By Tanner Campbell
Recently it was suggested to me that a Stoic could be apolitical. While I believe this is theoretically true, I don’t believe, in practice, that anyone could call themselves a Stoic while abstaining entirely from political involvement. I want to talk about why I feel that way.
While Stoicism doesn’t ask us to do anything in particular (Stoicism is highly contextual; there’s no “one way” to be a Stoic) it certainly suggests we should be doing things which reflect positively our character — or to, at least, avoid doing things which reflect negatively our character.
Part of developing our character towards Virtue and away from Vice, is assessing our roles and our competencies carefully and well. Stoics are constantly asking themselves questions like:
“What am I good at? What am I responsible for? What should I prioritize, and at what cost? What decisions can I make in this specific situation, right now, that will be the closest to truly virtuous? What is the most right thing to do, right now — in this exact moment under these exact conditions?”
What would it say about an American Stoic’s character if they, for instance, decided the best course of action (for them) would be to ignore the opioid crisis in America, saying, “I can’t do anything about this, therefore it’s best if I put it out of my mind and get on with my life?” (This isn’t an uncommon refrain, by the way!)
Many so-called Stoics believe that Stoicism encourages responses like, “If I can’t do anything about it, it’s not my concern. If it’s not my concern then I should stop thinking about it. If I’m not focusing on it, I can instead focus on myself and the things I can directly control.”
But these Stoics are wrong.
The Circles of Concern
Hierocles was a 2nd Century Stoic best known today for his work on what, in English, are referred to as the “Stoic Circles of Concern”, — a set of concentric circles centered around the individual. Each successive circle (as shown below) is one-step removed from the self, and the idea is to bring each circle one (or more) circles closer to you.
Hierocles’ circles encourage us to treat our family more like how we treat ourselves, our friends more like we treat our family, and to treat our community more like we treat our friends. This is meant to go on and on until we reach a sort of “singularity of concern” (my phrasing, not that of the Stoics), wherein we regard all the circles as part of the self.
This isn’t a fringe Stoic concept, it is a central one. Doing good for the cosmopolis is not a mandate in Stoicism, per se, but, returning to the always relevant question, “what does this say about my character”, what would it say about our character if we didn’t work to improve the world around us as citizens of that world?
Nothing good, we can be sure.
Returning to the American opioid crisis: where does this crisis exist? In our families? Maybe. Certainly in our communities, though, right?
If we’re to be Stoic — at least according to Hierocles — what must we do with our community circle? We must bring it into our friends circle by thinking of the community, and its members, as our friends and treating them accordingly. So, if we would help a friend, if we would care about a friend, should we not also help and care about members of our communities?
This same line of reasoning provides the key to understanding why, in my opinion, Stoicism necessitates political involvement if by “politics”, we mean, “behavior that attempts to guide or influence governmental policy”.
If the way we create sustainable change is through our governments (be they local or federal), then it is incredibly hard to imagine how a Stoic could withdraw from politics while not completely ignoring Hierocles’ Circles of Concern — thereby ignoring a key part of Stoic practice.
Tanner Campbell is the founder of Practical Philosophy and host of the Practical Stoicism podcast.