Juris North Group Discussions on Jurisprudence 2015-16 [Second Term]

The Juris North Group invites you to attend to the discussion on the following papers this term:

 

Week One [Wednesday 20^th January 2016, at 3pm, NBS 3.20, Manchester Metropolitan University] – “Gradations in Accessorial Liability.” Dr Mark Dsouza, Lecturer, School of Law and Social Justice, University of Liverpool.

 

Week Two [Wednesday 3^rd February 2016, at 3pm, Lecture Theatre 5, Rendall Building, University of Liverpool] – “On the Fallen Condition of (Legal) Language, or Why Legal Positivism has Normalised our ‘Form-of-(non-)Living’.” Dr Luca Siliquini-Cinelli, Lecturer, School of Law, Deakin University, Australia.

 

Week Three [Wednesday 24^th February 2016, at 3pm, NBS 3.01, Manchester Metropolitan University] – “Responsibility to Protect and the Syrian Conflict: Legality or Morality?” Yasmine Nahlawi, Advocacy and Policy Coordinator, Rethink Rebuild Society.

Week Four [Wednesday 16^th March 2016, 12pm to 7pm, NBS 3.02 and NBS 3.17, Manchester Metropolitan University] – First British-Russian Symposium on Jurisprudence and Sovereignty: Legal Theory and Political Theory Views.

The respective papers will be distributed by email before each event.

 

Enquiries: Dr Jorge Nunez j.nunez@mmu.ac.uk

 

Link to FREE registration

Juris North CALL For PRESENTERS [Jurisprudence Discussion Group]

Call for Presenters 2015-16 [Semester Two]

If your current research is on a topic that can be broadly characterised as jurisprudence—i.e. legal and political philosophy, and you would be interested in presenting it to a friendly group, which includes academics as well as lawyers, you are welcome to be a presenter at the Juris North Discussion Group.

The discussions are normally held on Wednesday afternoons. But we can be flexible about the particular days that we meet. Discussions are always informal and very lively since we follow a Rawlsian approach. That means we do not have “Professors” and “Students” but people interested in discussing issues related to legal and political philosophy. So any question is an important question for debate.

If you would like to give a paper as part of our 2015-16 Working Paper Series then please send an abstract, no more than 500 words long and written in English. If you are interested, please contact Dr Jorge Emilio Nunez j.nunez@mmu.ac.uk.

The seminars will have a “pre-read” format: successful applicants will be asked to send a draft paper two weeks in advance of the seminar so that it can be circulated amongst members of the group.

Accommodation and expenses: we will not be able to make any contribution towards accommodation and travel expenses.

Enquiries please contact Dr Jorge Núñez: j.nunez@mmu.ac.uk

Plato, the Ancient Greeks and the idea of Sovereignty [THIRD PART]

The Ancient Greeks did not have a dedicated theory about the idea of sovereignty but they developed the conceptualisation of State and its implications so we in fact are able to at least have hints about their thoughts in regards also to sovereignty.

PREVIOIUS POST ON ANCIENT GREEKS AND THE IDEA OF SOVEREIGNTY

Plato sets up the basis from where the Greek philosophers and thinkers (even the modern ones) depart. Plato understands that we are in presence of a State “when we have got hold of enough people to satisfy our many varied needs, we have assembled quite a large number of partners and helpers together to live in one place […]”.[1] He summarised with his conceptualisation all the elements we consider nowadays essential for the existence of a State: population, territory, government. Note that law is not mentioned but will be present throughout his work.

PREVIOUS POST ON PLATO ONE

PREVIOUS POST ON PLATO TWO

With The Republic “[…] there seems reason to believe it was monarchy which claimed [Plato’s] allegiance. A famous sentence of the Republic tells us, that there will be no rest from their troubles for the cities of Greece or for all mankind, until the days of philosopher kings; and from the Politicus we also learn the necessity of ideal and absolute monarchy. […] Reason, being one and indivisible, rules the spirit and the multitude of desires in the individual mind: reason, incarnate in one sovereign, must rule all other classes in the State. In such a sovereign the theories of the Republic culminate. […]The Platonic theory of monarchy is expounded in the Politicus”.[2]  However interesting, this point is not relevant here. Plato revaluates several forms of governments from different angles. It is true he considers monarchy as the best option in theory but he knows—being a pragmatic—that democracy results more feasible. The key detail for here: the sovereignty of a State remains a “human” attribute.

Let us turn the attention to what Plato says in the Politicus in relation to the Guardians, representatives, statesman or government:

“[…] we started by taking theoretical knowledge and distinguishing an instructional part of if, and we then drew on an analogy to make up the term ‘producer-instructional’ for a further subdivision. Next, within this ‘producer-instructional’ branch we isolated the not unimportant art of maintaining creatures. We found that a category of creature-maintenance was herd-maintenance, and that a category of herd-maintenance in its turn was the herding of creatures with feet. Within the herding of creatures with feet, the crucial segment we distinguished was the art of maintaining those which lack horns. And if you want to encapsulate in a single term the relevant subdivision of this art of maintaining creatures which lack horns, you have to combine at least three components and call it the branch of knowledge which is concerned with ‘the herding of species which cannot interbreed’. As for subdividing this class, since the art of herding human beings is the only section left which deals with two-footed gregarious creatures, then it is exactly what we are after – the art we’ve been calling both kingship and statesmanship”.[3]

Indeed, it seems Plato introduces a simple classification. But after more careful consideration we may see that he presents the elements that integrated—and still do —the theory of a ruler and the State: gregarious two-footed creatures (we would add, with consciousness) that are used to being in groups. He assumes they will have needs and in order to better cover their needs they will need direction; hence, the reciprocal relation represented-representative—i.e. sovereignty and its reflection. For the ones into political sciences and political theory, a very early reference to Nozick and his “aggregations.”

Another key development evident in Plato’s work: having different options in terms of forms of government, it is only one that truly reflects the idea of public sovereignty: “[…] ‘dictatorship’ is the term for the management by constraint of unwilling subjects, whereas ‘statesmanship’ is the term for the management by consent of willing, two-footed, gregarious creatures. So [the one] […] with this particular kind of managerial expertise is a true statesman-king […]”.[4]

As it has previously been mentioned in this post, it is clear Plato’s preference for monarchy but being a practical thinker and having experienced many realities throughout his life he concedes that “[…] in other cities there had been a development which had almost everywhere followed the same order, from monarchy to aristocracy, from aristocracy to tyranny, from tyranny to democracy”.[5]

For that reason it is at least hard to agree with Barker when he concludes that “[t]he statesman has an infinite complexity of circumstances, an infinite variety of characters, to handle; and like a physician, he must be left untrammelled by any book of laws, if he is to handle them as he should. The variability of his matter demands a corresponding flexibility in his power. States which bind their rulers to act according to law lose that flexibility. [...] The ideal of Plato would thus appear to be the absolute monarch of a subject people, unfettered by public opinion and unhampered by law”.[6] From The Republic to the Politicus and the Laws a common thread may be identified: sovereignty as an attribute of the people that are the polis. 

The idea of the representative evolves as his works and mostly his experience do so. Although he is inclined at first for a monarch ruling with absolute power he later on understands the idea of democracy as a better and more practical solution. It is important to highlight once again: sovereignty remains in all his works within the society. That society because of its needs requires representation. The representatives (or Guardians) are a reflection of the people’s will. Having one person representing them or a group does not change the essence of his idea.

Next time Plato’s Statesman.

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[1] Plato, The Republic, translated by D. Lee, Penguin Books, 1987, p. 58.

[2] Barker, Ernest, The political thought of Plato and Aristotle, Dover Publications Inc., 1959, pp. 164/165.

[3] Plato, Statesman, translated by R. Waterfield, Cambridge texts in the History of political thought, 1995, pp. 18/19.

[4] Plato, Statesman, translated by R. Waterfield, Cambridge texts in the History of political thought, 1995, p. 32.

[5] Barker, Ernest, Greek political theory: Plato and his predecessors, Methuen & Co., Ltd., 1951, p. 3.

[6] Barker, Ernest, The political thought of Plato and Aristotle, Dover Publications Inc., 1959, p. 167/168.

Plato, the Ancient Greeks and the idea of Sovereignty [SECOND PART]

The Ancient Greeks did not have a dedicated theory about the idea of sovereignty but they developed the conceptualisation of State and its implications so we in fact are able to at least have hints about their thoughts in regards also to sovereignty.

PREVIOUS POST ON ANCIENT GREEKS AND THE IDEA OF SOVEREIGNTY

Plato sets up the basis from where the Greek philosophers and thinkers (even the modern ones) depart. Plato understands that we are in presence of a State “when we have got hold of enough people to satisfy our many varied needs, we have assembled quite a large number of partners and helpers together to live in one place […]”.[1] He summarised with his conceptualisation all the elements we consider nowadays essential for the existence of a State: population, territory, government. Note that law is not mentioned but will be present throughout his work.

PREVIOUS POST ON PLATO

It is time now to focus our attention on another element that is part of a sovereign State and the Ancient Greeks considered too: the government.

Plato is clear about the relationship between two elements of the equation: government and law: “[a]t any rate the next and necessary step in this amalgamation is to choose some representatives to review the rules of all the families, and to propose openly to the leaders and heads of the people – the ‘kings’ […]. These representatives will be known as lawgivers, and by appointing the leaders as officials they will create out the separate autocracies a sort of aristocracy, or perhaps a kingship”.[2] That is to say, the representatives of the people that live in a certain territory and the rules or norms that are used to allow their coexistence.  It is clear that Ancient Greek thinkers considered the government or representatives as a necessity or necessary condition—i.e. the population’s need to have a direction, a purpose.

In other words, Plato refers firstly to what we may understand nowadays as population and territory; secondly, their necessities. Depending on the context the representatives will be elected and the law will follow. The following quotation illustrates the point:

“There are two stages involved in organizing a society. First you establish official positions and appoint people to hold them: you decide how many posts there should be and how they ought to be filled. Then each office has to be given its particular laws […]”.[3]

Plato goes further by reviewing the qualities required in the Guardians (as he calls the representatives) or rulers: “[a]nd so our properly good Guardian will have the following characteristics: a philosophic disposition, high spirits, speed, and strength”.[4] He highlights here the idea of a “good representative” as a polar star to be aimed for. He is not being idealistic in the sense his dialogue is purely theoretical. He is only giving us a hint. That is the reason why he follows: “[a]nd it’s absolutely vital to give your best attention to choosing, first of all, Guardians of the Laws”[5] since they will be representing people’s will and in dong so they would have to excel, to stand out from the crowd due to their virtues. Indeed, the rulers had to be virtuous according to Plato, something that seems to have been forgotten after so many centuries and many of our current representatives should be reminded of.

People’s will is crucial. Without using the concept, Plato implicitly includes the notion of people’s sovereignty: “[s]o we must choose from among our Guardians those who appear to us on observation to be most likely to devote their lives to doing what they judge to be in the interest of the community, and who are never prepared to act against it”.[6]

At least in The Republic and the Politicus or the Statesman we can easily see the sovereign power rests o people’s shoulders. We can discuss if the sovereignty is an attribute of the population or of the representatives but it is definitely a human one. The Laws may suggest a change. However, I consider The Laws as a metaphor: if population and representatives are unable to coexist in an orderly manner, they create a “tool” in order to allow “civilised” relationships.

Plato will always aim for the best in everything. Being the representatives the pinnacle of a social system it is not strange that he requires from them the highest quality in terms of virtues (or excellences in a literal translation). The philosopher has the principal virtue (wisdom) that can balance the three key elements that are the essence of any human being: reason, spirit and appetite. So it is to be expected that:

“[t]he society we have described can never grow into reality or see the light of day, and there will be no end to the troubles of states, or indeed, […] of humanity itself, till philosophers become kings in this world, or till those we now call kings and rulers really and truly become philosophers […]”.[7]

Consequently, “[t]he ‘philosopher-king’ is not a mere addition or insertion: he is the logical result of the whole method on which the construction of the State has proceeded”.[8]

Next time The Laws, The Politicus, and The Republic.

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[1] Plato, The Republic, translated by D. Lee, Penguin Books, 1987, p. 58.

[2] Plato, The Laws, translated by T. J. Saunders, Penguin Books, 1976, 125.

[3] Plato, The Laws, translated by T. J. Saunders, Penguin Books, 1976, p. 221.

[4] Plato, The Republic, translated by D. Lee, Penguin Books, 1987, p. 69.

[5] Plato, The Laws, translated by T. J. Saunders, Penguin Books, 1976, p. 223.

[6] Plato, The Republic, translated by D. Lee, Penguin Books, 1987, p. 119.

[7] Plato, The Republic, translated by D. Lee, Penguin Books, 1987, p. 203.

[8] Barker, Ernest, Greek political theory: Plato and his predecessors, Methuen & Co., Ltd., 1951, p. 170.