Echoes of Plato and Aristotle in Marxist Philosophy

I had to reach way back in our justice files for this post, but I think these are useful comparisons. First of all, I am not claiming that the views of Marx, Plato, and Aristotle are congruent or that their philosophies are similar in a general sense. I only wish to point out some parallels in the details of their ultimately divergent conclusions.

In Book IV, Plato describes a conversation in which Socrates schools Glaucon in the ways of justice. In building up his conception of the soul as different parts analogous to the workings of a city, Socrates makes two assertions:

1) “The power that consists in everyone’s doing his own work rivals wisdom, moderation, and courage in its contribution to the virtue of the city” (59).
2) “Meddling and exchange between these three classes, then, is the greatest harm that can happen to the city and would rightly be called the worst thing someone could do to it” (60).

In a Marxist society, the first claim would be universally accepted. If every citizen were free to pursue his or her passions, no one would experience the four types of alienation that result from work in a capitalist economy; thus, the general public would be happier and (as Marx presumed) more productive. However, the steps necessary to reach this stage of communism are wholly inconsistent with Plato’s second claim. According to him, there are three classes, and the society prospers only if every person is able to do his or her own life’s work within his or her assigned class. The society cannot be successful if people strive for social mobility; indeed, “these exchanges and this sort of meddling bring the city to ruin” (60). For Marx, the first principle is possibly only in a classless society. An extreme overhaul of the class system is the only way to achieve a state in which everyone can effectively and harmoniously contribute to the betterment of society, for only in a classless society can “the productive forces [increase] with the all-round development of the individual, and all the springs of co-operative wealth flow more abundantly” (181). In this case, Plato’s thesis and Marx’s antithesis, while in agreement over what is best for individual citizens, cannot be synthesized due to their opposing conceptions of a just society.

As for Aristotle, there are definite similarities between his notion of distributive justice and Marx’s defense of the “right of inequality.” Aristotle says that wealth should be distributed in direct proportion to merit, and justice exists between excess and deficiency. This, of course, is called a meritocracy; however, it is not completely incompatible with communism. In a Marxist system of course class differences would not be an issue, but such a system “recognizes unequal individual endowment and thus productive capacity as natural privileges” (181). He acknowledges the injustice, for example, in distributing the same amount of resources to two workers, one single and self-reliant and the other supporting a family, the single man has more for himself and is thus richer, living in excess of his needs. In order to avoid what he terms “defects” such as this, Marx concedes that “right instead of being equal would have to be unequal” (181), even in a communist state. I think this idea shows that Marx, radical though he was, had not completely abandoned or ignored what Aristotle considered implicit in human nature: “For everyone agrees that what is just in distribution must fit some sort of worth” (78). By this principle, even in a communist society that seeks to equalize people as much as possible, there is still stratification in distribution, as inequality is inherent not in regard socioeconomic status but in individuals’ abilities and circumstances.