Il contratto sociale come fondamento del diritto criminale nel «momento socratico» di Platone

Abstract

This my new platonic contribution – on the wake of my recent studies on the milesian school, on Xenophanes and on Heraclitus – continues to want to put in evidence varied historiographical thematics, neglected by the modern doctrine: the facts – according to Plato – that the criminal law was maximum tool of organizational cohesion of the ancient Greek State and that transcendental base of the criminal law was a mythical social agreement; Plato, in his «socratic moment», uses the master to realize a scheme about theory of law and theory of state, sketching, in the two marginal documents of the Apology of Socrates and the Crito, conclusions and intuitions subsequently revisited in the Republic, in the Statesman and in the Laws.

Key words: social agreement, Plato, theory of state, theory of law.