Stoic Utopia reconsidered: pyrrhonism, thics, and politics

The purpose of this paper is precisely to bridge a gap by identifying a coherent Pyrrhonian position with regard to political life. From the very outset, it stresses the primary role assigned to life, βίος, by contrast to the kind of emphasis on sheer theoretical analysis we find among this or that dogmatist school in relation to issues of political management. In order to meet such a goal, the paper offers a clear-cut – yet not arbitrary – selection of texts, while at the same time it adopts an approach that identifies a key starting point for acquiring a broader perspective on Sextus Empiricus's attitude to political choices and actions. Since much of Sextus's work consists in a staunch and often well-documented pars destruens; and since this attack is most frequently directed against Stoic doctrines, particularly when it comes to the issue of action or, indeed, more or less malevolent charges of ἀπραξία; and, last but not least, since in some exemplary cases specific Stoic theses constitute the best counterpart through which to bring out and almost cast into relief Sextus's genuine positions, the task at hand may prove less difficult than it seems.