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| POLITICAL SOCIALIZATION OF CHILDREN TODAY AND IN THE PLATONIC "REPUBLIC" |
 PRINTABLE VERSION |
Philosophy, almost since the beginning of the recorded history, has been plentiful with speculations about the way a perfect life should be. These insights have evolved into more concrete terms such as the "Ideal City", the "Utopia", the "Virtuous State", and the "Ideal Community" have begun to appear in various philosophical dialectics. Henceforth, it was philosophy that has shaped the modern kaleidoscopic spectrum of schools embracing the concept of socio-political idealism. Buddha, Socrates, Plato, Muhammad, Machiavelli, Rousseau, Locke, Hobbes, Marx, Engels, Gandhi, and countless influential persons throughout history had in mind different, yet precise models they had seen to be the ideal end the world should strive to achieve. Each of those philosophers, politicians, thinkers, ideologues, and religious leaders, made decisive shifts in the course of historical flow, and many of them were able to accomplish their own dreams on actual ground, by depending on the communication of socio-political ideas, which are based upon their respective philosophical inclinations, to the surrounding communities. Therefore, in order for each ideal model to live in the future, the idea of political-socialization of children became a matter of necessity. Consequently, each ideal model included its own perspective of "education" to which the future generations should be exposed in order to enforce a status of sustainability on the ideal city.
Plato's ancient ideas regarding children upbringing, which he displays in his authentic piece of literature, the "Republic", continue to have strong influence on child rearing methods in our modern era. From this standpoint, the desired outcome of this paper is to analyze the various forms of applying Plato's principles of political-socialization of children that exist in the modern era, in correlation with their basic Platonic origins. Accordingly, Plato's ideas should be put under further focusing. In the "Republic", Plato introduces the importance of political-socialization of children as a means to attain and sustain his theoretical model of an ideal city. He further elaborates in depth how the individual spiritual and moral idealism are considered as gates leading to an perfect society. Plato specifies some basic absolutes on which his project is to founded, and upon which the education of future generations is to be based. The Platonic project is founded essentially on the motto of "justice", such that in a just city, every job should be accomplished in the most perfect way. Plato ties his notion of justice with the "principle of specialization", meaning that not only should every member of the society have one precise and defined task to accomplish, but also future generations will be assigned their specializations according to their natural and acquired abilities –as will be discussed later- .
In accordance to other models that existed during Plato's times, such as the Hindu Varna¹ or caste system of social hierarchy, the Platonic social hierarchy consists of three categories that he arranges from the bottom to the top, respectively, as follows: the working class, the "auxiliaries" (Military class), and the "guardians" (The ruling elite). He asserts that these three social classes are in absolute natural harmony with three types of souls he suggests, which are: The rational, spirited, and appetitive souls, respectively. At this point, Platonic children education is being put into practice, when Plato confirms his intention to indoctrinate children with his theory of metallic souls. This theory suggests that, harmoniously with nature, one metal is analogous to all individual souls belonging to one Platonic social class (such that gold is assigned to the guardians' souls, silver to the auxiliaries', and bronze and iron to the working class's). Hence, as an example, children belonging to the guardians class will be raised to believe in that natural has especially chosen them to rule. From this basis, Plato suggests that philosophical dialogue skills, or education in general should only be taught to the suitable people, and that otherwise the society might face serious moral challenges. In consequence, future guardians are acquired the capacity to rule. In analogy to his theory of metallic souls, Plato decides that a society achieves a state of justice whenever social classes function in harmony between themselves, and whenever each individuals behavior is governed by the type of soul dominating his/her social class: In this way, -according to Plato- each social class will be designed for one specific task, and the society as a whole will attain purity, since the metals will not mix. Summing up the above, but in other words, it is observed that due to the fact that Plato considers that education should be monopolized by the ruling class, the labor class is completely marginalized from any form of political participation.
Detailed codes of the Platonic approach of raising his city's future guardians are further elaborated in the "Republic". Plato mentions a sort of system to forecast potential rulers among children belonging to all classes equally: He allows for labor class children with special leadership potentials to be educated by the state equally with guardians, but forbids at the same time any sort of interference in political life by adult individuals belonging to the lower classes. The Platonic future guardians should be able to control their display of kindness and cruelty, upon necessity. Accordingly, Plato offers them an education package that balances their softness and savageness, through music and poetry², altogether with military and physical training. The "Republic" also includes strict and detailed codes regulating the allowed types of stories to be told to the guardians, as well as the permissible types of architecture, poetry, and artwork that should prevail. Plato's main criteria of deciding whether or not a story, a poem, or a piece of artwork is to be allowed in his city are based upon the question of whether or not these items teach virtues (e.g. honor, -fear of death, saying the truth, and imitating virtuous people) to his future rulers. In an attempt to feed the principle of rejection of physical pleasure to the ruling elite, Plato mentions that guardians should not wear gold, and be just satisfied with the fact that gold is in harmony with their spirits. In other words, guardians should be satisfied by another type of pleasure with their natural and acquired superior abilities. Guardians should also be taught that pedophilia³ is not allowed to pollute paternal love between a man and a boy in the Platonic city, being, unlike heterosexual intercourse, solely based on pleasure.
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Saladin
My name is Ayman el-Hakea, I am a Construction Engineering graduate from the American University in Cairo. My origins date to an interesting mixture of Yemeni, Moroccan, Albanian, and Egyptian ancestors. I always try to be a moderate Muslim, I like animation, geopolitics, comparative religion, and football. I like to be with "people"...and I hope my writing isn't boring for anyone.
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