Eros and Polis: Desire and Community in Greek Political Theory

Paul W. Ludwig (St John's College, Annapolis)

Eros and Polis: Desire and Community in Greek Political Theory
Format
Hardback
Publisher
Cambridge University Press
Country
United Kingdom
Published
21 October 2002
Pages
414
ISBN
9780521810654

Eros and Polis: Desire and Community in Greek Political Theory

Paul W. Ludwig (St John's College, Annapolis)

Eros and Polis examines how and why Greek theorists treated political passions as erotic. Because of the tiny size of ancient Greek cities, contemporary theory and ideology could conceive of entire communities based on desire. A recurrent aspiration was to transform the polity into one great household that would bind the citizens together through ties of mutual affection. In this study, Paul Ludwig evaluates sexuality, love, and civic friendship as sources of political attachment, and as bonds of political association. Studying the ancient view of eros recovers a way of looking at political phenomena that provides a bridge, missing in modern thought, between the private and public spheres, between erotic love and civic commitment. Ludwig’s study thus has important implications for the theoretical foundations of community.

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