Plato And Counter-Argument Analysis

In this paper, I will argue that according to Plato and Aristotle, a good leader is someone who is a person of upstanding moral value with rational thinking, and friend-like qualities and these qualities can be obtained through the teaching of these qualities and continuously practicing them. To prove this claim, I will be introducing arguments from Plato and Aristotle and counter-argument from Glaucon.
Plato thought that a good leader is a just man who is wise. To be a just man Plato believed that he had to maintain balance of the three parts of his soul; the appetite – the part of the soul that desires pleasure and comfort; the spirited – the part of the soul that energetic and hot-blooded; and the rational – the part of the soul that is …show more content…
That if given the same opportunity, a just leader would commit the same act as an unjust one. And that tyrants – also known as an unjust leader – only want to satisfy their appetite; their desires. In The Republic, Glaucon counteracts the theory of a just leader by saying “For all men believe in their hearts that injustice is far more profitable to the individual than justice, and he who argues as I have been supposing, will say that they are right. If you could imagine any one obtaining this power of becoming invisible, and never doing any wrong or touching what was another’s, he would be thought by the lookers-on to be a most wretched idiot, although they would praise him to one another’s faces, and keep up appearances with one another from a fear that they too might suffer injustice.” In other words, Glaucon means that men greater profit from injustice and that if men that they could get away with it, then they will act unjustly. However, Plato rebukes Glaucon’s claim when he argues that sooner or later people revolt against a tyrant. Not only that, but tyrants can never be truly happy because they would have to repeatedly please their subjects so they wouldn’t revolt and that tyrants would have to continuously watch out for back-stabbers. Subsequently, it serves that if a leader is just and wise than not only he but his people would …show more content…
He thought that a ruler would maintain a certain type of friendship between themselves and their subjects. This is stated in book eight of the Nicomachean Ethics. He says, “Each of the constitutions may be seen to involve friendship just in so far as it involves justice. The friendship between a king and his subjects depends on an excess of benefits conferred; for he confers benefits on his subjects if being a good man he cares for them with a view to their well-being, as a shepherd does for his sheep (whence Homer called Agamemnon 'shepherd of the peoples').” What Aristotle is saying is that a ruler is like a friend to their people and as such he would look after their well-being and that looking after their well-being would be providing justice. Aristotle also states that to be a friend one must be virtuous – meaning morally correct, which he states in book two of the Nicomachean Ethics; “Perfect friendship is the friendship of men who are good, and alike in virtue; for these wish well alike to each other qua good, and they are good themselves,” meaning that perfect friendship comes people who are morally