Will a wise captain come to navigate our ship, or do mutineers always get us lost at sea?

How would you define democracy?

The word democracy comes from the Greek words “demos,” meaning people, and “katos,” meaning power. So democracy can be thought of as the “power of the people,” a way of governing that depends on the will of the people.

But what if that will of the people seems a bit lopsided? Have you ever examined democracy close up? Have you looked at some of those folks who get elected? Are we really confident that those who get elected are competent to deal with the great multitude of problems that will certainly confront them?

Have they received any training or been provided with a special resume of learning to help them solve the many problems of the city, state and federal government?

I’m certain you could come up with a list of names of bona fide elected politicians who will suffer at politics because of their deficiencies in ruling and backgrounds that have provided little expertise to prepare them to tackle the many difficult issues they will face.

Do you have confidence that all representatives elected today will work together to solve problems and be good constituents to their voters?

Should political leaders have to be well-educated, good thinkers, work well with others, have good ethics and not be ruled by lies, corruption and/or money?

And what if the voters only elect those leaders who promise to make their life better and spend money on projects that is of great importance to them? Making promises and spending money seems a preset to one’s election success and garnering of votes.

Promises and more promises are the key to electability.

Nothing left to be said about deficits and sacrifice. Not much discussion either about the tough decisions associated with budgets, crime, immigration and life in the fast lane. Are wars really necessary?

Many centuries ago, the Greek philosopher Plato took pen to hand and wrote a treatise called "The Republic."

It is a complicated piece of sorts where the philosopher outlines the perfect world, and Socrates (Plato's teacher and primary speaker in the text) presents his dialogue of what that might look like.

Plato believed that a philosopher king is needed to ensure that wisdom prevails and knowledge rules the state. Socrates also discusses and describes a picture of "a just verses unjust man" and the importance of ethics, and concludes that a just and ethical man is a happy man.

Justice is an important subject in "The Republic."

In Book VIII of the work, Socrates shares his thoughts on democracy.

Many of those political issues and problems in the government of Athens in 375 B.C. actually are present in today’s world and our own government.

When does democracy become problematic, then?

"It comes about when the rich become too rich and the poor too poor," according to The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy maintained by the University of Tennessee at Martin. "Too much luxury makes the oligarchs soft and the poor revolt against them."

As Socrates speaks from the ink of Plato’s pen, he reminds us that often "the pursuit of freedom at the expense of other goods, and of the sort of men in such a system, should give us pause."

When I first read that, it gave me pause as well.

Where is the unity of such "political" thought?

I can see little cooperation or desire to work together in a world of politics and democracy as it exists today in this country.

And perhaps that best represents those similar thoughts outlined in "Republic" during those days of the great philosophers as they examined their own government in Athens.

Do democracies across the world then suffer the same calamity? Do they rise and fall, because freedoms impact them in some negative way and disorganization soon takes its toll on their survival because the wise leader is not at the helm of the ship?

In Plato’s "Republic," he speaks of the "wise" ship captain, who could read the stars to navigate to a destination, being removed and replaced by vote of the ship's crew during a mutiny.

The unfortunate result about that vote is that none of the mutineers were trained in the art of reading the stars, and the ship was unable to navigate the waters because of the mutineers' ignorance.

Do voters today suffer from that same malady? In democracies around the world, is a smart leader avoided because of voting "mutineers" who think they know better?

I see leaders today who promise solutions to crime, immigration, budget responsibility and many more, yet fail to deliver on solutions.

If democracy is to succeed, there have to be some changes.

Will a wise captain soon arrive to navigate our own ship?

Or do mutineers always get us lost at sea?

Pete Waters is a Sharpsburg resident who writes for The Herald-Mail.

This article originally appeared on The Herald-Mail: Plato's 'Republic' holds lessons that apply to democracy today