1. Devolution to Timocracy (from Greek τιμή timē, "price, worth" and -κρατία -kratia, “rule”) - a regime in which the rulers are motivated by honor. (e.g. Sparta in ancient Greece)
2. Kallipolis, an aristocracy ruled by “the best,” with a unified rulership is stable, but “since for everything that has come into being there is decay, not even a composition such as this will remain for all time; it will be dissolved.” (546a, p.223)
3. Failure to attain the Nuptial Number - symbol of a science of eugenics, the reengineering of human nature to make it totally pliable and rationally-dominated; The children of the philosopher-kings will have less consideration; ‘chaotic mixing’ of classes. The son turns away from virtue to pursue honor and power, at the influence of the complaining wife: “Her husband ‘isn’t very serious about money and doesn’t fight and insult people for its sake…” (549d, p.227). The child ‘turns over the rule in himself to the middle part, the part that loves victory and is spirited; he became a haughty-minded man who loves honor.”
4. Devolution to Oligarchy ((from Greek ὀλιγαρχία (oligarkhía); from ὀλίγος (olígos), meaning 'few', and ἄρχω (arkho), meaning 'to rule or to command') is a form of power structure in which power rests with a small number of people. Rule based on property assessment. Honor destroyed by “the treasure house full of gold.” (550d, p.228) Corruption of rulers: “if a man were to choose pilots of ships in that way - on the basis of property assessments - and wouldn’t entrust one to a poor man, even if he were a more skilled pilot… they would make a poor sailing.” (551c, p.229)
5. Leads to faction - class warfare between rich and poor, and no one minding their own business and to debt peonage - enslavement via impoverishment, the greatest of all evils… allowing one man to sell everything that belongs to him and another to get hold of it; and when he has sold it, allowing him to live in the city while belonging to none of its parts… a poor man without means.” (552a, p.230) (alienation from civil society); poverty then leads to crime.
6. Personality of the oligarchical soul, sees his honor-loving father victimized by courts “thrusts love of honor and spiritedness out of the throne of his soul; and, humbled by poverty, he turns greedily to money-making…makes the [rational part of his soul] sit on the ground and consider nothing but where more money will come from…” (553b-c, p.231). The oligarchical soul as fragmented - must repress his desires (for more and more wealth) in order to maintain propriety/contracts. (232) the love of wealth cannot be moderated.
7. The USA a de facto vs de jure oligarchy? In 2015, the most recent year for which Quartz could access this information, the median member of the US Congress was worth at least $1.1 million. That is more than 12 times greater than the net wealth of the median US household. And that doesn’t tell the whole story, since the chambers of congress are not equal in wealth terms. The median net worth of a senator was $3.2 million, versus $900,000 for members of the House of Representatives.]
8. Devolution to Democracy (Greek: δημοκρατία dēmokratía, literally "rule by people") is a system of government where the citizens exercise power by voting. In a direct democracy, the citizens as a whole form a governing body and vote directly on each issue. In a representative democracy the citizens elect representatives from among themselves.
9. Increase of poverty - Oligarchs increase power through populism and debt-based consumption: “…in order that by buying and making loans on the property of such men they can become richer… carrying off from the father a multiple offspring of interest (tokos), they make the drone and the beggar great in the city.” (555c-d, p.234) - leads to takeover by the poor in the name of “freedom” or license.
10. Democracy as “probably the fairest of the regimes” because of its freedom and diversity of opinions and types of people (557c, p.235); is a “good place to look for a regime… [since it] contains all species of regimes.” Also it is “…a sweet regime, without rulers and many-colored, dispensing equality to equals and unequals alike.”
11. The democratic soul - in the interest of freedom, liberates unnecessary desires, practices aesthetic/hedonic egalitarianism, treating all pleasures as equally valid; calls “anarchy freedom, wastefulness magnificence, and shamelessness courage.” (560e, p.239)
12. Devolution to Tyranny (from Latin tyrannus, meaning "illegitimate ruler", from the Greek τύραννος tyrannos "monarch, ruler of a polis")
13. From the Pleasure of Duty to the Duty of Pleasure - Democracy gets drunk on freedom, enslaving reason and honor to hedonism; dissolution of ruler/ruled or teacher/student or doctor/patient hierarchy; loss of authority, loss of self-discipline; “Too much freedom seems to change into nothing but too much slavery, both for private man and city.” (564a, p.242)
14. Rise of the tyrannical ruler - appeals to desires and fears of the masses (hoi polloi); promises to give them anything they want; attacks his wealthy enemies to consolidate power; starts wars to maintain need for authoritarian leadership: “…as his first step he is always setting some war in motion, so that the people will be in need of a leader.” (566e, p. 246) Overcoming of shame.
15. Healthy and moderate vs sick and libertine relationships to Self - the tyrant as freeing dark unconscious desires vs the well-ordered soul as satisfying desires moderately so that they do not interfere with Life of the Mind. (572a-b, p.252). The tyrant as slave to his desires; steals to maintain consumption; all relationships become manipulative: “they live their whole life without every being friends of anyone, always one man’s master or another’s slave…the man who turns out to be the worst will also turn out to be the most wretched.” (576b, p.256)
16. Answers to Glaucon: (1) “The best and most just man is the happiest, and he is that man who is kingliest and is king of himself; while the worst and most unjust man is most wretched and…is most tyrant of himself and of the city.” (580c, p.261) (2) The love of learning (philosophical life) is more pleasurable that either the lover of material gain or honor seeking, based on the opinion of the only person familiar with all three kinds of pleasures: the philosopher (583a, p.264)
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