Plato

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Recommended: Justice as a central theme in Plato's ideal state

Justice as a scale
A. Introduction
Can Plato's theory of individual justice, after 2,500 years, still provide an explanation of what is going on in the minds of today's human beings?
After an explanation of Plato’s theory of individual justice, I will try in a second step to support its plausibility with a few examples; then I will state objections against his theory and further give counterarguments to prove Plato’s theory to be consistent and plausible. The last part provides the conclusion.
B. Plato's theory of individual justice put to the test
I. Plato's theory of individual justice
Plato's theory of individual justice is based on his construction of an “ideal city” that holds civic justice via an argumentum a fortiori (a maiore ad minus): “If we first tried to observe justice in some larger thing that possessed it, this would make it easier to observe it in a single individual” . That is why I am going to outline first the domicile of the four virtues in the “ideal city” and explain in a second part, what individual justice is.
Plato's “ideal city” has three different classes of inhabitants: 'producers', 'guardians' and 'rulers'. Each of these classes wears a main virtue: the producers have 'moderation' , the guardians own 'courage' and the rulers must hold 'wisdom' . The fourth virtue, justice, is to be found if each class does “its own work in the city” and are “not meddling with what isn't one's own” . “It is the power that makes it possible for them to grow in the city and that preserves them when they've grown for as long as it remains there itself”. Justice itself is claimed to be the major virtue as injustice is “the worst thing that someone could do to his city” . So this major virtue is 'embracing' all the other virtues and bringing harmony.
As stated before, these four virtues can be found in the individual's soul as well.: the tripartite conception of the soul and an harmonizing individual justice as fourth virtue. The three different parts are: the 'appetitive', 'spirited' and 'rational'. They correspond each to the classes’ of the “ideal city” and their function: first the 'appetitive' part corresponds to the producers' moderation, second the 'spirited' part with the guardians' courage and third the 'rational' part of the soul with the wisdom resided in the rulers. “We'll call the part of the soul with which...

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... reason, it must be that ordinary men do that, too. That is why the third objection has to be declined as well.
d) The last objection I can think of is that the “ideal city” leads only to the “ideal human being” that has ideal justice. Actually that is no objection, as Plato didn't claim his “individual justice” as a balancing harmony to be not the one of a perfect man. The opposite is the case: He even shows what is going to happen, if injustice is ruling in the soul. So Plato concludes from the “ideal city” to the “ideal human being” and doesn’t fail here.
All the objections fail to prove Plato's theory of individual justice to be false. So his theory seems to be consistent enough to give a plausible description of reality.
C. Conclusion
After stating the content of Plato's theory of individual justice, I took and supported his point of view by figuring out the structure of his arguments, added another metaphor for a more descriptive explanation and two more examples. While trying to find consistent objections against Plato's theory, the counterarguments prevailed. So Plato's theory of individual justice is after 2,500 years still a consistent model.

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