Star Wars and Philosophy (Popular Culture and Philosophy Series) - Kevin Decker [85]
Luke and Vader’s personal struggle with their own fears is at the heart of the larger story about struggle and conflict between the Rebels and the Empire. The resolution of that personal struggle represents a moment of self-discovery for both characters, a moment when each comes to understand, in virtue of their relation to one another, who they really were. And the same can be said for the larger struggles that are taking place within the saga. The Ewoks, for instance, prove who and what they are in their confrontation with the Empire. Similarly, the Naboo and the Trade Federations reveal something of themselves in their responses to the collapse of the Republic and the rise of the Sith. This, it seems, is what Hegel was trying to tell us—in the relation between masters and slaves, it is the slave, and not the master, who is in a position to reveal something about our possibilities as human beings. Fear may create and sustain relations of inequality, but the desire to know who and what we are will, in the end, likely triumph.
14
By Any Means Necessary: Tyranny, Democracy, Republic, and Empire
KEVIN S. DECKER
Palpatine—the weasel-like Senator from Naboo, the rapidly wrinkling Supreme Chancellor, and ultimately the cackling, loathsome Emperor—is reviled universally by fans as the epitome of evil. Still, you’ve got to give him credit for his political savvy. After all, Palpatine’s career is a textbook case in how the unceasing desire for power can change something like democracy, or rule by the many, into a tyrannical dictatorship. Using the constant threat posed by the Dark Side of the Force, the Sith—Palpatine and his protegé, Darth Vader—use the hyper-technological Imperial military to keep iron-fisted, monochromatic control over the galaxy. How different this vision is from the diverse and colorful, if conflicted, Old Republic of the prequel trilogy!
This same kind of political one-hundred-eighty degree turn has occurred in human history, too. Politicians, political scientists and theorists over many centuries have grappled with how this could have happened, in most cases in order to prevent it from happening again. But the story of the road to tyranny isn’t just of historical interest, even though democracy and tyranny date back to ancient Greece. It also embroils us in heady debates of today about the source of political authority, whether the needed expertise of politicians is a good trade-off against the possibility of their corruption, and how much power can safely be concentrated in the hands of a few.
These arguments often boil down to the question of who rules versus who should rule. This isn’t an easy question, because it presumes that we’ve settled on what kind of government is best—democracy, republic, aristocracy, or some other? Also, it presumes that we know whether rulers need some virtue or expertise in order to rule, or could everyone simply rule themselves? Political life in the Star Wars galaxy provides us a jumping off point in approaching these central questions of political philosophy.
Galactic Politics for Dummies
Despite their lukewarm reception by the fans, Episodes I-III in the Star Wars saga tell us the most about the political forces that fundamentally drive its episodic stories and overall narrative. With the blockbuster episodes made in the late 1970s and 1980s, there wasn’t much to say. The Cold War-style political message of Star Wars at that time was fairly simple: big, evil empires that rely on soulless technology and dominating control over their populations are bad, and rebellion against such empires is justified. By contrast, Episodes I-III deliver a more complex message about the human failings and weaknesses that help to undermine a huge, declining federation of civilizations.