Plato's Cave Analysis

In what ways can you connect Plato's cave to our study of government and leadership?

Plato’s cave has two groups: the ones who have shadows cast over their heads and the ones which (prisoners) and the puppeteers. These groups have distinct differences which establish the separation between the potential leaders and history-changers to the followers. The first group stares at their shadows against a wall via reflections from a  large burning fire above head. The fire imitates the sun, providing a mock source of enlightenment and clarity of reality. To the ones casting shadows on the wall, the cave and only what consists within it is their reality, as their source of enlightenment is simply the shadows themselves. The second group are the puppeteers, who are more advanced than the prisoners below considering they know the shadow are not “real”, but are still constrained to the same fire and the same confinement in the cave as the ones below in the chains. Both groups represent the make up of society; society (the cave and everyone within it) is not reality, but rather a false one. When connecting Plato’s cave allegory to principles of government and leadership, one can find an easy connection: leaders are the ones who begin their journey at the lowest point in the cave and through an extensive process, end up emerging from the cave into reality, redefining everything that they knew about life. Then, such an accomplishment will allow them to return in and out of the cave using their leadership qualities to attract and obtain others to follow them--this establishing a leader-based society, or in other words, a government. The leader must first understand that the shadows are a result of the fire as they are merely projections of the bigger selves which the prisoners can become; it is a foreshadowing, as all leaders must start at the bottom level, the shadows forecast a view of the bold and towering individuals which will sprout out of that level in the time to come. After understanding the concepts of the shadows, the individual must then comprehend the means by which those shadows are made and effected: the puppets via the ones on the “higher” level in the cave. The puppets are a metaphor for the notion that people can help create and blossom a leader’s qualities and animation, and are used in order to allow the leader to gain eminence as well as develop his knowledge of reality even more. This is done through the process of observing and understanding the fire. The fire is the source of all light. The light is the source of life, learning, and holds the capacity by which the leaders will soon uphold and surpass. The enlightened leader (with assistance from the fire, puppets, and shadows) will then discover that this reality is not the reality that they want to see, as the culmination of their leadership skills are put to the test when the individual ascends out of the cave, transforming the fake (cave) reality into the reality which exists as the outcome of the leader’s transformation; realities are created and destroyed as leaders emerge, dictating reality’s presence and composition. Once a leader understands what reality is (their reality to be exact), they are able to reenter the cave and enlighten the imprisoned--the leader acts as the new fire. They inform the prisoners in the cave about what is in store for them beyond it, and passing his leadership qualities along, the leader becomes the key to the new reality for the prisoners. The act of taking the people and allowing them the opportunity to delve into a new reality via convincing, creating, and a lengthy process, illustrates the establishment of followers to a leader. Followers are essential in a leader’s success, and in addition to followers, the cave allegory and leadership process is similar to the establishment of a government; governments are made up of a leader(s) and followers which are drawn in and abide by the leader since they confide in him as much as he confides in himself (leader-like quality). Thus, the foundation of leadership and governments come from the emersion of a group of people into an entirely redefined reality, so to speak, as an individual or group of individuals provide them a convinced and self-assured better reality. The cave is the starting point which the leader is to base his to-be-developed new reality as it defines crucial components which make up or break down a structure of society--components which are to be determined by the leader himself. He receives this power from the inhabitants of the cave, who believe that this leader is something special and to believe in because he did precisely what they could not. The cave is the assessment of a leader, which provides the qualities and materials which a leader needs in order to successfully establish what will become the new cave. Successful leaders throughout history are the ones who take what was before them and redefine it to establish a new reality, and gain popularity as they convince others that their new reality is improved from the previous one; the old cave to the outside.