It is part of the nature of man to desire to live with other people. Humans desire to live in community together. A community is when two or more people gather with a common cause or purpose. When there is a group, there is a diversity of opinions and ideas. Everyone has his or her own idea of how something should be accomplished. This is why groups need leaders.
Just like a boat needs to be steered, a group needs a leader with the wisdom to know the direction to take things. For Socrates, being a philosopher and a lover of truth is the highest role in life and is what is most needed in a leader. Socrates states that the leader of the city should be the philosopher king. The question is what would the philosopher king look like. What would he value?
The first thing to be understood is what the nature of the philosopher king might be. It is known that he needs to be a lover of truth; constantly asking questions and desiring to know the right path. Socrates says, “let’s agree that they are always in love with that learning which discloses to them something of the being that is always and does not wander about, driven by generation and decay.” Being that the philosopher king would be a lover of truth and wisdom, he would not desire to please his appetite for the vices of sex, food, and property. Indulgence would cause him to lose his sense of focus. He might start living for himself and not the city. Socrates says that he would “forsake those pleasures that come through the body – if he isn’t counterfeit but a true philosopher.”
Wisdom is not just being able to recognize fruitless pursuits like overly indulging in vice, it is being able to learn from the past. The philosopher king is someone who will remember what has happened from the past, instead of choosing to be brought down by it. He will use the knowledge of the past to better guide the city in the best direction. Socrates says, “Let us never then admit a forgetful soul into the ranks of those that are adequately philosophic; in our search let us rather demand a soul with a memory.” Socrates later says when using the analogy of the pilot of the ship, “They don’t know that for the true pilot it is necessary to pay careful attention to year, seasons, heaven, stars, winds, and everything that’s property to the art, if he is really going to be skilled at ruling a ship.”
Plato was not naïve. Most leaders claim to be working for the common good, guided by deep ideals. Many even believe themselves. However, ultimately their lives are organized around the pursuit and retention of power. Plato’s ideal ruler would be different because he would be a philosopher. Only someone who does not want power can remain uncorrupted by it, and the trappings of power mean nothing to a true philosopher except insofar as they help him in his chosen task, the pursuit and transmission of knowledge. In a poorly structured society, he is not able to philosophize freely.
As stated earlier, the philosopher king must love to learn because he loves truth. He must place a high importance on education so that he can grow in virtue. Socrates says, “Well, then, I suppose that if the nature we set down for the philosopher chances on a suitable course of learning, it will necessarily grow and come to every kind of virtue.” The knowledge that he receives from his education will be a base for his understanding of life.
With society being the way they are, it would be very hard to find the philosopher king. There are not that many people out there that would fit the qualifications. There is no guarantee that when someone finds a suitable philosopher to be king that he would want to do it.
For a city or a community to thrive and not just get by, they need a great leader. Socrates’ city needed the philosopher king. It would be someone who loved wisdom, sought the truth, had a solid understanding of history, and an education that gave him a solid base of knowledge. The leader…the philosopher king would have the foresight to “steer the ship” in the right direction.
These “philosophical reflections” are not as my mystical as one might initially suppose. On Plato’s view, the philosopher tries to work out what each thing is in its best possible form and how it best fits with everything else. He considers the good of the whole and how the parts can function to create and sustain it.
In Republic, Plato’s image for political life is a ship. The owner is stronger than everyone else, but doesn’t know much about sailing. The sailors are fighting over who should be captain, and the crowd round the owner trying to get appointed. An unschooled onlooker might be confused into thinking the art of captaincy is the art of taking and retaining the helm. Meanwhile, the true captain sits on the margins, unrecognized. Unlike the others, he considers the seasons, winds and stars; everyone says his head is in the clouds.
In a democracy, we, the people, are the ship-owner. Despite the fact that most of us have not seriously reflected on the means or ends of statecraft, we consider ourselves competent to elect a statesman. Politicians encircle us with their seductive dances and the one who wins our hearts we call our president.
Our nation is in need of a president to curb the challenges with iron determination, no matter if he does not the qualification of the philosopher, but must obtain the legitimacy of his power through the public’s ballots. Moreover, frauds in election do not put only a society’s democracy under question but also the legitimacy of power. So, at least our president must be a semi-philosopher so as to lead the society towards social, economic and political betterment.