Open AccessSocrates’ defence of justice in the Republic
Author(s) -
Manlio Fossati
Publication year - 2022
Publication title -
plato journal/plato
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.108
0eISSN - 2183-4105
pISSN - 2079-7567
DOI - 10.14195/2183-4105_23_4
Subject(s) - socrates , economic justice , dialogical self , afterlife , focus (optics) , the republic , epistemology , sociology , retributive justice , political science , law and economics , environmental ethics , law , philosophy , physics , optics
This paper argues that the dialogical dynamic gives important information on the importance of, and the hierarchy between, the reasons illustrated in favour of justice in Plato’s Republic. Despite his interlocutors’ request to focus exclusively on the effect of justice in and by itself, Socrates indicates that the description of the consequences of justice included in Book 10 (608c2-621d3) is an integral part of his defence, and that some of these consequences, the rewards assigned by the gods in the afterlife, are more important than both the other consequences of justice and the benefit of justice in and by itself.