Notes on the Paranoid Factor in Political Philosophy: Fear, Anxiety, and Domination

The argument explores the relationship between paranoia and its presence in political philosophy. I look primarily at two arguments in the history of political ideas: Plato's Laws and Hobbes' Leviathan. Each theorist looks at political life and form in the context of what from a psychodynamic perspective would be called paranoid. Institutional recommendations stress what Plato calls watchfulness; each theoretical formulation imposes repressive administrative and political apparatus on the subjects of the polity or commonwealth. Each discourages speech and action that moves against what authority defines as right, just or appropriate. And each imposes heavy penalty for disobedience of authoritative command. The essay also looks at modern theories of paranoia and paranoid reaction, in addition to the psychological implications of rule premisdd on the model of paternal authority.