Philosophos Basileus or Philosopher’s Examination with Power

Abstract

Many thinkers and philosophers, from Confucius and Plato to Kant, Hegel and Marx, have expressed their views on how state administration should be and how philosophy will solve this problem. In our article, we have discussed Plato, Aristotle, Confucius, Farabi,  Cicero, Seneca and Marcus Aurelius only in the  context of “king philosopher / philosopher king” in order to categorize these views within the limitations of  the  subject. We even tried to show their examination with power by narrowing the issue further. In this sense, we dealt with the problems faced by these philosophers when they had the opportunity to apply  their theoretical thoughts on their administration,  rather  than  politics  and  state theories. We have dealt with the  attitude of philosophers towards the power and that of the power against them. Again, based on the ideal of the philosophos basileus (philosopher king), which Plato mentioned in his work called the State, we tried to show what results these  philosophers have in the state administration.  Some of these philosophers  prepared only the theory of the ideal state,  some of them tried to enter the state  administration, some of them entered the state administration, but suffered the rage of power. Philosophers  faced many difficulties in implementing ideal forms of governance, some  were  exiled, some  were retreated, and others were executed.  Despite  all the negativities and obstacles they  faced, they still did not give up their  views on how the ideal state should  be [...]