Can liberal education survive liberal democracy?

Public Interest, Spring, 2002 by Diana Schaub

I WOULD like to begin with an oath to the goddess Hera. My warrant for such an unorthodox beginning comes from Socrates, who swore "by Hera" when he was involved in speeches about the betterment of the young. The uttering of such an oath was almost as unorthodox for him as it is for me, though for different reasons. In the Greek world, "by Hera" was a woman's oath, Hera being the goddess who superintended childbirth and childrearing. The oath was taken up by Socrates--never one to scorn the wisdom of women and never one to stand upon convention. The oath was used by him to indicate his preference for private, philosophic education as against civic education.

The most telling instance is in the Apology, when Socrates interrogates his accuser Meletus. Having been charged with corrupting the young, Socrates asks Meletus: "Who, then, makes the young better?" Meletus says, "all the Athenians" make the young better--all, that is, except the corrupter Socrates. Socrates tests this answer by comparing the human situation to that of horses. He says it is undeniable that it is "the one"--skilled in horsemanship--who improves horses, and certainly not the unknowing many. However, Socrates' antidemocratic argument in favor of the expert educator might be thought just a tad tendentious. Socrates points to the problem himself when he says that his argument holds not only for horses but for "all the other animals." Let's try asking the question again about a different species. Who makes otters better? Or who makes leopards better? Meletus's likely response--"all the other otters," "all the other Ieopards"--is not a bad answer. Even with respect to horses, the soundness of Mele tus's answer depends on whether one is speaking of wild or domesticated horses. In their natural state, isn't it "all the horses" who make the baby horses better? The young are socialized into the ways of the group; they are naturally acculturated. This is Meletus's understanding of the process of education in democracy. Growing up in the democracy educates for democracy. Environed by the laws, and by fellow citizens obedient to the laws, the young are made better. Meletus assumes that law is natural, and in particular that democratic law is natural.

Socrates embraces a different educational model: the thoroughbred horse, which is bettered by contact with, and subordination to, the knowing members of a higher species. What a brilliant metaphor Plato has given us. A horse is one of the very few creatures with two possible modes of existence. Leaving aside the question of which of these modes is truly better for a horse, what about man? Are we also beings with two modes of existence? Are we better off wild or domesticated? And what do those terms mean as applied to us? If Meletus is right, then living within the horizon of political law is, paradoxically perhaps, a dictate of our wild nature or at least our untutored nature. We are beings who are naturally conventional, If Socrates is right, then the fulfillment of our nature requires a different sort of culture. What higher things or higher being might human beings be understood as in the service of? If horses need human trainers in order to achieve their domestication and be thorough-bred, then what do h umans need for their high-toning? The concept of domestication as applied to man would seem to point toward the divine. And indeed, throughout the Apology, Socrates stresses the divine guidance that led him to the philosophic life.

It makes sense that the other, even stranger oath, employed by Socrates is "by the dog." Whereas "by Hera" was a Greek woman's oath, "by the dog" is not a Greek oath at all. It is a Socratic neologism. But it is a fine oath for someone who believfes it possible to live in company with what is higher than oneself. The dog, even more than the horse, is a being who has switched his allegiance from his pack-fellows to man. No man is a hero to his valet, but every man is a god to his dog. Only half in jest, I would say that among the brute creation, the dog alone has a theistic sensibility (and it is thus entirely appropriate that "dog" is an anagram of "god"). In swearing "by the dog," Socrates lets us know that he defines man not as a political animal, but as a companion animal to the divine.

Ancients vs. moderns

Since the Enlightenment, the Athenian experience of the opposition between civic education and divine philosophizing has been forgotten. Moreover, the forgetting was deliberately induced by modern philosophers like John Locke. Locke was a great advocate of home schooling. In his educational treatise, Some Thoughts Concerning Education, he recommends that children be kept as much as possible in the company of their parents. Parents might employ a tutor but ought not to send children away to school. At a stroke, Locke puts an end to the ancient contest between the city and the philosopher. His radical privatization of education seems to dispense with both civic and liberal education. The education of boys is now to be modeled on that traditionally accorded to girls--a useful education directed toward domestic and economic objects.