Statecraft as a Ruling, Caring, and Weaving dunamis

Chapter 10 focusses on Statesman 303d4-305e7 and considers the Visitor’s seemingly three definitions of statecraft in the dialogue: 305c10-d5, 305e2-6, and 311b7-c7. By focusing on the role of the dunamis of given forms of expertise, and the metaphorical method of smelting metals at work in this section of the dialogue, it argues that a definition of statecraft (hē politikē) as ruling, caring, and weaving is reached in 305e2-6 and then fleshed out in 311b7-c7 by the explication of the ergon (task) which it is the role of that dunamis to accomplish. This is broadly consonant with a passage in Republic 5 identifying any given dunamis in terms of that over which it is set and what it accomplishes (apergazetai), a schema filled out in the Statesman by explicit reference to the ergon of a dunamis (305c4-5). Political expertise is not a passive body of knowledge but rather actively and precisely organized toward the realization of its distinctive task.

Weaving together Natural Courage and Moderation

Chapter 11 discusses Statesman 305e8-308b9, where the Visitor identifies, as a source of civic conflict, disagreements about whether a course of action or a person is courageous or rash, moderate or cowardly, disagreements he analyses as conducted using thick ethical terms. He claims that these disagreements are rooted in natural temperamental differences among human beings (some are naturally courageous and others naturally moderate) and are to be reconciled by political expertise’s production of shared true opinions among citizens about what is fine, good, and just. The chapter develops an account of how political expertise might use the two expertises of measurement (metrētikē) described at Plt. 283c-285c to give citizens of opposing outlooks shared beliefs about what is just, fine, and good (309c-311a), and points to some counterparts in the Laws to the account, developed from the Statesman, that expertise enables one to hit the mean.

Trailhead

Chapter 2 focusses on Statesman 257a1-259d6 and argues that Plato’s non-elenchtic methodology, although often characterized as ‘collection and division’, is a much richer combination of elements. The methodology exposes ways ordinary language may mislead the scientific project: it itself involves paradigms, especially that of weaving, definition as both demarcation and explanation, and special care in positing the initial step and in collection under genuinely principled kinds, (eidē). The argument for the Unity of expertise in king, statesman, head of household, and master (258e8-259c5) illustrates this last. But both its validity and its relation to the Allocation of political expertise in the first ‘cut’ or division (259c6-d2) are problematic. The chapter argues that the Unity argument’s relation to the Allocation is as a methodological prerequisite, and not, as others suppose, a step in an argument for the latter. Regarding its invalidity, the chapter takes issue with three attempted solutions, and, appealing to Aristotle’s Politics, suggests that an effective argument can be restored by supposing a remark fallen out before Robinson’s transposition of 259d4-6.

Expert Assistance in Security Politics: Problems and Possibilities

The article examines the problem of correlation between the “knowledge society” and “knowledge practice,” based on analysis of the phenomenon of security expertise as a part of political expertise. In the article, we consider the relationship between politics and security and demonstrate under what circumstances security becomes politics. It is noted that at present the concept of security has become very multifaceted and includes various spheres, from military-political to informational and humanitarian. We defines security expertise, list its key parameters, origin, its institutionalization and practices. Special attention is paid to the characteristics of the main schools in the study of security expertise problems. Their general ideology and inherent problems are analyzed, including the correspondence of the quality of the expertise to recognized standards of scientific knowledge. We explain why security issues appeal to experts and result in numerous studies. We raise an issue of causes that may lead to possible deprofessionalization of security expertise. We identify a number of institutions with an expert status in the field of security and explain the global growth of analytical centers specializing in security expertise. A brief description of such analytical centers and their main features is given. We look into examples of practical impact of expertise on political decision-making, and possible mechanisms of expert support. It is concluded that expert analysis can exercise direct impact on political processes, and the experts become influential shadow participants. On the one hand, this may contribute to adopting more balanced decisions, but, on the other hand, it may result in deprofessionalization of experts who will try to adjust to the demands of politicians. Thus, in the sphere of security expertise, one of the results of the formation of a “knowledge society” is a decrease in the autonomy of the scientific sphere, which has a side effect in the form of deprofessionalization of knowledge.

Women and peace-building in Northern Ireland’s print news media

This research sits at the nexus of women, peace-building and the news media in order to decipher how the representations of women and peace-building in post-conflict Northern Ireland affect women’s social situation in divided societies recovering from violent ethnonational conflict. Women are habitually associated with non-political community-level reconciliation through an assumed innate and feminine propensity to peace. This is amplified through gendered news media portrayals which serve to reinforce patriarchal social knowledge, and in turn, this disenfranchises women by foregrounding their femaleness rather than political expertise; and damages peace by marginalizing a significant demographic of the population and intensifying social inequality, which is the foundation for conflict.

Plato On The Unity of the Political Arts (Statesman 258 D–259D)

Plato argues that four political arts—politics, kingship, slaveholding, and household-management—are the same. His argument, which prompted Aristotle’s reply in Politics I, has been universally panned. I consider and reject three ways of saving the argument, and argue for a fourth. On my view, Plato assumes that politics is identical with kingship, just as he does elsewhere, but he begs no questions because the point of his argument is to identify the public arts of politics and kingship with the private arts of household-management and slaveholding. He does this successfully by addressing three reasons why one might distinguish the private from the public arts. His argument leaves room for Aristotle to propose other reasons. One of them—involving differences among men and women and slaves—is unfortunate, but another is more promising. The Aristotelian can assume that political expertise is a matter of know-how gathered by experience of the particular actions which differ in the public and private arts. But Plato might well be right to reject this, and to insist that the essential difference between the expert and non-expert—the dividing line between good and bad rule—is not in experience but in their grasp of their goals.

Latin American Political Discussion in Comparative Perspective

This chapter fills a major gap in the literature on Latin American politics by providing descriptive information about the region's political discussion networks. It reports the absolute and relative prevalence of political discussion — compared to other countries and to other intermediaries — in Brazil, Mexico, and eight other Latin American countries. Latin American citizens discuss politics at a frequency that is typical or even above that prevailing in other countries, and their propensity to speak with residential neighbors is well above the global average. The chapter then portrays the amount of political disagreement and the disparity in political expertise between discussion partners. Rates of disagreement over vote choices in Latin America are high relative to those in the United States, and this is largely because the region's multiparty systems afford more opportunities for disagreement. Moreover, Latin Americans seek out discussion partners with relatively high political expertise, an important part of the socially informed preferences argument.

Women in Legislative Committees in Arab Parliaments

Extant studies have predominantly focused on women's numerical presence in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA)'s legislatures, yet, research examining the role played by female politicians continues to be limited. To bridge this gap, we study one of the most important, albeit overlooked, bodies within these assemblies: legislative committees. Using an original dataset on committee memberships (n=4580), our data show that females are significantly marginalized from influential committees and tend to be sidelined to social issues and women's committees. To explain this, we develop a theory of provisional gender stereotyping. We argue that the duration of quota implementation shapes women's access to influential committees. We focus on two mechanisms to support our argument: a redistribution of power dynamics within legislative bodies and women's political expertise.

Politics as Architectonic Expertise? Against Taking the So-called ‘Architect’ (ἀρχιτέκτων) in Plato’s Statesman to Prefigure this Aristotelian View

This article rejects the claim made by other scholars that Plato in the Statesman, by employing the so-called ‘architect’ (ὁ ἀρχιτέκτων) in one of the early divisions leading to the definition of political expertise, prefigured and anticipated the architectonic conception of political expertise advanced by Aristotle. It argues for an alternative reading in which Plato in the Statesman, and in the only other of his works (Gorgias) in which the word appears, closely tracks the existing social role of the architektōn, who was designated as such only in virtue of appointment by a city to a role that was crucially defined as epitactic, involving overseeing the workers on site engaged in constructing some civic building works. It is this epitactic dimension of the role on which Plato relies in the Statesman, as opposed to the kind of claim to overarching integrative expertise that Aristotle would use the figure of architectonic political knowledge to make.