The Form of Politics
Aristotle and Plato on Friendship
Description
For statesmen, friendship is the lingua franca of politics. Considering the connections between personal and political friendship, John von Heyking’s The Form of Politics interprets the texts of Plato and Aristotle and emphasizes the role that friendship has in enduring philosophical and contemporary political contexts. Beginning with a discussion on virtue-friendship, described by Aristotle and Plato as an agreement on what qualifies as the pursuit of good, The Form of Politics demonstrates that virtue and political friendship form a paradoxical relationship in which political friendships need to be nourished by virtue-friendships that transcend the moral and intellectual horizons of the political society. Von Heyking then examines Aristotle’s ethical and political writings – which are set within the boundaries of political life – and Plato’s dialogues on friendship in Lysis and the Laws, which characterize political friendship as festivity. Ultimately, arguing that friendship is the high point of a virtuous political life, von Heyking presents a fresh interpretation of Aristotle and Plato’s political thought, and a new take on the most essential goals in politics. Inviting reassessment of the relationship between friendship and politics by returning to the origins of Western philosophy, The Form of Politics is a lucid work on the foundations of political cooperation.
Reviews
“The Form of Politics acts like a good friend in exhorting readers to care about virtue. By illuminating what is at stake in practicing and understanding the nature of sunaisthetic friendship and its political counterpart, Heyking does an excellent job of revealing the inadequacies of modern conceptions of friendship and of demonstrating how much the Greeks can help us in recovering a vocabulary for discussing the intellectual component of friendship. The Form of Politics is thus essential reading for any social scientist skeptical of the value of friendship as a political concept.” International Political Anthropology
"A reconsideration of the relation of friendship and politics is most welcome. And this is what John von Heyking has given us — a moving, learned, yet experiential explication of friendship." New Oxford Review
“Full of many moving, even beautiful passages, The Form of Politics is a work of first-class scholarship and deep personal meditation. With an exceptional sweep of background material and a sense of abiding relevance and familiarity, von Heyking presents what has obviously been a labor of love stemming from the direct teaching of undergraduate students.” -James V. Schall, Georgetown University
"The author tells us that he decided to write a book about friendship because there is 'no other topic in politics, or ethics, that really matters.' [Von Heyking] elevates friendship to its rightful place as a topic of proper philosophical speculation. ... [He] exemplifies that shared insight which is the sunaisthetic moment, and that lies at the heart of his thesis: "Our discoveries of fundamental truths coincide with discoveries about ourselves and each other, done together. This, in essence, is what liberal education is about."" Literary Review of Canada
"The most intriguing aspect of von Heyking's work is the idea of how the political community comes together and strengthens itself through festivity, an overlooked aspect of political friendship the author brilliantly brings back to the fore." Contemporary Political Theory
"A rich meditation on friendship’s role ... past and present, with reference to a variety of political and literary figures. The Form of Politics is well summarized by an epithet Evelyn Waugh attached to a man who never made an enemy nor lost a friend: "Oh dear friendship, what a gift of God it is. Speak no ill of it."" Interpretation