Abstract
Plato recognizes faction as a serious threat to any political community (e.g., at Rep. 462a9-b2). The Republic’s proposed solution to faction relies on bringing citizens into a relation of ὁμόνοια. On the dominant line of interpretation, ὁμόνοια is understood along the lines of “explicit agreement” or “consensus.” Commentators have consequently thought that the καλλίπολις becomes resistant to faction when all or most of its members explicitly agree with one another about certain fundamentals of their political association—for example, they agree regarding who should govern in the καλλίπολις.
We argue that ὁμόνοια in Plato’s political philosophy has been under-analyzed and misunderstood. We show that, in Alcibiades I, rendering ὁμόνοια simply as agreement results in confusion about how expertise, political friendship, and civic unity are compossible in a well-ordered political community. In our view, Plato refines and adds philosophical depth to the concept of ὁμόνοια in the Republic. We claim that ὁμόνοια is a relation of psychological “like-mindedness” that obtains among members of different occupational classes in a political community. A community is rendered resistant to faction, then, when its members are, in some significant way, psychologically alike. Additionally, while Platonic ὁμόνοια can naturally be expected to result in substantive agreement among citizens, we argue that Platonic ὁμόνοια does not consist solely in agreement.
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- 1.
The essays in the Federalist Papers, authored by Alexander Hamilton, John Jay and James Madison, were published anonymously in New York newspapers beginning in October 1787. A mostly complete collection of essays was published in book form in 1788. Historian Douglas Adair confirmed the authorship of the each of the Federalist Papers in his 1944 work.
- 2.
- 3.
R. E. Allen holds that Thrasymachus argues that faction (στάσις) enters into “the very definition of government” (2006, p. ix). Allen regards Thrasymachus as thus raising a central question for Plato’s political project: Can any human political society avoid faction?
- 4.
470b7-9: ἐπὶ μὲν οὖν τῇ τοῦ οἰκείου ἔχθρᾳ στάσις κέκληται, ἐπὶ δὲ τῇ τοῦ ἀλλοτρίου πόλεμος.
- 5.
For example, at Republic 351d4-6, Socrates says: “For faction, Thrasymachus, accompanies injustice and hatred and war of each against each other, but justice accompanies ὁμόνοια and friendliness.” (Στάσεις γάρ που, ὦ Θρασύμαχε, ἥ γε ἀδικία καὶ μίση καὶ μάχας ἐν ἀλλήλοις παρέχει, ἡ δὲ δικαιοσύνη ὁμόνοιαν καὶ φιλίαν).
- 6.
Demosthenes : …ἀλλὰ τοὺς ἐχθροὺς κρατοῦντες, καὶ ἃ πᾶς τις ἂν εὖ φρονῶν εὔξαιτο, τὴν πόλιν εἰς ὁμόνοιαν ἄγοντες, ἀθάνατον κλέος αὑτῶν λελοίπασι, τοὺς ἐπιτηδεύοντας οἷα σοὶ βεβίωται τῆς ἀγορᾶς εἴργοντες (Against Androtion, 77.1-78.1).
- 7.
Isocrates : Οὐ γὰρ ἐφθονοῦμεν ταῖς αὐξανομέναις αὐτῶν, οὐδὲ ταραχὰς ἐνεποιοῦμεν πολιτείας ἐναντίας παρακαθιστάντες ἵν’ ἀλλήλοις μὲν στασιάζοιεν, ἡμᾶς δ’ ἀμφότεροι θεραπεύοιεν, ἀλλὰ τὴν τῶν συμμάχων ὁμόνοιαν κοινὴν ὠφέλειαν νομίζοντες τοῖς αὐτοῖς νόμοις ἁπάσας τὰς πόλεις διῳκοῦμεν, συμμαχικῶς, ἀλλ’ οὐ δεσποτικῶς βουλευόμενοι περὶ αὐτῶν, ὅλων μὲν τῶν πραγμάτων ἐπιστατοῦντες (Pangyricus 104.1-104.8).
- 8.
- 9.
A sample of translations of ὁμόνοια as it appears at Republic 351d5: Jowett (2000) and Larson (1979) translate “harmony”; Grube-Reeve (1992): “common purpose”; Reeve (2004) renders ὁμόνοια (perhaps in an overtranslation) as “a sense of common purpose”; Griffith (2000): “co-operation”; Lee (1987): “unity of purpose”; Sterling and Scott (1985): “unity.” Of the translations we surveyed of 351d5, only four chose one of the LSJ suggestions for 351d5: Bloom (1968) and Allen (2006) chose “unanimity,” Shorey (1937) selects “oneness of mind,” and Waterfield (1993) chose “concord.” At 432a8, translators were more likely to cleave to one of the LSJ meanings of ὁμόνοια (or to the version provided by previous translators). Shorey (1937) translates ὁμόνοια as “concord”; Bloom (1968), Grube-Reeve (1992), Lee (1987), Reeve (in Cooper and Hutchinson 1997), and Waterfield (1993) as “unanimity.” We should note that “unanimity” can be understood as consisting either in agreement or as psychological similarity . So, the philosophical issues we raise here cannot be settled by translation alone.
- 10.
Agreement can also be signaled by the Greek term: ὁμοδοξία (similarity in belief or sameness of belief) . We contend that, for Plato, ὁμόνοια does not simply consist in ὁμοδοξία. Aristotle makes this point at Nicomachean Ethics (IX.6 1167a23ff.): “Concord (ὁμόνοια) appears to be friendly feeling. This is not merely agreement in beliefs (ὁμοδοξία).” Aristotle will go on in this chapter to argue that ὁμόνοια is political friendship in which citizens are “of one mind” about their common ends and interests (1167a29-30). We hold that Plato’s view provides a distinctive and interesting account of the psychology that underlies this kind of “one-mindedness.”
- 11.
The author of Alcibiades I makes much of these linguistic indicators of agreement. There is ample textual evidence in Alcibiades I, in fact, that linguistic competence is the model for agreement (for example, at 111a5-112e2). Those similarly competent in some natural language (a) respond similarly to the same questions; and (b) referentially pick out the same items with the same terms. We will have more to say about the treatment of ὁμόνοια in the Alcibiades I in the next two sections.
- 12.
From the text, it is not clear exactly what is being claimed about the relation between political friendship and ὁμόνοια. Socrates asks: “When you say ‘friendship’, do you mean ὁμόνοια or [not]?” (126c4). There is no verb, although the “is” is assumed. As is quite usual in Greek, this still leaves the meaning rather indeterminate among a number of interpretive and logical choices. The formulation, political friendship [is] ὁμόνοια, suggests at least the following possibilities: (1) Political friendship is identical with ὁμόνοια; (2) Political friendship consists (entirely) in ὁμόνοια; (3) Political friendship consists (partly) in ὁμόνοια; (4) Ὁμόνοια is at least a necessary condition for political friendship such that there cannot be political friendship without ὁμόνοια; (5) Ὁμόνοια is a sufficient condition for political friendship such that if ὁμόνοια obtains, so does political friendship.
- 13.
See last note. 126c4-5 indicates that ὁμόνοια is at least a necessary condition for political friendship, but is not determinate enough to help us say if the relation between political friendship and ὁμόνοια is understood as a stronger relation, e.g., constitution, sufficiency, or even identity.
- 14.
Here Alcibiades assumes a conventionally-recognized gendered division of work. Socrates may not fully endorse this gendered division of work, but notes at 127a5-7 that this division is presupposed by Alcibiades ’ argument (κατὰ τὸν σὸν λόγον). In Republic V, for example, Plato’s Socrates will argue against just such a gendered division of labor in the kαλλίπολις.
- 15.
Another logical issue with this argument is that it makes the move from qualified to general claims. For example, Alcibiades moves from holding that citizens are not in ὁμόνοια regarding their areas of specialization, to concluding that there is no ὁμόνοια among citizens tout court. Clearly, this is an illegitimate move and may further point to Alcibiades’ general confusion. We can amend things by disambiguating between ὁμόνοια with respect to some subject matter or other.
- 16.
We might like to say here that novices lack “first-order” epistemic grounds. That is, the husband will lack whatever would primarily ground the belief “Spartan wool is superior for weaving summer garments.” However, the husband might have grounds for the belief “my wife is superior in weaving to me.” Thus, the husband possesses “second-order” epistemic grounds. These second-order epistemic grounds might license certain other beliefs such as “when my wife tells me that Spartan wool is better, I should believe her.”
- 17.
Despite Alcibiades’ failure to demonstrate political expertise, it is a background assumption of the Alcibiades is that political expertise is possible—it is possible for a human being to have knowledge about justice and injustice, and to have knowledge about how to make a community more just, both internally as well as in its dealings with other communities. If political expertise were not possible, there would be little point to Socrates’ attempted intervention with Alcibiades .
- 18.
This point is stressed in several of Plato’s dialogues, for example, the Gorgias, Republic, Apology and Statesman.
- 19.
Kamtekar (2004), understanding “ὁμόνοια” as “agreement,” has argued that robust political ὁμόνοια is achieved in the kαλλίπολις despite the epistemic differences between philosophers and non-philosophers. In Kamtekar’s view, both knowledge and virtue admit of degrees. Philosophers possess the highest degrees of virtue and knowledge, courtesy of their direct connections with the Forms. According to Kamtekar, however, non-philosophers are capable of possessing “demotic” virtue and knowledge , which are genuine but of lesser degree than that possessed by philosophers. First, in Kamtekar’s view, non-philosophers in the kαλλίπολις acquire true beliefs as a result of their cultural education . Second, non-philosophers are justified in these beliefs because these beliefs are “reliably connected with facts that make them true” (Kamtekar 2004, p. 142).
Accordingly, Kamtekar embraces the view we have rejected—political ὁμόνοια is to be understood, in her view, in terms of some degree of shared skill-knowledge. Note that Kamtekar’s view is sustained by attributing to Plato a wholly externalist account of knowledge. Non-philosophers count as knowing because their beliefs are connected in a reliable way to what makes these beliefs true. Non-philosophers may thus know without having access to cognitive states that are directly related to the Forms (contrary to what Plato has Socrates say on this subject in Book V of the Republic). They also need not be capable of (internally) accessing, that is, the justifiers for their true beliefs. It will be enough, in Kamtekar’s view, if education ensures that non-philosopher’s true beliefs in fact track what makes those beliefs true. We find no reason to accept that Plato would count something as knowledge if the epistemic agent were not able provide justification when challenged to supply it (or worse, would provide as justification something that was, in fact, false, such as what Plato calls the “Noble Lie”—see note 28, below). We do not, however, deny that Plato thinks that knowledge also has at least some externalist condition (see Smith 2000).
- 20.
The analogy with a body is helpful here. Faction is analogous to disease in a body. Civic unity will not simply be the absence of faction. Rather, civic unity is analogous to health in a body, a positive state that will tend to make a body resistant to disease. Interestingly, in the Republic, Plato’s Socrates presents a πόλις that is resistant to faction, but not entirely immune from it.
- 21.
The formulation echoes the Alcibiades I’s remarks concerning individuals who “disagree with themselves” and who are thus at odds with themselves.
- 22.
Catherine McKeen has argued elsewhere that adherence to the Principle of Specialization secures functional unity in the kαλλίπολις (McKeen 2004). While functional unity is an important component of overall civic unity , it is weaker than what is needed for robust civic unity. As an illustration of this, CM notes the city of pigs in Republic II. This πόλις is functionally unified by adherence to a modified form of PS, but falls short of the more complete unity achieved in the kαλλίπολις.
- 23.
See note 19 above.
- 24.
Τῷ φιλοσόφῳ ἄρα ἑπομένης ἁπάσης τῆς ψυχῆς καὶ μὴ στασιαζούσης ἑκάστῳ τῷ μέρει ὑπάρχει εἴς τε τἆλλα τὰ ἑαυτοῦ πράττειν καὶ δικαίῳ εἶναι, καὶ δὴ καὶ τὰς ἡδονὰς τὰς ἑαυτοῦ ἕκαστον καὶ τὰς βελτίστας καὶ εἰς τὸ δυνατὸν τὰς ἀληθεστάτας καρποῦσθαι.
- 25.
Οὐκοῦν ἵνα καὶ ὁ τοιοῦτος ὑπὸ ὁμοίου ἄρχηται οἵουπερ ὁ βέλτιστος, αὐτόν φαμεν δεῖν εἶναι ἐκείνου τοῦ βελτίστου καὶ ἔχοντος ἐν αὑτῷ τὸ θεῖον ἄρχον.
- 26.
οὐκ ἐπὶ βλάβῃ τῇ τοῦ δούλου οἰόμενοι δεῖν ἄρχεσθαι αὐτόν, ὥσπερ Θρασύμαχος ᾤετο τοὺς ἀρχομένους, ἀλλ’ ὡς ἄμεινον ὂν παντὶ ὑπὸ θείου καὶ φρονίμου ἄρχεσθαι, μάλιστα μὲν οἰκεῖον ἔχοντος ἐν αὑτῷ, εἰ δὲ μή, ἔξωθεν ἐφεστῶτος, ἵνα εἰς δύναμιν πάντες ὅμοιοι ὦμεν καὶ φίλοι, τῷ αὐτῷ κυβερνώμενοι. (The text is framed as a rhetorical question, drawing out the contrast between the Socratic-Platonic view and Thrasymachus’ view, and thus nicely tying the culminating view of the Republic with the preliminary remarks about faction in Book I).
- 27.
This also seems to us to count against Kamtekar’s claim that those outside the ruling class in the Republic should count as having a share of knowledge insofar as their beliefs reliably track what makes the beliefs true, since any falsehood that served to justify such beliefs (as would inevitably be the case resulting from a use of falsehood in political rule) would serve as a defeater for such “knowledge.” See note 19, above.
- 28.
Again, see Kamtekar (2004), and our notes 19 and 27 above.
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McKeen, C., Smith, N.D. (2018). Like-Mindedness: Plato’s Solution to the Problem of Faction. In: Anagnostopoulos, G., Santas, G. (eds) Democracy, Justice, and Equality in Ancient Greece. Philosophical Studies Series, vol 132. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-96313-6_6
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