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Type of bind: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 320.011
EAN num: 9780192833938
ISBN number: 0192833936
Label: Oxford University Press, USA
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 480
Printing Date: July 09, 1998
Publishing house: Oxford University Press, USA
Sale Popularity Level: 547688
Studio: Oxford University Press, USA
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Product Description:
The Politics is one of the most influential texts in the history of political thought, and it raises issues which still confront anyone who wants to think seriously about the ways in which human societies are organized and governed. By examining the way societies are run--from households to city states--Aristotle establishes how successful constitutions can best be initiated and upheld.
For this edition, Sir Ernest Barker's fine translation, which has been widely used for nearly half a century, has been extensively revised to meet the needs of the modern reader. The accessible introduction and clear notes examine the historical and philosophical background of the work and discuss its significance for modern political thought.
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Rated by buyers 
-
I read this book for a graduate seminar on Aristotle. Politics is one of Aristotle's most prescient works that had a profound impact on our Founding fathers.
Nicomachean Ethics (EN) is part of political knowledge. Politics regulates when virtue does not. Laws are created for people who are not virtuous. Polis= "city or state." Humans live in society, so virtue ethics is not just for individual living, community is a shared project for the good. Aristotle starts with his method, a phenomenological attitude. He starts with pairs, male and female, builds up to ruler and subject, master and slave as a natural relationship, the 1st social community thus is the household. Household is an economic relationship and has monarchy of patriarch. Villages are a collection of households with a king. Then you have a Polis, a fulfilled complete community formed from several villages. Self-sufficiency is the mark of a Polis. An organized social relationship is Polis and a reason is being able to take care of needs of life and promote living well. Only in a Polis can you have art, philosophy, etc. All these are actualized in a Polis. Politics is natural to human life. We are meant to be social. According to Aristotle, "If you don't want to live in a state you are either a God or a beast."
Logos= "rationality or language" is what helps us to be political animals. Rational language expands capacity in human life. Since Aristotle thinks the Polis has a telos or an end then the Polis as potential comes even before the household. This is similar to the acorn having the telos to become a mighty oak tree. Politics completes the human condition for Aristotle. Need a Polis to develop other human capacities.
Aristotle's hierarchy. Slaves are a living tool for Aristotle. Aristotle argues that some people are meant to be slaves right from birth. "Born to be ruled." Slavish person does not have enough rationality to rule themselves. Aristotle says not every form of actual enslavement is justified according to him. He justifies the human use of animals as a natural act.
Aristotle now wants to find what kind of government is best. In a Polis citizens have things in common. Aristotle criticizes Plato's Republic, he finds it to be overly controlling. Socrates says the soul has 3 aspects and so does the Polis. The Soul has:
1. Reason
2. Passion
3. Appetite
The Polis has:
1. Philosopher King.
2. Guardians, (military).
3. Commoners.
Both are a hierarchal ordering. Socrates and Plato talk about the state holding all property in common. This includes the state raising children after birth instead of the parents, thus there will be no family clans trying to better themselves over their neighbors. Aristotle criticizes this idea. Aristotle says a Polis is a plurality of people thus people are not all the same and a Polis must accommodate differences in people, which actually makes a Polis better. Aristotle criticizes Socrates and Plato's idea of a Polis needing to have "unity" of people. This is a contrast to the Polis of Sparta. Aristotle says the best way to integrate citizens to the Polis is to allow them taking turns in ruling it. Aristotle believes that holding property or rearing of children in common as in the Republic is wrong no one really loves children like their own and communal property never gets really taken care of. Love is diminished the less nuclear family we are.
Aristotle says you need a mix of private and public property. Thus, the best kind of Polis is a combination of a governing element. Aristotle affirms a constitutional democracy or Polity. A citizen participates in government by definition for Aristotle.
Comparison of virtue and the good citizen. Excellence of virtuous man not the same as a good citizen. There will be few virtuous men, but good citizens just have to follow the law. Aristotle says good political virtue and good moral virtue don't have to go together. "Living finely then most of all is the goal of the city."
Aristotle classifies 3 types of government which occur naturally in nature and 3 types of deteriorations of those governments, they are:
1. "Monarchy," rule by one man a king, this is a top down rule. The deterioration is a "Tyranny," who is a ruler who rules for his own benefit.
2. "Aristocracy," rule by the best few men in the Polis, also this is a top down rule. The deterioration is an "oligarchy,' which he defines as rule of the rich who want to perpetuate themselves.
3. "Polity," All citizens participate in government with a constitution set above them to guide them instead of a king or aristocracy. The deterioration is a "democracy or what yesterday we call mob rule or tyranny of the majority. He calls it rule of the poor.
Aristotle does a good job of looking at ... Read More
Rated by buyers -
I read this book for a graduate seminar on Aristotle. Politics is one of Aristotle's most prescient works that had a profound impact on our Founding fathers.
Nicomachean Ethics (EN) is part of political knowledge. Politics regulates when virtue does not. Laws are created for people who are not virtuous. Polis= "city or state." Humans live in society, so virtue ethics is not just for individual living, community is a shared project for the good. Aristotle starts with his method, a phenomenological attitude. He starts with pairs, male and female, builds up to ruler and subject, master and slave as a natural relationship, the 1st social community thus is the household. Household is an economic relationship and has monarchy of patriarch. Villages are a collection of households with a king. Then you have a Polis, a fulfilled complete community formed from several villages. Self-sufficiency is the mark of a Polis. An organized social relationship is Polis and a reason is being able to take care of needs of life and promote living well. Only in a Polis can you have art, philosophy, etc. All these are actualized in a Polis. Politics is natural to human life. We are meant to be social. According to Aristotle, "If you don't want to live in a state you are either a God or a beast."
Logos= "rationality or language" is what helps us to be political animals. Rational language expands capacity in human life. Since Aristotle thinks the Polis has a telos or an end then the Polis as potential comes even before the household. This is similar to the acorn having the telos to become a mighty oak tree. Politics completes the human condition for Aristotle. Need a Polis to develop other human capacities.
Aristotle's hierarchy. Slaves are a living tool for Aristotle. Aristotle argues that some people are meant to be slaves right from birth. "Born to be ruled." Slavish person does not have enough rationality to rule themselves. Aristotle says not every form of actual enslavement is justified according to him. He justifies the human use of animals as a natural act.
Aristotle now wants to find what kind of government is best. In a Polis citizens have things in common. Aristotle criticizes Plato's Republic, he finds it to be overly controlling. Socrates says the soul has 3 aspects and so does the Polis. The Soul has:
1. Reason
2. Passion
3. Appetite
The Polis has:
1. Philosopher King.
2. Guardians, (military).
3. Commoners.
Both are a hierarchal ordering. Socrates and Plato talk about the state holding all property in common. This includes the state raising children after birth instead of the parents, thus there will be no family clans trying to better themselves over their neighbors. Aristotle criticizes this idea. Aristotle says a Polis is a plurality of people thus people are not all the same and a Polis must accommodate differences in people, which actually makes a Polis better. Aristotle criticizes Socrates and Plato's idea of a Polis needing to have "unity" of people. This is a contrast to the Polis of Sparta. Aristotle says the best way to integrate citizens to the Polis is to allow them taking turns in ruling it. Aristotle believes that holding property or rearing of children in common as in the Republic is wrong no one really loves children like their own and communal property never gets really taken care of. Love is diminished the less nuclear family we are.
Aristotle says you need a mix of private and public property. Thus, the best kind of Polis is a combination of a governing element. Aristotle affirms a constitutional democracy or Polity. A citizen participates in government by definition for Aristotle.
Comparison of virtue and the good citizen. Excellence of virtuous man not the same as a good citizen. There will be few virtuous men, but good citizens just have to follow the law. Aristotle says good political virtue and good moral virtue don't have to go together. "Living finely then most of all is the goal of the city."
Aristotle classifies 3 types of government which occur naturally in nature and 3 types of deteriorations of those governments, they are:
1. "Monarchy," rule by one man a king, this is a top down rule. The deterioration is a "Tyranny," who is a ruler who rules for his own benefit.
2. "Aristocracy," rule by the best few men in the Polis, also this is a top down rule. The deterioration is an "oligarchy,' which he defines as rule of the rich who want to perpetuate themselves.
3. "Polity," All citizens participate in government with a constitution set above them to guide them instead of a king or aristocracy. The deterioration is a "democracy or what yesterday we call mob rule or tyranny of the majority. He calls it rule of the poor.
Aristotle does a good job of looking at ... Read More
Rated by buyers 
-
Perhaps I've been reading too many ancient Greeks and Romans, and certainly too many treatises on ancient politics, but I had a great deal of difficulty getting through this book. Aristotle is a very well-known philosopher and a student of Plato. This book outlined his views on politics, and he quite blatantly goes against a lot of what Plato and Socrates said, but his ideas make sense, especially for the time and place when they were written. It was interesting to compare his ideas to those of Plato since I just finished reading Plato's Republic. I think at heart, I'm more in agreement with Aristotle than with Plato.
Rated by buyers -
Perhaps it is not accidental that the work of the Aristotle, the student who explored so clearly and deeply all the externals and interactions of nature and Man, is recorded as tedious, repetitious, complex lecture notes while Plato the teacher who tried to find all the answers within the confines of his own head is recorded as lucid, lively dialogue. Aristotle the rube was evidently too busy observing, cataloging, teaching - living, to write it all down in an organized coherent whole while Plato the aristocrat was at very first desperate to capture all he could remember then to expand upon the works of his revered master, Socrates, trying desperately to walk in his sandals. I think maybe with Aristotle there was just too much material, to much to know, and the thing he did best was know. So here is the country boy with that horrible Macedonian accent but regal connections come to study at the Academy, to learn from the very best, and in the end, the thought he produces far surpasses all that the best laid before him.
How is the community of Man best organized? That is the concern of Aristotle's "Politics". Plato had more or less just conjured up an ideal "Republic" based on his interpretation of Socrates. But that was not enough for Aristotle. He traveled, he learned, he catalogued everything and human organization and systems of government were at the top of his list. And he did this traveling analysis at a unique time when all possible permutations of human social organization were up for a try, from the dynamic democracy of the tiny city-state to the decrepit tyranny of the Persian Empire. With this catalog, he could not just conjecture as to what government might work best but make solid statements of fact about the consequences of various human organizations and recommendations about what works best under what circumstance. And we live with the result of his systematic pursuit. As one reads (or re-reads) this the very foundation of Western political thought, images of Madison flipping pages of a well warn and well loved edition to find a particular passage as he pens drafts of the Constitution of the United States of America flash by time and again. The result of his obvious reference to Aristotle was a thriving republic that has grown and flourished providing freedom and the possibility of a good life for millions. What grew from Plato was the horror of the Soviet Union. But I have betrayed my prejudice. One must read both and in order, Plato very first to discover the thoughts that inspired Aristotle's questions then Aristotle to find the answers.
That said, I must reiterate, this book is exceptionally tedious, repetitious and complex (though not intellectually difficult). Thousands of people have made careers analyzing it and commenting on it. It is not for everybody but Mortimer Adler's "Aristotle for Everybody" is. That book is a brief, well written compendium, a distillate, of all we have of Aristotle. To go through a life and not read at least that is to miss some of the best thinking ever done by a human.
Rated by buyers 
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Yep, I feel way over my head giving Aristotle three stars, but I'm throwing in my two cents anyhow.
This book is an incredible window into another time. Aristotle's views on a number of topics (women and slavery come quickly to mind) stand out so opposed to our beliefs yesterday that it's almost worth reading this book just to get some perspective on how new some of the social ideas we take for granted really are. Getting that sense of perspective is truly the best part of this book.
That said, there is little here beyond that for anyone but a student of philosophy or someone engaging in a very serious study of the history of government. Very little of what Aristotle says rings true yesterday and at times it's as if he went to the future and decided to predict the exact opposite of what's come to pass.
If you are a layperson looking for a classic on government, I recommend Plato's Republic. While it is even older than Aristotle's work, it is filled with insights that feel as if they must have been written in modern times. That is a truly inspiring feat of thought and foresight.
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