The Role Of Moral Codes In Ancient Greece

The establishment of a “moral code” and whether responsibility for its creation lies with the government or the citizens has been a topic of research for a number of years. The establishment of this code in Ancient Greece seems to have primarily been the responsibility of the government itself, but sometimes potentially through the citizens, who were essentially required to have a certain ability to contribute to the decision-making process, as some were often elected at random. It also appears to be combination of code flowing naturally from the structure of government and code coming directly from government that encompassed the Greek’s ideas of government role.
However, the question of whether the Greeks were right to legislate moral code
It is made clear in The Nicomachean Ethics that Aristotle believes that an understanding of ethics is needed because it is essentially the responsibility of the government to create good men. In other words, Aristotle is saying that the main point of the government’s role in morality is to legislate moral behavior for the citizen. It is the role of the legislator to make citizens good through “habituation” (Aristotle, 32). The moral code, in Aristotle’s mind, must be backed up by government-imposed laws or risk being mostly ignored by the population in general, as they would have no reason to maintain a moral code without coercive laws informing them of proper behavior (Pangle 2011, 86). On page 278 of The Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle even states directly that “education in goodness is best undertaken by the state.” This moral education, carried out by the legislator who has chosen what is “moral,” is something that must be done with all citizens (Ward 2001,
However, according to Aristotle’ viewpoint, citizens might play a small role in the establishment of a moral code initially, but only in a minor way, as the average citizen doesn’t have the right mindset to fully comprehend or set morality (Lockwood 2006, 47). Some level of self-rule was to be expected though, and that minor amount of political participation was key to the function of the city (Mulgan 1990, 195). A moral example, though, needed to be presented to the citizens or else they would be hard pressed to find any motivation to lead a moral life (Lindsay 2000, 446).
Interestingly, the non-ideal city would need more political participation from all of its citizens than the ideal city would (Mulgan 1990, 210). Not all members of society were expected to be able to have the ability to self-rule, either; for example, those who were not technically considered citizens, such as slaves, children, and foreigners, would not be expected to understand enough (Frank 2004, 95). For Aristotle, this provides more support for the idea that government legislation of moral behavior is necessary for everything from the functioning of the city to the successful everyday lives of its