Plato as Critical Theorist

“This book will challenge and provoke or edify different readers, but also possibly the same ones. Count me among the grateful latter.”—Victor Castellani, European Legacy

“Jonny Thakkar follows in a tradition of political philosophers and theorists such as Charles Taylor, Michael Sandel, Michael Ignatieff, and Michael Walzer: theorists who work at the highest levels of intellectual rigor, but who are committed to their theoretical work making a political difference. This book engages with recent Platonic scholarship as well as with contemporary political theory, and what emerges is a remarkable synthesis: a Platonically inspired idealist defense of modern democratic liberalism.”—Jonathan Lear, University of Chicago

“Jonny Thakkar’s book is incredibly stimulating, intelligent, and, at times, astonishingly original. It touches on a number of compelling themes in contemporary politics, political theory, and the history of ideas. It will spark terrific debates and push people to think in new ways about Plato, Rawls, and the place of ideal theory in political thinking.”—Marc Stears, Macquarie University