Diacritica 25-2_Filosofia.indb - cehum - Universidade do Minho

ELITISM AND THE ETHICS OF VIRTUE
At least due to this harmful implication VEE is an problem that has
to be revoked, not merely dismissed so as to save the plausibility of VE in
the actual world. So far it has passed unnoticed that Aristotle might have
noticed this in his own way in his famous statement that a state can be
maintained stable only if all its citizens “know each others’ character”. For
“where they do not possess this knowledge both the election of offi ces and
decision of lawsuits will go wrong” (Politics 7.2 1326b14-17). Aristotle takes
this conclusion to be evident, but the rationale behind it can only be that
without knowledge of each other’s character, the citizens would not be able
to tell pretenders and deceivers from genuinely practically wise offi cials.
Th erefore he straightforwardly recommends that the state should not grow
so complex that its citizens become practically unable to evaluate each other’s
characters. [19]
Leaving Aristotle’s recommendation aside for a moment, we can already
notice that the premisses behind it fi t well with the view that the people who
do not have the insight of the practically wise have should still attempt to
see who is a practically wise. Since VEE would allow some people to freely
deceive others by pretending to be good; since widespread deception would
corrupt the government and legal system; since the deception could be prevented
only by making everyone to know each other’s characters; since VEE
prevents people from acquiring suffi cient amount of this sort of knowledge;
therefore the non-practically wise have at least a good political reason – i.e.,
the preservation of good government and legal system – to revoke VEE by
attempting to see who is practically wise. Since the non-practically wise
can, however, never see people’s characters as reliably as the practically
wise, revoking VEE would be only able to alleviate the threat of deception,
but not completely eliminate it. As the scale of deception would, however,
be smaller without VEE than under in, the political reasons to revoke VEE
remain nevertheless good in any case.
Let us now focus on Aristotle’s recommendation that the state should be
prevented from becoming as complex as to prevent everyone from knowing
each other’s character. We have now reasons to revoke VEE without abandoning
the virtue-based value theory of VE, but as it seems that admitting
that the non-practically wise have good reasons to attempt to see who is
practically wise would only alleviate the threat of deception, it may legitimately
be asked what practical arrangement would help VE to best alleviate
that threat. Aristotle’s recommendation could be taken to be his answer to
19 See Pol. 7.2 1326b18 & 22-25
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