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	• Politics (Dover Thrift Editions) Aristotle Dover Publications, 2000 - 355 pages average customer review:based on 24 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

In "The Politics", the author begins by analyzing the human being, that is in his opinion a political animal by nature. Afterwards, he explains what are, for him, the origins of the polis: family, small village and then, polis. Aristotle says that even though the polis is the last chronologically, it is all the same the most important, because it is autarchic. The polis (not exactly like our states, but similar to them in some aspects) is a natural community, because it answers to something that human beings need. Only in the polis will men find perfection, only there will they be completely human. Aristotle distinguishes between citizens and non-citizens (the vast majority), and points out that only citizens have political rights. The author delves in many other themes, for example the causes of revolution, the good and bad forms of government, and the "ideal" form of government. What is more, he also considers several constitutions, and talks about the adequate education that forms good citizens for the polis.

Now, why should you read a book that was written many centuries ago and that on top of that isn't especially easy to read?. The answer is quite simple: "The Politics" is worth it. Of course, you will find faults in some of Aristotle's opinions (for instance, he thought that slaves were "live property", and that slavery was a natural institution), but you cannot ignore that most of his book is as relevant today as it was when he wrote it. "The Politics" is a book that teaches the reader to analyze reality, and to watch things differently, from another perspective. It also mentions several times that it is always necessary to take into account the context, because there are not perfect solutions good for every circumstance. Even though that seems merely common sense, it is an often forgotten truth...

On the whole, I can recommend this book to all those who are interested in Political Science, History of Ideas, or simply curious. I can guarantee that if you are patient enough to end it, you will learn a lot.

Belen Alcat

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The father of medieval thinking

Aristotle was in fact a Macedonian by birth and had as one of his utmost desires to be accepted in Athens as a full-fledged citizen, something he never attained. To be or not a citizen at those times, was the determinant factor in the importance each one attained in the social structure. One has to keep in mind that all the political concepts that we inherited from the Greeks, got a different perspective at those times, where slavery was normally accepted and practised against the non-Greeks human beings. Aristotle was a disciple of Plato, whom he quotes many times in a derogatory manner, and he lived in Athens many years after years of tutorship of Philip and his son Alexander of Macedonia, to whom he did not mention a word of praise or reprimand in this book. What amazed most after reading this excelent book is the maturity the institutions had attained at his times, and the degree of accuracy and detail to which he devotes many chapters analysing the constitutions of many Greek states, Sparta included. One word of caution has to be addresed to the student of poltics: this is not a book about statecraft or the arts of governing people at 350 BC. All in all, the text seems to lose some strenght due to the impossibity of translating so rich a text and by the lack of precise terms for each and every situation there described. But, in the end, the reader will get a glimpse of this very important period of western civilazation, specially if one has in mind that the heyday of Greece was gone and what lays ahead was the supremacy of Rome as world militar empire. To add interest to the reader, one has to keep in mind that the powerfull influence the aristotelian thought had in the medieval thinking.

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Aristole's Politics is relevant and still applicable today

~The Politics (Penguin Classics)~ is a groundbreaking classic of Hellenistic political thought from the rational philosopher Aristotle. "Man is by nature a political animal," avows Aristotle. First, it is important to note that this is not an authoritarian ruler's blackbook on the art of governing. Aristotle is not Machiavelli. Second, many people when first approaching Aristotle naively presume that he is mirror-image protege of Plato, which could not be further from the truth. Aristotle's references to his teacher Plato are laced with a cynical tone of irreverence. Plato was an idealist and Aristotle was a profound realist. I think it is a pointless endeavor to pick favorites from among them since rationalism and idealism both have their limitations. Some political theorists split hairs over whether Aristotle or Plato is a "conservative," which is hardly ascertainable. This is reductionism at its worst. In Hellenic antiquity, there was no delineation between the state and civil society, which should horrify the modern conservative. So, perhaps the conservative should content himself to be well read in both Aristotle and Plato rather than simply seeking to emulate one of them. Aristotle had a profound influence on the rise of medieval scholasticism and profoundly shaped the thought of Catholic theologians like Thomas Aquinas. Perhaps one of his big accomplishments is giving the realist camp intellectual ammunition to buoy their position.

Politics is still relevant today I think and one can learn a lot from Aristotle. It should be noted that Greek political thought and their concept of the polity (body politic) is profoundly dissimilar from post-medieval political thought in the West. Yet Aristotle's Politics is still relevant today in my opinion. I think one of the most profound things to be gleaned from Politics is a healthy dose of realism as opposed to the naive Wilsonian idealism that our leaders apply to foreign policy. Aristotle realized there are no canned quick-fix universal solutions to subordinate everything to. Also, Aristotle elaborated upon the various ascertainable political systems in their good and bad forms respectively (i.e. monarchy, tyranny; aristocracy, oligarchy; polity, democracy; etc.) Moreover, the practical approach to governance varies depends on any number of factors such as the nature of the polity, culture and society. Hence, modern efforts to impose "democracy" and/or "democratic capitalism" as if these are tangible commodities for export abroad usually are usually met with failures, or unexpected and less than desired for results. In recent years, nations like Russia acclimated to authoritarian rule never had much success at implementing it. The closest thing to "democracy" in the Islamic world, for example, would be Ayatollah Khomeini's populist fundamentalist regime in Iran that emerged in the late 1970s. Is that what the West really wants for the Muslim world?

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