Magtens øre – Om den intellektuelle som magtens rådgiver

Abstract

No public power is without its advisors, people outside power but essential to its efficiency and functioning. Political philosophers have always lived and worked closely to the public power, as advisors, celebrators, critics and this relationship is also always fraught with dangers. Not only for the philosopher or intellectual risking his or her independence and possibly also life but also for the power itself. If one can give advice to power, and thereby demonstrating intellectual superiority, why not then usurp power for oneself? Political philosophy is filled with discussions of the necessity and dangers of political advice and this article explores the historical transformation of the public power from a personal rule to an administrative system and how that transformation changes the question of the giving and taking of advice. Reading a large number of known and relatively unknown sources a whole advice literature is presented having as its ultimate theme the most important political question from antiquity until today: how to gain and preserve power.