Each person will not know who their immediate biological family is. More ominously, children born with defects will be “ hidden away” ( katakrypsousin).Įverything is to be arranged so everyone can say “mine” about the same things. There will be rigged “lotteries” so that the lesser-credentialed think it is just bad luck that they cannot “hook up” with the alphas.īabies will be taken from their mothers by the rulers to a kind of state crèche. The best warriors will get to sleep with the most beautiful women. Less amusing is the proposed power of Socrates’ enlightened guardians to “breed” men and women as breeders selectively mate horses, dogs or fighting birds. When Socrates suggests that justice is only possible if philosophers become kings, or kings philosophers, his young companion Glaucon jokes that most people on hearing this will probably reach for their weapons. The third class are craftspeople and traders more recognisable to us today. Indeed, Socrates depicts men and women as absolutely equal in all decisive senses. The second class will be “auxiliaries” or soldiers who will share everything in common, including wives and children. On top will be a ruling caste of (yes) philosopher-guardians. The Matrix 20 years on: how a sci-fi film tackled big philosophical questionsĭivided into ten “books”, the Republic is mostly taught as a text championing a series of radical prescriptions concerning the best city ( polis) or regime ( politeia).Īt a certain point, Plato’s Socrates tells his young friends that the best city will be one in which the population is divided into three castes.

Warner Bros., Village Roadshow Pictures, Groucho Film Partnership

Keanu Reeves in The Matrix (1999): the film revisits some of Plato’s ideas outlined in The Republic.

The Republic by Plato