Aristotle: Anarchist or Totalitarian?

Paper Summary:

According to Jonathan Barnes, Aristotle's political philosophy runs rife with totalitarian principles. Not so, replies David Keyt, since Aristotle, perhaps never recognizing it himself, approached his political philosophy from a fundamentally anarchistic base. Was Aristotle essentially a totalitarian or an anarchist? This paper attempts to answer that question. First, it interprets Barnes' argument as presented in his 1990 essay "Aristotle and Political Liberty." It then moves onto an exposition of David Keyt's position as put forward in his 1993 paper "Aristotle and Anarchism." Thereafter, the paper returns to Barnes' essay and examines each numbered point. By combining his own arguments with Keyt's insights, the author of the paper refutes Barnes' position.

From the Paper:

"This contention against slavery, Keyt suggests, "contains the seeds of philosophical anarchism," since its conclusion infers about slavery that no difference exists by nature between master and slave, and the rule of master over slave depends on force. The same can apply in the political arena: no difference exists by nature between ruler and subject, and political rule depends on force. Hence, "a wholesale challenge of political authority is but a short step from the wholesale challenge of slavery" (138). The main idea behind philosophical anarchism is that coercion is unjust, and "the rejection of political authority ... is not a first principle of the theory (of anarchism) but a corollary of its view about coercion and force" (138)."

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