Chasing Plato?

RAFAEL MAJOR

Patrick
Keywords: Democratic Faith, Deneen, justice, Plato

Abstract: Patrick Deneen's Democratic Faith is a timely discussion of our need to question our faith in democracy. As friends of democracy, we must examine it closely if we are to defend it. While the author agrees with Deneen's general argument, he takes issue with Deneen's particular reading of Plato. By using Plato as a champion of noble democracy, Deneen overlooks the deeper Socratic investigation into the relationship between our faith in democracy and our hopes for justice. It is this more fundamental investigation, the author suggests, that may ultimately provide the deepest understanding of our democratic faith and our ability to defend it.

Deneen's Democratic Faith is a finely

crafted effort to be sensible in an academic world in which noting the possible inadequacies and shortcomings of democracy has become an almost impeachable offense. Rather than attempting to strengthen our faith in democracy with faith alone, Deneen-like others in the past-sees very clearly that the most excellent defense of democracy is best forged in the fire of reasonable scrutiny.' Deneen's Democratic Faith is a faith seeking understanding, or a Summa Demokratia that begins with the all-important and deceptively simple question of whether, besides democracy, any further doctrine is required. In contrast to those on the political right and left who are content to deploy hook, crook, carrot, and stick on democracy's behalf, Deneen begins like a Socratic phi-

losopher: "We do not betray democracy by questioning the faith: by making ourselves uneasy, we hold at bay the dangerous extremes of any faith toward unwarranted optimism, utopianism, and fanaticism, even as we do not lose our democratic hopes."'2 I liked this book immediately, particularly when I perceived the extreme importance of Plato to the argument as a whole. Imagine the possibilities of a legitimate study of democracy, printed by a prestigious publishing house, and written by an author with the probative integrity to see the extreme importance of including-rather than dismissing-Plato in our attempts to understand our hopes for democracy's success. If Deneen's Democratic Faith finds its intended audience, the practical consequence could manifest itself in graduate students' exposure to both friendly criticism of normally unquestioned faith in democracy and exposure to Plato from a viewpoint other than the usual critical perspective 3 of Karl Popper and Sheldon Wolin. Within the context of my admiration for Deneen's practical efforts, however, I do want to suggest some possible inadequacies or shortcomings with his Plato. Deneen knows the extreme danger to which his and all other interpretations of Plato are subject. As an earlier commentator stated: Plato himself, shortly before his death, had a dream of himself as a swan, darting from tree to tree and causing great trouble to the bird catchers (ornithotherais) who were unable to catch him. When Simmias the Socratic heard this dream, he explained that all men would endeavor to grasp Plato's meaning, none, however, would succeed, but each would interpret him according to his own views, whether in a theological or a physical or any other sense.4 Deneen is so aware of being a bird catcher himself that he goes beyond the usual procedures to establish his argument, but he falls short. His reading of Plato is subtle and exciting while remaining politely humble and tentative, but his

Rafael Major is a visiting assistantprofessor at Michigan State University, East Lansing. He has published articles on Shakespeare,Machiavelli,CambridgeSchool historiography, and Leo Strauss. Copyright 2008 HeldrefPublications 210

Fall 2007. Volume 36. Number 421 humility before his intended audience and fellow scholars overrides his humility before Plato's own words. Deneen's argument runs as follows: 1) Contrary to the institutionalized version of Plato's Republic, a close analysis of the Socratic image of the just city indicates the dialogue is really more about achieving justice in one's own soul than about practical justice in political life. The "city in speech" is really a city in "speech," the real city is the "city" in the soul . . . a pattern laid up in heaven for those individuals who are capable of it (196-201). 2) Socrates's primary concern in the Meno is the importance of education, and the crucial need to keep striving for the truth even when the truth seems impossible to attain at the outset (202-8). 3) If both of these things are true, then it becomes possible to see that the ultimate unstated Socratic teaching may be the best basis for the education of all democratic citizens. Imagine a kalli-demokratiacomposed of an infinite number of citizen gadflies. There would be no single ruling element because the knowledge of a modicum of uncertainty and their own need for training would guide each individual. All of us should be "courageous" and "eager" to pursue our education in virtue. This would allow every individual to recognize a higher good than his or her own immediate happiness and personal honor. The result would be a just society with free citizens unencumbered by the need of a noble lie or founding myth. The grounds for mutual self-rule would be understood by appeal to reason and commonweal (208-12). Does this sound like noble bird catching? Deneen knows it does and so humorously follows with the obvious question: if this kalli-demokratiais the ultimate secret of Platonic or Socratic teaching, why would Plato write or say so much about the kallipolis? Was he such a bad teacher? (212). Deneen answers his own question with a very optimistic reading of Plato's Apology: Socrates's declaration that he will continue to question every single Athenian citizen, regardless of his or her social status or education (everyone and anyone), proves that the Platonic philosopher is the finest exemplar of the highest democratic faith (213). A relatively new development in Plato scholarship makes Deneen's reading of the Republic and Meno possible. Until recently it was virtually impossible for any interpretation of Plato to see the light of day unless accompanied by a rigorous scholarly apparatus. Although the impetus for such scholarly evidence was not necessarily malicious, meeting these standards can have a stultifying effect on any interpretation of Plato-especially if one's reading of Plato depends on a radical doubt in the soundness of traditional interpretations. As Deneen makes evident (192-96), the current scholarly climate has undergone a fundamental shift, and now interpretations of Plato that cut across the grain of traditional scholarship stand out as potentially more thoughtful and truer to original authorial intentions 5 than even the most respected classical authorities. Deneen follows the lead of J. Peter Euben and others in his willing-

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ness to reinterpret Plato, but Deneen's freedom from the encrustation of scholarship-including distorting interpretations such as those of Karl Popper-can only be a first step. The second and much more difficult task is the need to reconcile Deneen's Socratic champion with the Socrates who inhabits Plato's text. For example, despite its significant virtues, Deneen's reading of the Republic depends on a consistent conflation of the "just soul" in the "self-ruled" soul. While this conflation does not seem unreasonable as a logical proposition, we must nevertheless ask whether Plato (or Plato's Socrates) makes the same identification. He does not, and this seems true whether one takes every word of Socrates literally or ironically. One unavoidable theme of the Republic is that not everyone can be self-ruled, but it is possible that every soul can be just in a well-governed city. Stretching this point even further, Socrates always seems to operate on the knowledge or assumption that every soul is attached to justice, regardless of the interlocutor's explicit claims. The Republic is the textbook case for this pervasive character of justice. If the human concern for justice is all-encompassing, however, then the urgency of understanding how to prevent individuals from straying is reduced, and it becomes more important to see how an unexamined attachment to justice can cause great mischief.6 Even the mighty Thrasymachus, who openly denies the claims of justice, exhibits a range of anger and embarrassment that belies his denial of justice's prick.7 Glaucon and Adeimantus are left to make Thrasymachus's full argument, but their sophisticated and cold rehearsal indicates a lack of attachment to the very logical argument they report.' Socrates's immediate response is telling: I listened and although I had always been full of wonder at the nature of Glaucon and Adeimantus, at this time I was particularly delighted and said, "That wasn't a bad beginning, you children of that man"
. ..

[quoting a love poem]...

"Sons of Ariston, divine offspring of a famous man. That, my friends, in my opinion is good. For something quite divine must certainly have happened to you, if you are remaining unpersuaded that injustice is better than justice when you are
able to speak that way on its behalf."9

If we understand Socrates literally, it means Glaucon and Adeimantus were never truly taken with Thracymachus's speech or others of the same ilk. Socrates is truly surprised at their continued faith in justice. Read ironically, it means that Socrates never thought that Glaucon and Adeimantus were interested in anything but a Socratic defense of what they already believed and earnestly hoped was true. This brief example does not settle any disagreement I have with Deneen's Plato, much less does it establish Plato's or Socrates's ultimate stance regarding democracy. It is important for the dialogue as a whole, however, because whatever Socrates has contributed at this point in the conversation is overtaken by a consideration of a "city in speech." Understanding the image of the philosophic city, containing both just citizens and selfruled human beings, depends on knowing why Socrates chose to describe it. In other words, it is a possibility that no amount of reflection on the city in speech-no matter how heavenly it is-will yield more than what we already hope to be true. Taken

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Persoectives on Political Science Persnectives on Political Science 3. 1 do not mean to imply that Deneen simply dismisses these antiPlato critics. See 193 with 339, n.L 4. Anonymous Prolegomena to Platonic Philosophy, cited in Deneen's article "Chasing Plato," Political Theory 28, no. 3 (2000): 421-39, here 422. For a lengthier discussion of this passage see Jacob Howland, "ReReading Plato: The Problem of Platonic Chronology," Phoenix 45, no. 3 (1991): 189-214. 5. For example, even a classicist as ensconced as Myles Burnyeat can now blithely characterize those such as John Burnet and F. M. Cornford as "scholarly opinion [that] was itself the codification, with properly footnoted sources, of a millennia-long tradition." Myles F. Burnyeat, "Other Lives," London Review of Books 29, no. 4 (2007): http://www.lrb .co.uk/v29/n04/burn02_.html (accessed December 5, 2007). Until recently, dismissal of such authorities would be unthinkable to most classicists (for example, see Burnyeat, "Sphinx without a Secret," a review of Studies in Platonic Political Philosophy by Leo Strauss, New York Review of Books, May 30, 1985, 30-36). 6. The great virtue of Deneen's Democratic Faith as a whole is his clearheaded discussion of the possible deleterious consequences of unexamined faith in democracy. It is unfortunate that he does not also point to the parallel (and ultimately more fundamental) unexamined faith and hope in justice that is the theme of Plato's Republic. See, for example, Devin Stauffer, Plato's Introduction to the Question of Justice (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2000). 7. Plato, The Republic, trans. Allan Bloom (New York: Basic Books, 1968), 336b ff. with 350d. 8. Ibid., 358e ff., 362e-367e. 9. Ibid., 367e5-368b. 10. Ibid., 592b.

by itself, the city in speech appears to have many valid (that is

arguable) interpretations. Luckily for us, however, Plato chose to present the pattern laid up in heaven in a way that makes it more than an inscrutable article of faith.'( In conclusion, I repeat both my sympathy with and admiration for the broader argument of Deneen's Democratic Faith. Unless we are courageous and eager in the examination of our most deeply held beliefs-including an unexamined faith in democracy-we may well deprive ourselves of the ability to defend our democracy from forces that would voluntarily or involuntarily transform us. NOTES
1. For recent examples see Allan Bloom's forward in Leo Strauss, In Liberalism Ancient and Modem, ed. Allan Bloom (New York: Comnell University Press, 1968), v-vi; and Confronting the Constitution, ed. Bloom (Washington, DC: American Enterprise Institute Press, 1992). More important, see Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America, trans. H. C. Mansfield (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000), e.g., 400; or better yet see the reasonable praise and criticism reported in Aristotle, The Politics, trans. C. Lord (Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1984), book 3. 2. Patrick J. Deneen, Democratic Faith (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2005), xvii. All parenthetical references in the article will be to this work.

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TITLE: Chasing Plato? SOURCE: Perspect Polit Sci 36 no4 Fall 2007 The magazine publisher is the copyright holder of this article and it is reproduced with permission. Further reproduction of this article in violation of the copyright is prohibited. To contact the publisher: http://www.heldref.org/