Education and Corruption in Plato’s Republic

• In Event: The Ancient Conception of the Good

Abstract

Socrates presents two substantive accounts of corruption in the Republic. According to the first account, the moral-political education that a young person receives through the praise and blame of the many—whom he calls “biggest sophists” (402b1)— is itself a form of corruption. Such an education corrupts the nature of the promising young in that it leads them to a life of politics over and above the life of philosophy for which they are truly fit. Here, Socrates speaks of corruption from the perspective of philosophy. In the second account of corruption, the source is not the civic education of the young but is instead a part of the philosophic education: the young get their hands on dialectics—meaning simply arguments and refutations—and subsequently lose their attachment to the law and the prescribed beliefs of the lawgiver. Here, Socrates speaks of corruption from the perspective of the city. This paper attempts to think through the implications of the two accounts of corruption. Perhaps by “considering them side by side and rubbing them together like sticks,” we can make education “burst into flame, and once it’s come to light, confirm it for ourselves” (435a1-2).

Author

• Quinn Rifkin, Boston College