The first book of The Republic revolves around the concept of justice and injustice and whether one pays better than the other. There are three main points of view: Cephalus’ and Polemarchus’ view, respectively, is that justice takes place when one pays one’s debt and that justice happens when one benefits from friends and harms his enemies. Thrasymachus’ view is that justice is only in the interest of the stronger; in other words, justice is determined by those in power and the weak have to submit to it. In contrast, Socrates’ view is that justice pays better than injustice because it elicits the goodness and wisdom in people and only the just and wise are able to live a good life. While Thrasymachus’ and Socrates’ points of view seem compelling, one could argue that they are also extreme and their failure to seek for middle grounds, rather than extreme opposites, is somewhat naïve and one-dimensional.
Thrasymachus’ argues that justice is only in the interest of the stronger because [political] power controls the lower social class –whether right or wrong only those who have power are in a position to come off better than the weak because they can ‘buy’ or create their own justice. Later, he goes on and says that injustice pays better than justice because men who are unjust are happier since they can get away with a lot more than the just, for instance the just man pays for taxes while the unjust man avoids it and thus ends up ‘better’ than the just man who lost money paying for taxes. He believes men are by nature individualistic and selfish and that men should go after whatever makes them happy with no consideration whatsoever of others’ lives.
His arguments for defending injustice seem very compelling if thought in a very narrow-minded way: Thrasymachus fails to see that not all people with power are unjust, selfish and individualistic; he fails to understand [or consider] that maybe happiness is subjective and that not everyone believes happiness comes only with the acquisition of power or money –to many, Socrates being one of them, happiness is a spiritual state of mind conquered with the achievement of other virtues. Also, he fails to realize that not all situations in a man’s ordinary life are at stake or that they have to be decided in court with a judge; there are events in a man’s life that are private and thus are not of importance of anyone else but himself. Therefore, Thrasymachus’ view of injustice triumph over justice, pretends to defy all notions of moral-affiliation, moral values and all types of bonds between two entities, thus leaving us with the biased belief that injustice pays better than justice.
Alternatively to Thrasymachus’ view, Socrates believes justice is the key to achieve the greater good and the extremely well-crafted Kalipolis he had in mind; a city governed by philosopher rulers whose justice, wisdom and excellence would lead its citizens to excel in every aspect of their lives. However, Socrates, as well as Thrasymachus, views justice as an interest, though, as opposed to Thrasymachus, Socrates views it as an interest of a community, of a whole, of a group and not as an interest of the individual solely, like Thrasymachus.
As a result, Socrates standpoint in Book I is that a man in power –such as a statesman, looks only for the interest of those under his ruling with no self-interest whatsoever. Consequently, Socrates’ arguments against Thrasymachus’ are proven to be easily won due to his tremendous ability to seek for the truth using the Socratic method which, one can argue, was the decisive factor of his argument victory against Thrasymachus.
Undoubtedly, at a simple view, Socrates arguments for the defense of ‘justice pays better than injustice’ are the ones that are going to have more adepts [**followers?] because his reasoning as to why this is true makes moral sense to us and fits with the values that we have been taught. However, when arguing about ‘justice as the interest of the stronger’ or why self-interest is the ultimate demise of a society, Socrates fails to find some other reasons for which a society can be terminated aside from self-interest, which by the way, does not seem as harmful to a society as malice or hatred can be.
Even so, Socrates views the relationship of statesman – citizen or shepherd - herd, as a completely selfless parent – child relationship in which the parent seeks for nothing but the wellbeing of his child, in this case, the ruler will only want the best for its citizens and nothing less than that, even the statesman forgetting about his own wellbeing and comfort. This ideal premise of a statesman-citizen relationship, although a very nice one, is a very impractical and non-realistic one. To think that Socrates would believe this was plausible makes one wonder if Plato was, indeed, very well aware that he was just writing about a utopian society.
Both Socrates and Thrasymachus have well-founded, extremely opposite, debatable arguments pro and against justice and injustice, respectively. However, what really makes one question is whether they thought this was the only way possible to sustain a society, and if they did not think this was the only way, then why aren’t there any other ways explained or talked about in the book? Was it a matter of the eras in which they were living? Was it a cultural matter -Greek gods, sacrifices, myths? Whatever the reasons they had to sustain their points of view, the grounds why both theories do not seem to work in a society is that both are extreme and too far away from reality; it seems that it never occurred to them to combine both theories in order to bring middle grounds. One was too loose and careless and the other too methodic and perfect. Neither of them could have worked, because men’s behavior does not represent those extremes; men are a combination of both.
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If you'd like to hear more about Plato's definition of justice and injustice, visit the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy at:
http://www.iep.utm.edu/. It is very helpful.
