Socio-political changes, uprisings, coups, revolutions and their prevention: an attempt to reconstruct Aristotle’s conception Cover Image

Sociopolitické změny, povstání, převraty, revoluce a jejich předcházení: pokus o rekonstrukci Aristotelovy koncepce
Socio-political changes, uprisings, coups, revolutions and their prevention: an attempt to reconstruct Aristotle’s conception

Author(s): Miroslav Novák
Subject(s): Politics / Political Sciences
Published by: Univerzita Karlova v Praze, Fakulta sociálních věd
Keywords: Aristotle; socio-political changes; coups; revolutions; inequalities; democracy; oligarchy; politeia

Summary/Abstract: This article seeks to „reconstruct”, synoptically arrange and explain Aristotle’s conception of socio-political changes, coups, uprisings, revolutions and their prevention, which is „chaotically” (Pierre Pellegrin) presented in the book V. of Politics. It is argued that a number of ideas that are commonly associated with Modern Age authors, such as Niccolò Machiavelli, John Locke, Alexis de Tocqueville, Karl Marx and in the early 20th century Max Weber, for instance, appeared much earlier with Aristotle. Aristotle builds on a vast documentation and comes from an analysis of equalities and inequalities. His conception of socio-political development is not cyclical (which is the case of Artistotle’s great teacher Plato), but linear. Among political regimes Aristotle attributes a special position not only to democracy in ancient rendition, but above all to politeia in its own sense, which corresponds to our representative democracies to a large extent. builds on a vast documentation and comes from an analysis of equalities and inequalities. His conception of socio-political development is not cyclical (which is the case of Artistotle’s great teacher Plato), but linear. Among political regimes Aristotle attributes a special position not only to democracy in ancient rendition, but above all to politeia in its own sense, which corresponds to our representative democracies to a large extent.

  • Issue Year: 10/2018
  • Issue No: 1
  • Page Range: 86-138
  • Page Count: 52
  • Language: Czech