Aristotle and citizenship

Aristotle and citizenship
the responsibilities of citizenship in the Politics

Ralph Harrington
BA (Lond.), MSt (Oxon.), DPhil (Oxon.)

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ARISTOTLE’S POLITICS is an investigation of how people live in political communities; it is both a practical study of the nature of real states and a theoretical exploration of the form of the best possible state. At the centre of both aspects of the work is the phenomenon of the polis, the self-sufficient political community, the state; and at the heart of the state is the concept of the citizen, for ‘the state is an aggregate of citizens’ (Politics I: ii, 59*). Aristotle follows the same method as he uses with other ‘natural’ objects in studying the state, seeking to analyse it by examining its constituent parts; those parts are the citizens of the state, and it is the exercise of the responsibilities of citizenship which give the state its existence. Any explanation of the significance attached to citizenship in Aristotle’s political theory must therefore examine both the basis of citizenship as the type of human function and the relationship between the fulfilment of that function and the phenomenon of the state.

Aristotle begins his political investigation with three claims: first, that man is a ‘political animal’ (Politics I: ii, 59) with a natural impulse towards association with others; second, that the state ‘exists by nature’ as a result of that human impulse (Politics I: ii, 59); and third, that there are certain human faculties, such as the ability to reason over matters of good and evil, and justice (Politics I: ii, 60) which can only flourish in the context of a political association, the expression of which distinguishes man the political animal from other, nonpolitical animals. Clearly, if the origins of the state are so deeply rooted in the fundamentals of human nature, and the qualities of citizenship are in turn at the heart of the nature of the state, then the origins of the human role of citizenship must also lie deep within human nature. Aristotle in the Politics gives support to this view:

... men have a desire for life together, even when they have no need for each other’s help...The good life is indeed a chief end, both communally and individually; but they form and continue to maintain a political association for the sake of life itself. (Politics III: vi, 187)

It is through political association that man’s deep impulse towards community finds expression, and it is through citizenship that political association is enabled to function.

‘Who is a citizen?’ (Politics III: i, 168) is one of the most important questions Aristotle asks in the Politics; for, while all human beings are impelled towards the creation of communities, culminating in the ultimate political community, the state, not all of them become the citizens of that state as it is described by Aristotle. His empirical evidence reveals that there is no consistent rule of citizenship: ‘…there is no unanimity, no agreement as to what constitutes a citizen; it often happens that one who is a citizen in a democracy is not a citizen in an oligarchy’ (Politics III: i, 168). Aristotle’s citizen is defined in terms of his eligibility for the offices of the state: ‘what effectively distinguishes the citizen proper from or others is his participation in giving judgment and in holding office’ (Politics III: i, 169). By ‘office’ Aristotle is not referring only to the chief political, judicial and administrative posts in the state, but also official posts, including service on juries and the like. Aristotle takes the type of constitution which he calls ‘democracy’ as offering the widest general range of such offices for the purposes of discussion, but recognises that other forms of constitution may have differing definitions of citizenship to fit in with their own institutions; thus the fact that a ‘citizen’ of Athens is eligible for membership of assemblies and juries with a permanent place in constitution gives the specific meaning of ‘citizenship’ there a different significance to that which it would have in Sparta, where such institutions have a more ad hoc existence. But Aristotle is clear that this does not affect the validity of his basic definition: ‘as soon as a man becomes entitled to participate in office, deliberative or judicial, we deem him to be a citizen of that state; and a number of such persons large enough to secure a self-sufficient life we may, by and large, call a state’ (Politics III: i, 171). Thus, while the specific details of constitutions differ from state to state the significance and meaning of ‘citizenship’ as a valid term for those who participate fully in those constitutions is, for Aristotle, unimpaired.

Both the origins of Aristotle’s concept of citizenship and the nature of the functions which Aristotle wishes the citizen to fulfil influence the criteria which he establishes for the possession of citizenship. At the beginning of the Politics, in book I, he has claimed that ‘the real difference between man and other animals is that humans alone have perception of good and evil, just and unjust, etc. It is the sharing of a common view in these matters that makes a household and a state’ (Politics I: ii, 60). Furthermore, ‘whatever is incapable of participating in the association which we call the state... is not a part of the state at all’ (Politics I: ii, 61). Those who are incapable of sharing a perception of justice, good and evil, those who cannot participate in the processes of discussion, deliberation and decision which lie at the heart of the human political association, cannot be admitted to the citizen body. This category of non-citizens includes those people who are best suited to the role of slaves, and women, who are in Aristotle’s view intelligent and able to reason, but have a tendency to let passion overcome their rational powers.

Citizenship, then, is the essence of the state’s existence; it is through the political activity of the citizen body at the offices of the state are filled and their functions enabled, whatever the constitutional form of state:

The ‘constitution’ of a state is the organisation of the offices, and in particular of the one that is sovereign over all the others. Now in every case the citizen-body of the state is sovereign; the citizen-body is the constitution. Thus in democracies the people are sovereign, in oligarchies the few. (Politics III: vi, 187)

The political responsibilities of citizenship could hardly be greater, but for Aristotle they are entirely in accordance with nature. Citizenship is nothing less than the fullest fulfillment of human potential in terms of the ‘good life’. In this respect, as throughout Aristotle’s politics, the essence of citizenship lies in active participation. The citizen is not merely an inhabitant of the state, nor simply a member of a politically privileged class; he is the essence of the state’s ability to achieve the greatest measure of happiness and virtue as a community. For this, the citizen must have the leisure to devote himself to the educative cultural pursuits which facilitate his understanding of virtue. For this reason, Aristotle is clear that ‘the citizens must not live in mechanical or commercial life. Such a life is not noble, and it militates against virtue’ (Politics VII: ix, 415).

Thus there is more to the state and its role than as an association serving the common interests of its people and fulfilling the human desire for community. In Aristotle’s teleological political science, the state has a purpose: to enable its citizens to enjoy the greatest degree of happiness, and acquire fullest measure of virtue. The ‘best state’ will fulfil this purpose, permitting all citizens to obtain the possession of arête, goodness, and phronesis, practical wisdom. In the Ethics, Aristotle wrote that: ‘…the end of political science is the highest good; and the chief concern of this science is to imbue the citizens with certain qualities, namely virtue and the desire to do fine deeds’ (Ethics, I: ix, 81). In the Politics he makes the same point relate specifically to the form of the ‘best state’: ‘our object is to find the best constitution, and that means the one whereby state will be best ordered, and... we call a state best ordered in which the possibilities for happiness are greatest’ (Politics VII: xiii, 428). The statesman must have knowledge of virtue if he is to guide the state towards the goal of virtue, for ‘the true statesman is thought of as a man who has taken special pains to study [ the nature of virtue]; for he wants to make his fellow-citizens good and law-abiding people’. Furthermore, ‘legislators make their citizens good by habituation; this is the intention of every legislator, and those who do not carry it out fail of their object. This is what makes the difference between a good constitution and a bad one’ (Ethics II: i, 92). If the citizens are to respond to the aims of the state in this respect, they too must have a knowledge of virtue; the laws and the education system must be shaped in such a way to ensure that they are capable of attaining the ultimate goodness, happiness and virtue.

* References to Aristotle’s Politics and Ethics, given in round brackets in the text, are to the editions cited in the bibliography, and take the form: (book: section, page number).

© Ralph Harrington 2005. This work is protected by copyright and is made available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivative Works 3.0 Licence. This means that you can copy, distribute and transmit this work freely as long as it is attributed to the original author; you may not alter, transform or build upon this work; and you may not use this work for commercial purposes.

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Bibliography

Works by Aristotle

The Ethics of Aristotle, translated by J. A. K. Thomson, revised by H. Tredennick (London: Penguin, 1953, rev. edn. 1976)

The Politics, translated by T. A. Sinclair, revised by T. J. Saunders (London: Penguin, 1962, rev. edn. 1981)

Some further reading

Jonathan Barnes, Aristotle (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1982)

Michael Davis, The Politics of Philosophy: A Commentary on Aristotle’s Politics (Lanham, MD: Roman & Littlefield, 1996)

J. D. G. Evan, Aristotle (Brighton: Harvester, 1987)

G. Huxley, ‘On Aristotle’s best state’, History of Political Thought. vol. VI, no. 1 (1985), pp. 139-49

Curtis. N. Johnson, ‘Aristotle’s polity: mixed or middle constitution?’, History of Political Thought, vol. IX, no. 2 (1988), pp. 189-204

Curtis. N. Johnson, Aristotle’s Theory of the State (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1990)

David Keyt & Fred D. Miller, Jr, A Companion to Aristotle’s ‘Politics’ (Oxford: Blackwell, 1991)

Carnes Lord, Education and Culture in the Political Thought of Aristotle (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1982)

Richard G. Mulgan, Aristotle’s Political Theory (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1977)

F. Rosen, ‘The political context of Aristotle’s categories of justice’, Phronesis, vol. XX (1975), pp. 228-40