Peer-reviewed Publication
Ruling with Knowledge vs. Ruling with Laws
The Role of Law in Plato’s Best City in the Statesman
in History of Political Thought 45, no. 4 (2024): 595-620; https://doi.org/10.53765/20512988.45.4.595
Unlike some scholars who argue that there is no need for law in Plato’s best city and others who argue that law is a useful tool in the city, this paper argues that law is a necessary tool not only in cities without genuine political experts but also in the best city ruled by the experts. Law is necessary even in the best city because it serves as the mechanism that delivers the experts’ knowledge in a way that can reach the lives of ordinary citizens. The law in the best city has peculiar status as a necessary but inferior tool to political expertise, and this status can be explained through the description of the best city as law-possessing, law-abiding by default, and sometimes law-overruling.
Doctoral Dissertation
The Role of Law in Plato’s Cities
In this dissertation, I investigate the function of law in Plato’s cities and his theoretical framework. I argue that law constitutes an essential part of the various cities Plato builds and discusses in his dialogues, facilitating good governance by connecting the knowledge of the lawgivers and the lives of ordinary citizens. I show that Plato conceptualizes law as the distribution of reason, through which knowledge is delivered to the citizens. For Plato, law provides the citizens access to the reason-driven way of life. Moreover, by demonstrating Plato’s recognition of law’s connective function in the Republic, Statesman, and Laws, I argue that Plato’s attention to law is not merely a later development, but is evident throughout his theoretical framework. Plato’s interest in law does not conflict with his idea of the rule of philosopher-rulers and the rule of reason. Law’s connective function and the rule of reason are not only compatible but can also mutually reinforce each other.
This dissertation contains four chapters. In Chapter One, I explore various ideas present in Plato’s dialogues and other texts from the fifth and fourth century BCE, and show that Plato is engaging in the larger contemporary discourse on law. In Chapter Two, I focus on the Laws and reconstruct Plato’s concept of law, examine its aim, and show that Plato introduces two new elements, namely the preambles and the Daily Meeting (commonly known as the Nocturnal Council), to strengthen law’s connective function. Chapter Three focuses on the Statesman, and I demonstrate that law is an essential part of any political system, including the best city ruled by a genuine political expert. In Chapter Four, turning to the Republic, I show that the principal structure of Kallipolis is formed by the laws, and illustrate how the process of constitutional degeneration in Book VIII occurs as the connective function of law declines.
Works in Progress
When the Connection Fails:
The Function of Law in the Degeneration of Constitutions of Republic VIII
This paper aims to show that law has a connective function between the lawgivers’ knowledge and the lives of citizens in Plato’s ideal and corrupt constitutions, and argue that the degeneration of constitutions in Republic VIII occurs when law loses this connective function. While the process of kallipolis’ decline into a series of corrupt constitutions in Republic VIII has been studied by many scholars, insufficient attention has been given to the parallel decline of law at every juncture of degeneration. I illustrate the chain of degeneration from kallipolis to the corrupted constitutions of timocracy, oligarchy, democracy, and tyranny, and show that this linear degeneration occurs when law becomes progressively less influential within each city. Two variables affect the connective function of law: the quality of the laws and the law-abidingness of the citizens. Within the process of degeneration, the quality of law changes from the good laws of kallipolis, to the bad laws of rulers who introduce laws to their own advantage, and eventually to no law (lawlessness). The law-abidingness of the citizens decreases from full law-abidingness in kallipolis, to the rulers’ disobedience to the law, and finally to the disobedience of all citizens. Within the process of degeneration, these variables can bear upon each other: the rulers’ disobedience and manipulation of the laws to their own ends can result in the emergence of bad laws. Different combinations of these two variables represent different degrees of law’s connective function, and also the degree to which the constitution departs from its ideal form.
Socratic Attentive Shame and Its Role in Political Life
In this paper, I defend the value of shame in political life through the model of Socrates’ experience of shame. Against the view that Socrates is immune to shame, I argue that his seeming immunity to the experience of shame results from his high attentiveness to his sense of shame. Building on the view that the sense of shame is essential to Socratic elenchus in bringing his interlocutors to acknowledge their incoherence and feel ashamed, I argue that Socrates is not only in the role of shamer but also with his own shame experiences. I categorize the shame experiences of Plato’s different characters into three types: ‘Avoiding,’ ‘Confronting,’ and ‘(Socratic) Attentive’ shame. ‘Socratic Attentive Shame’ is distinguished from the other two by constant deliberation and immediate constructive reactions, which enables shame to be generated internally rather than externally and bring about positive changes to the ashamed. Examples of each type of shame in Plato’s dialogues illustrate how Socratic Attentive Shame can serve as a positive model for the role of shame in our political life.
In Preparation
– Platonic Philosophy of Law and Modern Jurisprudence
– Law and Virtue in Platonic, Confucian, and Legalist Philosophies
– The Role of Shame (αἰδώς and 羞惡) in Virtue Cultivation in Plato and Mencius
Jiseob Yoon 