Sunday, December 19, 2010

December 19, 2010

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? (Who will guard the guards?)
-Plato, The Republic
This is a question posed by Plato in The Republic, a book which discusses the idea of a Utopian government. He is asking, who will protect against the protectors of the city. The guards are analogous to government. Plato is concerned about how you would keep a government from harming the people. Plato eventually concludes that the people will guard the guards. This question has been influentially throughout history whenever a people has wished to establish a government that answers to them.

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