Philosophical praxis as a political praxis. A reading of ‘the politics’ in Plato’s Phaedrus

Abstract

Plato’s Phaedrus is presented as a dialogue which deals with rhetoric and erotic. However, Plato’s treatment of both issues suggests the political framework that gives them meaning. In this paper I will deal with the reading of Plato’s critique of writing in political terms, and thus try to establish the historic character of Plato’s story. I will try to show that the criticism of writing is part of a platonic operation in order to legitimize a recovery of privileges of certain aristocratic sectors in the context of Athenian democracy. This paper will start from the ‘différence politique’ as a theoretical framework, and then analyze the dimension of ‘the political’ in the presentation of the story and the articulation of the elements of the story of Theuth and Thamus.