Socrates: A True Champion Of Democracy

In the Gorgias1, Socrates says, “I think that I am the only or almost the only Athenian living who practices the true art of politics; I am the only politician of my time”, while in the Apology2, he claims that “he who will really fight for the right, if he would live even for a little while, must have a private station and not a public one.” As we know, Socrates did manage to live for over 70 years, and did indeed confine himself to a private stance; but how can one be a politician without being a public figure? Or was Socrates not a true champion of justice, as he maintained to be? In order to reconcile these two seemingly contradictory claims, we must first understand who, according to Socrates, can be considered a true champion of justice, and what he considers to be ‘the true art of politics’. In the Crito3, Socrates argues why he is not going to escape death, even though he has the means to. In order to do so, he invokes ‘the laws’ — a personified ideal form that questions him: “Tell us, Socrates, … are you going by an act of yours to overturn us — the laws and the whole State? Do you imagine that a State can subsist and not be overthrown, in which the decisions of law have no power, but are set aside and
He must do this regardless of the opinion of the majority or possible consequences for himself; he must act only in accordance to the opinion of the few wise, knowledgeable men who understand what is justice, and the laws of the State. Unfortunately, in all of the dialogues the author of this essay has read5, Socrates never clearly explains what ‘the laws’ really are — they remain a sort of abstraction, a divine essence of justice. However, this does not invalidate our definition of a champion of