevented the unification of Italy which he had a patriotic desire.

Machiavelli believed that ‘success’ means achievement of your purpose and weather you are a saint or a sinner, you will want to achieve as much in terms of politics and science in order to be seen as a success. To achieve a political end he advised that you ‘have power and do anything to hold onto it.’ He also mentioned that politicians would be better when they depend upon a virtuous population than when they depend upon one that is indifferent to moral considerations. What we learn from Machiavelli is that the world has become more like that of his ideas than it was before, and that the modern man who hopes to refute his philosophy must think more deeply than seemed necessary in the 19^th century.

Hobbes Leviathan (1588-1679)

Now we move onto Hobbes who was born in 1588 and attended oxford at the age of 15, where he learnt scholastic logic and the philosophy of Aristotle. The work of Galileo and Kepler profoundly influenced him that he learnt when he tutored Hardwick at the age of 22. His book Leviathan was published in 1651 however failed to please anyone. It’s rationalism offended most of the refugees (of who were English royalists that he associated with when he fled to France) and its attacks on the Catholic Church offended the French government (this made him flee to London)

He said that the doctrines of Leviathan life were nothing but a motion of limbs- therefore automata's have an artificial life. He called commonwealth a creation of art that was seen as an artificial man and sovereignty as the artificial soul. The Leviathan was made up of ruler of the church and the power was given to the military. The book concentrated mainly on the western political philosophy from the perspective of the social contract theory. This is the idea that the state of nature in society before the contract began was a state of no rules or laws where people’s dominant passions were aggressive. There was no respect for anyone or their property which caused society to be like a state of war. Every citizen lived in fear of one another as it was as though ‘every man was against every man’ This made life brutish, nasty and short for all that lived, even though all men were considered to be naturally equal dominating one another made living peacefully impossible. Therefore an authoritative figure needed to be introduced to end the universal war. The citizens allowed a sovereign to have power over everything, with the promise that they would protect people’s lives and property.  This was named ‘the social contract’ that would rule society, but it was agreed it would end if the sovereign ever failed to protect its people.  The Contract allowed the citizens a right to defend themselves in situations outside the contract such as personal feuds that didn’t involve property.

Hobbes decided that the English civil war occurred because power was divided between King, Lords and commons. Therefore he believed the powers were best with the sovereign as they were seen to have supreme unlimited power.