Author(s)
FRED GUYETTEKeywords
Aristotlefriendship
common good
justice
General Works
A
DOAJ:Multidisciplinary
DOAJ:General Works
History of scholarship and learning. The humanities
AZ20-999
Social sciences (General)
H1-99
Full record
Show full item recordAbstract
For theorists of political liberalism, individual rights take priority over the good. Communitarians hold, however, that a society focused exclusively on individual rights will be made up of atomistic selves who cannot sustain any commitment to the common good. Aristotle’s discussions of friendship and the common good can contribute to the conversation concerning the polis and its ends. Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics emphasizes homonoia, but his Politics envisions “political friendship” more as a space for agonistic struggle. Aristotle knows about the destructive effects of pleonexia, and he describes several community-building virtues that are opposed to it: justice, temperance, and liberality. Aristotle also claims that the genre of tragedy can inform a commitment to work for the common good.Date
2012-11-01Type
ArticleIdentifier
oai:doaj.org/article:be8968ce94dd4dccbd7f34b3a5f1361e2069-1025
https://doaj.org/article/be8968ce94dd4dccbd7f34b3a5f1361e