These days to tell a student that Plato was an idealist condemns him to utter irrelevance.
These days to tell a student that Plato was an idealist condemns him to utter irrelevance.
Even less useful than Paul Erdos, 
the mathematician who lived for numbers whom I sometimes suggest as an example of a philosopher king sort of person.
To find out more about Mr. Erdos try Paul Hoffman, The man who loved only numbers (New York Hyperion, 1998).
But the allegory of the cave helps to explain the point. One example of the perversion is the remark of Patrizia Reggiani who once said, ”I would rather weep in a Rolls-Royce than be happy on a bicycle.” She was convicted of murdering his husband Maurizio Gucci (yes, that Gucci) for the money. This link is to a New York Times story of the time: http://select.nytimes.com/search/restricted/article?res=F40D10FA3F5D0C738EDDAC0894D0494D81
If the linke does not work for you it is the New York Times of May 20, 1998.
Another well known part of Plato’s Republic is the rule of the Philosopher-Kings. Like Socrates, Aristotle, and Thucydides, Plato was no friend of Athenian democracy. Like the others he wanted political institutions that could withstand the will of the mob, or of a charismatic figure like Alcibiades. If Alcibiades is the successor of Achilles from the Iliad, a powerful but terrible and unrestrained force of nature, then the polity must create institutions to tame Alcibiades.
The Philosopher Kings with their fifty years of discipline and training answer to that need. They emerge and are justified by the Myth of the Metals that are born within each of us: the very few Gold who can live the life of the mind and denial of temptation, a somewhat larger number of Silver who have spirit and discipline, and the vast majority of Bronze who are satisfied with ordinary life.
The Gold Philosopher Kings and Queens live a life of study and denial like a monk on a hill top with all things in common. This Platonic communism is another thing slid over by Penguin translation during the Cold War. It is utterly clear in the text and the logic of the argument that the communism is limited to those who are Philosopher kings but Aristotle for some reason sees it extending to the whole society, and rejecting it on that ground. An early neo-con? Or was Aristotle reacting to a lost Platonic text (an earlier version of the Republic), and did Plato change the argument because of Aristotle’s criticisms, but if so, then why did not Aristotle change his criticism? Well, maybe he did and that work, too, is lost.
The only part of the society pictured by Plato that needs the discipline of communism is the Philosophers. I have debated this point with Aristotle in Jackson, Michael, “Designed by Theorists: Aristotle on Utopia,” Utopian Studies, 12.2 (2001): 1-12. Perhaps Aristotle is arguing against an earlier version of the Republic where the purpose and extent of communism was less clear.
Who are the Philosopher Kings and Queens today? There are some possiblities like judges or national bankers (see my Philosopher-Kings and Bankers,’ Theoria 107 [August 2005], 19-35) who are both insulated from society and yet to some extent rule it. Then there are the clowns, well I mean musicians.
God knows why this group calls itself The Philosopher Kings, but it does. No indication is given on the band’s official web site www.philosopherkings.com/