Aristotle On Politics

Aristotle, a Greek philosopher, Alexander the Great's tutor, wrote Politics Ð'- one of his most celebrated works. In that work, he discusses what the perfect form of government is and how it can be achieved, what goes into it and who gets to be the rulers and the ruled, but one of the most important aspects of the best state is happiness. In this essay, I will explain Aristotle's definition of the state, the ruler and the ruled. The first three are introductory to our main focus here, which is happiness or moral virtue because without proper definition of the prior, one will not be able to understand how moral virtue plays a part in the state. Let us then start with our discussion.

Aristotle states that every state can be classified as a community and that every community exists for the purposes of reaching good. A political state is also a community, but a community that is higher than other kinds of communities, therefore the political state is trying to reach the highest good. "If all communities aim at some good, the state or political community, which is the highest of all, and which embraces all the rest, aims at good in a greater degree than any other, and at the highest good." The highest good he explains to be something that we do not attempt to achieve out of selfish reasons. He makes it clear in the introduction to Happiness in Nichomachean Ethics. "Suppose, then, that the things achievable by action have some end that we wish for because of itself.... Clearly, this end will be the good, that is to say, the best good." In order for this kind of end or future goal to be accomplished, Aristotle makes it very clear that a state must be governed by suitable leaders. He goes on to explain, that some people assuming that qualifications of different level leaders only vary by the number of people they have under their rule. " But Aristotle explains that is a mistake.

"In the first place there must be a union of those who cannot exist without each other; namely, of male and female, that the race may continue ( and this is a union which is formed, not out of deliberate purpose, but because, in common with other animals and with plants, mankind have a natural desire to leave behind them an image of themselves), and of natural ruler and subject that both may be preserved."

In other words, both the ruler and the ruled have a common interest of the state surviving and succeeded over time.

A state, according to Aristotle, must be self-sufficient. The very basic form of state that Aristotle does not directly call a state is a union of two individuals, a male and a female. The next basic form of state is a union of many families, which in turn creates a village. When those villages create a union of their own and are self-sufficient, they create a state. By making a link between a family and the state, Aristotle is concerned with the natural need for a state. "[I]f the earlier forms of society are natural, so is the state, for it is the end of them, and the natrure of a thing is its end." The individual alone is not self-sufficient, therefore there is a natural need for humans to live in groups. Therefore, "The proof that the state is a creation of nature and prior to the individual is that the individual, when isolated, is not self-sufficing; and therefore he is like a part in relation to the whole." Aristotle gives proof for why men need to live in a group, by

stating that nature has given us the need to live in groups in order to lead quality life filled with happiness. By saying that an individual is part of the whole society, he indicates that individuals make up the state, hence the man cannot exist without the state, nor can the state exist without individuals.

Aristotle also makes a radical comparison of man to animal. He acknowledges that animals, too, are nature's creations. But he notes that they are a different kind of creations. He refutes the objection by stating that humans have speech, not just a voice, which animals possess as well to express pain and pleasure. It is speech that gives us the ability to express reason and intellect. However, he believes that, "man, when perfected, is the best of animals, but, when separated from law and justice, he is the worst of all." He emphasizes law and justice because those are the two elements of a state. The state makes laws and provides order through the element of justice, which the citizens ought to live by. He goes on to explain that because man is born with "arms", such "arms" must be used virtueosly. "Since armed injustice is the more dangerous, and he is equipped at birth with armes, meant to be used by intelligence and virtue, which he may use for the worst ends."

Aristotle's conception of ability to rule is closely tied with his conception of slavery. He states that there are those who are by birth rulers and those who are slaves. He also believes that the distinction between rulers and ruled exists not only in the human kingdom, but all throughout the universe. Therefore, it is natural for some to be slaves and others rulers.

The ruler Ð'- is a perfection of body and mind. The mind rules over the body, and reason or as Aristotle calls it, intellect rules over the appetites. The same kind of reasoning we have seen in Plato. Individuals driven by appetite are the least knowledgable and therefore need to be ruled by those who are governed by reason, who have the ability to reason rather than give into their appetites. Aristotle reinforces his argument by stating, "[T]he lower sort are by nature slaves, and it is better for them as for all inferiors that they should be under the rule of a master." In Nichomachean Ethics, Aristotle gives us a good example of why the "lower sort" should not have the power. When one of such individuals is sick, they assume happiness being healthy; those who are poor wish for wealth; but "Among the wise," it is believed that there is another kind of good that is in its own existence, and it is that kind of good that leads to a greater good. And the ruler is essentially responsible for that higher good because it is the ruler who can ignore his appetites and do what is good by reason.

The ruled Ð'- those are the people who have the capacity to understand that it is needed for them to be ruled; they are to follow what the state requires them to do.

Aristotle makes a distinction between the ruler and the ruled by claiming that it is nature that marked both.

"Nature would like to distinguish between the bodies of freemen and slaves, making the one strong for servile labour, the other upright, and although useless for