INTELLECTUALS AND POLITICS. The Obsession of a Phantasmagorical Betrayal
INTELLECTUALS AND POLITICS. The Obsession of a Phantasmagorical Betrayal

Summary/Abstract: The issue of the relationship between intellectuals and politics started to be more vividly discussed after ’89 although it is more than two thousand years old. Having been recently liberated from a totalitarian political regime, which required each individual who belonged to this category to be “a good propagandist of Marxism-Leninism”, Romanian intellectuals started to taste political freedom. However, if during the communist period they formed a common body, being subject to the same prohibitions, in democracy – as it had been expected – various differences of opinion and option in what regards the relationship with politics have started to emerge. It is an old story and this image of the intellectual who is deemed to have the duty of being apolitical originates in a poor understanding of Plato’s philosophy. This understanding was theorised in the 20th century by Julien Benda, author of the well-known work The Betrayal of the Intellectuals, who was also misunderstood. Hence, an entire tradition of stigmatising the intellectuals’ involvement in politics emerged. I shall point out that Plato did not see any contradiction between the status of philosopher and that of politician and that the intellectuals and scholars accused by Benda have not betrayed anything.

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