Elective question #1

What general principles govern the origins and organizations of the community (polis) according to Plato? According to Hobbes? How does the answer each gives shape his view of justice and the proper form of government?

Platon puts forward idea of the ideal state in which there is a class of philosophers, a class of soldiers, or guards, and a class of handicraftsmen, farmers and workers. In Platon's ideal state all should be precisely fixed, all is constructed under the certain plan which anybody from citizens cannot break. That is why it differs from the known states-policies described by fragility, absence of the strict order and, as consequence, domination of injustice. Platon connects the ideal state with leadership of the law. All citizens of the state should submit to the law equally. Moreover, ideal polis is that state where the law predominates. To provide observance of the lawful order in a life, it is necessary to develop special system of the measures providing durability and stability of the law, his compulsion for all. Proceeding from properties of the state, it is necessary to deduce logically his private characteristics, to define his device, and finally, to solve the problem on a role of individuals in it. Thus, Platon's logic goes in sequence of conclusions from the state to the individual. Individual freedom admits only that measure in what she is necessary for the state.

However according to Platon's idea about the policy, in the ideal state natural propensities of people are taken into account, and compulsion is called, only to promote fuller realization of these propensities.

Platon's ideas about the policy and the government are some similar to ideas Hobbes. Gobbs's doctrine about the state is based on concept of the natural law. The first basic natural law says: everyone should achieve the piece by all means available at his order and if it cannot receive the piece, it can search and use all means and advantages to war. Directly second law follows from this law: everyone should be ready to refuse the right on everything when others too wish it as it counts this refusal necessary for the piece and self-defense. Besides refusal of the rights there can be still a carry of these rights. The third natural law says, that people should adhere to own contracts. In this law to be function of validity. The theory of the State of Gobbs logically follows from his theory of the right and morals. The basis of the state lays in reasonable aspiration of people to self-preservation. From here it is clear, that the confidence of the safety is necessary for observance of natural laws, and for achievement of safety there is no other way as connection of sufficient quantity of people for mutual protection. For general welfare, people, as Gobbs considers, should agree to refuse the rights in the name of the piece and preservation of a life and to be united together for performance of the agreement. Such contract or such transferring of the rights also is formation of the state. Gobbs defines the state as follows: " The state is one person or assembly which will by virtue of the agreement of many people is the law for all of them as it can use forces and abilities of everyone for maintenance of the general piece and protection.

The person or assembly to which will all submit other, receives the name of the Supreme authority; all other are citizens ".

Thus, the State, by virtue of transferring on it of the rights of all possesses all rights belonging to the person in a natural condition, that is rights of the state are boundless. At Gobbs, the purpose of the state - to abolish a natural condition of the person, and to install the order at which to people safety and quiet existence would be provided. Clearly, that for preservation of this condition of safety the government should be armed with the necessary rights.

Elective question #2

Do we have an obligation to help starving people here and/or in other lands? If so, what is the basis of this obligation? If not, do we have any other reason to help such people? Identify and critically use any of the philosophies we studied including those in the text that we did not touch upon in class.

The problem of obligation in helpping starving people here and in other lands follows from a problem of a parity of the state, the law and morals. There is a question, whether the state is obliged to help the citizens and other requiring people? It is possible to answer this question proceeding from concept of a legal status of the person. The legal status of the person in the general view can be characterized as system of the rights and the duties, legislatively fixed by the state in constitutions and other legal certificates. In the rights and duties not only samples, standards of behaviour which the state counts obligatory, useful, expedient for normal ability to live of social system are fixed, but also main principles of mutual relations of the state and the person are opened.

Interrelations of the state and the person demand precise orderliness. It is caused special by such importance of attitudes for maintenance existing building, for his normal functioning. The precondition of possession the rights and duties is citizenship as the certain legal condition of the person. It expresses a legal accessory of the individual to the state which " acts in the legal form, receives legal expression in institute of citizenship which norms define conditions and the order of purchase, loss of citizenship, etc. " . Citizenship is the legislative ground for the person to have the legal rights and freedom and to carry out the duties established by the law, i.e. the basis of a legal status of the person. Citizenship and legal consequences following from him are inseparable by nature the states, from his social orientation. Rights and duties fix complex system of interrelations of the state and the person, based on democratic principles.

Rights of the person is its social opportunities determined by economic conditions of a life of a society and legislatively fixed by the state. In them that measure of freedom which is objectively possible for the person at a concrete historical stage of development of a society is expressed. Within the limits of this formally fixed freedom self-determination of the person is carried out, conditions of real using by the social blessings in various spheres political, economic, welfare and private life are established. Rights of the person is not potential, but the real social opportunities of the individual following directly from the law. The state fixes rights of the person not any way. The set of the rights, their volume are always caused by a level of economic development of a society. The legislator can fix only such rights for which realization the social and economic and political preconditions following from real public attitudes were generated. Rights of the person - not "gift" of the legislator, and the social opportunities, providing to the person the certain standard of a life.

The democratic society is a society of social justice. Therefore interconditionality of the rights and duties represents the necessary factor of maintenance of his normal ability to live. At a present stage of development of a society the social responsibility covers not only the attitude of the person to the rights, to their most active realization and use in interests of a society, but also the attitude of the person to the duties which is connected to comprehension of the debt and necessity of performance of legal requirements. Basic value is got with a problem of legal equality in various spheres of a life of a society and the state. Its decision assumes creation by the state of the reliable guarantees providing such equality the Declaration of Independence proclaims, that there are inaliennable human rights for which maintenance the state is created. Taking into account all told, I think, that State is obliged to help the requiring citizens.

As to not citezens and people living in other countries, this problem is solved with the help of international law and main principles of morals and morals. The list of the rights and freedom of the person and the citizen, peculiar to a lawful state, contains in the international certificates. It first of all the General declaration of human rights accepted by General Assembly of the United Nations on December, 10 1948., the International pact on the economic, social and cultural rights, the International pact about the civil and political rights accepted at XXI session of General Assembly of the United Nations on December, 16 1966. The general declaration of the rights and freedom of the person, the accepted United Nations in 1948 will consist of 30 clauses. In it it is proclaimed, that " all people are born free and equal on the advantage and the rights. They are allocated reason and conscience and should act in the attitude each other in spirit of a brotherhood ". The international declarations and contracts establish principles which assert necessity of the help to less developed countries.

I think, that any state carries out also universal mission without which there can not be no society. Realization of various collective needs of a society concerns to performance of common causes first of all: the organization of public health services, formation, social security, automobiles and communications, construction of irrigational constructions, struggle against epidemics, criminality, measures on prevention of war and maintenance of the world, etc. The Universal applicability of the state in a more comprehensive sense will be to be the tool of the social compromise, mitigations and overcomings of contradictions, search of the consent and co-operation of various layers of the population and public forces. If the state really wants prosperity for the citizens, it should put moral standards in a basis of the policy, adhering to positions of the democratic concept of the state which are based on uniqueness and self-value of each person, his respect on the part of the state, care of each citizen of a society, the person and the state, and also the help on the part of the state that who cannot independently provide itself.

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