The Ascent to the Good

Praised and condemned by totalitarians and democrats, liberals, fascists and communists, progressives and conservatives, Plato's Republic is one of the most influential writings in the history of political ideas. In its central books the philosopher puts in the mouth of Socrates the principles of its challenging political construction.

The defense of the philosophical government in Plato's Republic reveals the necessity of distinguishing true philosophers from false ones. This issue leads to the central question of the Good, the principle that constitutes the foundation of philosophical knowledge and of political activity. Once this principle has been introduced, the subsequent question turns on the education of the philosophers, which occupies Book VII.
The present volume contains contributions to the main issues developed in Books V-VII of the Republic, on which the attention of scholarship in the past 100 years has focused, practical philosophy, metaphysics, dialectics, and the question of the Good.