The preliminary remarks are now complete, and it remains to discuss and describe the ideal state. In Book II, where others’ accounts of it were criticized, Plato’s Laws had been much less severely handled than his Republic, and less systematically. What now follows (chapters iv to xii) is similar in method and principles, but not always in detail, to the Laws. Aristotle treats first the materials and the conditions of the ideal state, its population, size, situation and climate (iv–vii); next its institutions, social, political, and religious, especially as concerns citizenship, ownership of land, and division into classes (viii–x); and then the siting and layout of the ideal state itself (xi–xii). All this is somewhat external; the account of the constitution as such begins at Chapter xiii with a discussion of education, which is the main subject of the rest of Book VII and all that remains of Book VIII. However, nowhere in the Politics is there an account of a constitutional framework such as Plato in his Laws described in detail.
As for the size of the ideal state, Plato had advocated (Laws 737e ff.) the mathematically convenient number of 5,040 citizen farmers, plus their families and slaves, and an admixture of resident aliens. Aristotle, however, does not commit himself to a particular number: he is content to suggest only empirical guidelines for determining the maximum and minimum. True to his teleological principles, he argues that the population must be neither too large nor too small to prevent the state from fulfilling its function.
1325b33 Now that our introduction to these matters is finished, and since we have earlier discussed the other constitutions, the first part of what remains to be discussed will deal with the question, ‘What are the fundamental postulates for a state which is to be constructed exactly as one would wish, and provided with all the appropriate material equipment, without which it could not be the best state?’ We must therefore postulate everything as we would wish it to be, remembering however that nothing must be outside the bounds of possibility. I mean for example with respect to a body of citizens, and territory. Other craftsmen, say a weaver or a boatmaker, must have a supply of their materials in a state suitable for the exercise of their craft; and the better these materials are prepared, the finer will inevitably be the result which the craftsmen’s skill will produce. So too a statesman or lawgiver must have the proper material in suitable condition.
1326a5 The first part of a state’s equipment is a body of men, and we must consider both how many they ought to be and with what natural qualities. The second is territory; we shall need to determine both its extent and its character. Most people think that if a state is to be happy it has to be great. This may be true, but they do not know how to judge greatness and smallness in a state. They judge greatness by the number of people living in it; but one ought to look not at numbers but at capacity. A state too has a function to perform, and the state which is most capable of discharging that function must be regarded as greatest, rather in the same way that one might say that Hippocrates was ‘bigger’, not as a man but as a physician, than one of greater bodily size. However, even granting that we must have regard to numbers, we must not do so without discrimination: although we must allow for the necessary presence in states of many slaves and foreigners (resident or visitors), our real concern is only with those who form part of the state, i.e. with those elements of which a state properly consists. Pre-eminence in numbers of these is a mark of a great state, but a state cannot possibly be great which can put into the field only a handful of heavy-armed soldiers1 along with a large crowd of mechanics. A great state and a populous one are not the same.
1326a25 Moreover, experience has also shown that it is difficult, if not impossible, for a populous state to be run by good laws; at any rate, we know of no state with a reputation for a well-run constitution that does not restrict its numbers. The language itself makes this certain. For law is itself a kind of order, and to live under good laws is necessarily to live in good order. But an excessively large number cannot take on any degree of order; that would require the operation of a divine power, such as actually holds together the universe. Moreover, beauty commonly arises in a context of size and number; so the state, too, will necessarily be most beautiful if, though large, it conforms to the limitation just mentioned.2 But there must also be a norm for the size of a state, as there is a normal size for everything else – animals, plants, instruments, and so on. Each of these can only keep the power that belongs to it if it is neither too large nor too small; otherwise its essential nature will be either entirely lost or seriously impaired. Thus a boat a span long will not really be a boat at all, nor one that is two stades long.3 There is a certain size at which it will become either too large or too small to be navigated well.
1326b2 It is just the same with a state: if it has too few people it cannot be self-sufficient, whereas a state is a self-sufficient thing. If it has too many people, it can certainly be self-sufficient in its basic requirements, but as a nation, not as a state, because it is difficult for a constitution to subsist in it. For who will be military commander of this excessive population? Who will be their crier unless he has the voice of a Stentor? Therefore, when the population first becomes large enough to be sufficient for itself in all that is needed for living the good life after the manner of an association which is a state, then that must be a state of a primitive kind.4 It is possible to go on from there; a state greater in population than that will be a larger state, but as we have said, this process is not unlimited.
1326b11 What the limit of the extra should be can easily be determined by an examination of the facts. The activities of a state are those of the rulers and those of the ruled, and the functions of the ruler are decision and direction. In order to give decisions on matters of justice, and for the purpose of distributing offices on merit, it is necessary that the citizens should know each other and know what kind of people they are. Where this condition does not exist, both decisions and appointments to office are bound to suffer, because it is not just in either of these matters to proceed haphazardly, which is clearly what does happen where the population is excessive. Another drawback is that it becomes easy for foreigners, and aliens resident in the country, to become possessed of citizenship,5 because the excessive size of the population makes detection difficult. Here then we have ready to hand the best limit of a state: it must have the largest population consistent with catering for the needs of a self-sufficient life, but not so large that it cannot be easily surveyed. Let that be our way of describing the size of a state.